Sean and Ed discuss being an outsider in light of Holocaust Memorial Day. Enjoy the show!

It's the time of year when Sean gives his system a bit of a flush out! His '13 Day Detox' is a routine he's been doing for years and, with the caveat that you should always seek medical advice before making big changes to your diet. 

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It's a new year which always gives us that precious thing - a chance for a fresh start! Let's have a chat about goals and starting things afresh.

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What's Coming This Episode?
It's Chriiiiiistmaaaaaas! The time of year of giving and receiving. Of spending time with family and friends. Food! And more. It's also a time to reflect and to assess.

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Links

Giving and Receiving Is Not Just For Christmas
It’s Christmas time to see the light and the love

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Hygge is a Danish concept that is defined as a quality of cosiness and comfortable conviviality that engenders a feeling of contentment or well-being. This it would seem would be be the natural desire of all people. The perfect relationship between couple and in families embodies these very things. Yet, despite our best efforts, it is for many of us, so hard to attain. Divorce rates, of those that bother to marry, are high. You will have heard us going on about…

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Remembrance Day is a powerful time of year for me. It was on that day, a while ago now, when Mike, my father in law dew his last breath. I looked at my watch and it was 2.33 in the afternoon. So, now, every November 11th at 2.33 I raise a glass of and wish him well. He was, I assume still is, a lovely soul. I am not sure that we ever get over those feelings of loss. We may come to terms with them and perhaps with time the volume of the emotional disturbance is lessened.

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Our sense of smell is probably our most underrated and misunderstood of all of our senses. We have tended to lose the importance of our sense of smell because we have devalued it and hijacked it with chemical additives.

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Ed has been thinking about the importance of local action recently. Some fantastic volunteers have been hard at work in his area and he's been amazed by the reaction of people. How can we harness this effect more widely? What can our listeners do to get stuck in?

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Sean has some news - a grandchild has arrived for him and his family! Very exciting news... but it's an important job with important responsibilities. Let's have a chat about how to make the most of this potentially fantastic period of our lives.

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Today we're talking about getting out of your comfort zone and meeting people! We were inspired by a story on The Good News Network. Have a listen and let us know your thoughts.

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We have just seen the attempted assassination of Donald Trump followed by an appeal by President Biden for the population to come together and accept disagreement with out seeing it as a threat. It is okay to disagree with other people. It does not need to lead to violence, war and death. Now we see violence on the streets of the UK!

We often see anger as a negative force. Though it can be a very creative and useful force.

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George Orwell, author of Animal Farm, described a political landscape that I am starting to see developing all around me. I see laws and rules being created only then to see them not being followed or totally ignored by those people who created them in the first place. The obvious was the fiasco of Dominic Cummings and the Barnard Castle affair and the Party Gate nonsense.

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The election is here (in the UK)!!! Sean and Ed recorded a quick episode before the big day... but in the knowledge that it would likely be published after the results had been announced. Will it hold up? Will it be of any use??! Let's find out...

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How do we know what we are belong told is true?

How do we know if what we believe is real?

We are all told things from the day we are born about life, other people, history and events. Politicians, teachers, religious leaders, advertisers, propagandists, to the covid doom sayers and conspiracy theorists and even our loved ones all want us to share their point of view and to believe what they tell us.

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This week we are revisiting our relationship with nature and the effect that it has on our mental health and wellbeing. Finally the rain seems to have stopped and we are enjoying some sunshine. I was reminded of when I was looking out of the window of my apartment in Doha Qatar when I was working at Sidra Hospital. Below me the City was a busy place and I could see at least a thousand houses. Each house full of people, thousands of people. The roads full, sometimes gridlocked, as all these people rushed from somewhere to somewhere else. All in a frenzied dash that is, for many human beings throughout the world, normal everyday life. I was struck by the overwhelming concept of ‘just how many of us human beings are there living on this planet?’

Currently the world seems a not very safe place, the news is full of war reports and stabbings in schools. Alongside this are all the reports of violent shop lifting and assaults on care staff in the NHS. More and more counselling clients are sharing their anxious concerns for themselves and their families especially their children. There is an increase in trauma both direct and vicariously experienced.

This week Ed and I were talking about the effects of persuasion and how people can seem to gullibly just believe anything. I was explaining about the Barnum effect. Barnum was the great circus master who was into the concepts of illusion and fooling the audience into believing that what they were seeing was real.

An episode recorded near Easter which enabled us to chat about new beginnings.

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Social media is full of conspiracy theories. Currently those about Katherine Princess of Wales are rife. There is great interest, in certain groups, as to whether the stories about her abdominal surgery and public appearance and photograph are real or fake. The thing that interests Ed and I is why is it so important? What is it about gossip and rumour that we all get so hooked up in?

The idea of needing to get away would suggest that where we are is never really good enough. I get it that the act of taking a break, of doing something different, is stimulating and often relaxing but the question got me thinking about do we appreciate where we are and what we have? Are we able to enjoy the space that we live in.

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