The "Emotion colouring In exercise" is a deceptively simple 6-minute writing exercise where we practise identifying and describing our feelings.  For important additional information about this process, see the "Initial background for the colouring in exercise: assessment, maps, emotional intelligence & emotion differentiation" and the "Further background for the colouring in exercise: gratitude, expressive writing, emotion processing & taking it forward&q

I've already written a couple of posts about this trip to Sweden - "Achieving clinical excellence (ACE): the 'Becoming a more effective practitioner' conference in Sweden" and yesterday's Achieving clinical excellence: pre-conference workshop 'What is FIT?

I wrote yesterday about arriving in Sweden.  Howevery I'm primarily here for the ACE Conference, so how was yesterday's pre-conference workshop with Scott Miller & Bruce Wampold - "What is FIT, the research behind it and how to do it"?   Well, my initial response was one of some disappointment.  It felt to me that the combination of these two fine researchers/presenters was probably less than the sum of their parts ...

I read a lot of research.  When I find an article of particular interest I download it to my bibliographic database - Endnote - which currently contains well over 26,000 abstracts.  I also regularly tweet about emerging research, so following me on Twitter, Facebook or Google+ (click on the relevant icon at the top of this web page) will keep you up to speed with some of what I'm finding interesting. Additionally you can view this highlighted research by visiting Scoop.it (click on the "it!" icon at the top of the page).  At Scoop.it, I stream publications into five overlapping topic areas: Cognitive & General Psychotherapy, Depression, Compassion & Mindfulness, Healthy Living & Healthy Aging, and Positive Psychology.

I'm off to Sweden this weekend, seizing the chance for some 'touristing' in Stockholm before taking a train north to the 'Achieving clinical excellence (ACE)' conference in Ostersund.  If becoming a more effective practitioner interests you and you can't get to Sweden this May, then there is plenty of opportunity to participate in the conference online.

And now in Ostersund, on the morning of the pre-conference workshop day, I look back very fondly on my brief stay in Stockholm.  What a really lovely city it is ... and I felt surprisingly at home (maybe some Viking genes?).

I’ve just been to the Farmer’s Market here in Edinburgh and I set myself the challenge of being more chatty than usual to the stallholders I was buying food from.  I ‘pushed’ myself to be friendly & talk more than I’ve ever done before (and I’ve been going to the market intermittently for years) … and it was such fun.  Tender, bubbly, jokey, light.  And I had more of a spring in my step for hours afterwards.  And it didn’t mean that I took much longer doing the shopping than I usually do either.  And as one might have predicted, this ‘good mood’ and happy positivity then splashed over into my actions subsequently (see Barbara Fredrickson's 'Broaden-and-build theory' of the function of positive emotions and her comments about

At our eighth & last session of the Compassion, wisdom & wellbeing training, we reviewed the journey we've been on together over the last couple of months.  We looked at what each of us personally had found most interesting & valuable.  The weekly reflection sheets that we'd filled in could make it easier to remember the variety of areas we've explored.

These home practice suggestions link with the seventh session of the Compassion, wisdom & wellbeing training.  There are seven home practice requests for the fortnight until our 8th & last evening together.  

These home practice suggestions link with the sixth session of the Compassion, wisdom & wellbeing training.  There are five requests for this next week.  

I'm due to give a talk at the "Cosca Ethics Seminar" in a few hours.  The title is "Do therapists get wiser with experience - or just repeat the same old mistakes?".  The 52 slides make quite a large file to download.  I've put them on Dropbox, so here's the Dropbox link to them as a downloadable Powerpoint presentation and here they are as a PDF file.  There should also be three handouts provided at the seminar - the "Situated wise reasoning scale (SWIS) event", "SWIS questionnaire &am