March 12, 2025 • 39 mins
In this episode of the #TherapistsConnect podcast, Dr. Peter Blundell interviews Dr. Jay Beichman about his life, work, and his latest book on pluralism in counselling and psychotherapy. Dr. Beichman shares insights into his writing process and explores how pluralistic approaches are a broad church and that there are many different conceptualisations of what it means to be 'pluralistic'.
The conversation also delves into pressing issues within the profession, including the SCoPEd framework and its potential implications for therapists. Dr. Beichman and Dr. Blundell discuss the challenges and debates surrounding professional regulation, access to employment, and the evolving landscape of the field.
Additionally, the episode addresses the realities of work-life balance for therapists. Dr. Beichman provides personal reflections on navigating these challenges while staying true to his values as a practitioner.
This engaging and thought-provoking discussion offers valuable perspectives for therapists, trainees, and anyone interested in the complexities of modern counselling and psychotherapy. Tune in to gain fresh insights and join the ongoing conversation about the future of the profession.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Dr Peter Blundell (00:00):
Hello and welcome to another episode of
(00:02):
the Therapist Connect podcast.
My name is Dr Peter Blundell andI'm back interviewing therapists
about their life and work.
Now the next selection ofepisodes that are coming out
over the next few months areslightly delayed and they were
recorded back in 2024 so some ofthe references that are made in
in the recordings might betalked about in the past tense
(00:22):
or times that have gone by.
Um, and it's just been someissues in terms of editing and
making sure that these gotreleased.
So apologies to all my guestsfor that delay.
Um, but I hope you still enjoythese episodes as much as I did
recording them.
So, in this particular episode,I'm interviewing Dr.
Jay Beichman, who is a humanistintegrative pluralistic
therapist, and we talk abouteach of these aspects of his
(00:44):
practice in this episode.
Jay has over 25 years experienceas a therapist and has a private
practice in central Brighton.
He's also writing a book onpluralism and how this relates
to therapists and therapy, whichwe also talk about.
If you'd like to support thispodcast, please share with
colleagues and leave us a reviewon your favorite podcast
(01:04):
platform.
Hi, Jay.
How are you doing?
Jay Beichman (01:07):
Okay, thanks.
How are you?
Dr Peter Blundell (01:08):
Yeah, I'm not too bad.
Long time no see or speak.
I dont know this about you, butwhat made you train as a
therapist then in the firstplace?
Jay Beichman (01:16):
Yeah.
Um, uh, well, I mean I alongwith the model of, I'm not sure
that all therapists are woundedhealers, but I think certainly a
lot of them are, and I'm one ofthem.
Um, basically, so my wounds, ifyou like, um, the first thing I
(01:37):
was actually brought up inAmerica until I was about six or
seven.
Oh.
Um, and then.
And then because my parents gotdivorced and my mum came back to
England and my dad stayed inAmerica, um, I kind of lost my
home, uh, you know, which Ididn't actually think about
until I went into therapy.
(01:58):
But, you know, when I did gointo therapy in my late 20s, my
first therapist, you know, said,um, oh, that must have been, and
this is what's so great about,you know, like the way it
validates her and it's big ormakes you think about it.
You know, she said, oh, thatmust have been tough sort of.
leaving your home and countryand everything when you're six,
seven, um, nine.
(02:19):
Yes.
Yes.
Maybe it was.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Oh, I hadn't really thought, youknow, cause it's my normal, if
you like.
Um, um, but I do retrospectivelysee that as a kind of wounding
and then, and the divorce ofcourse.
Yeah.
Um, and then because of thedivorce, my parents wanted me to
be out of the way.
So I had a brief spell in aboarding school, which was
(02:42):
another kind of, um, pain losswound.
And, and then, uh, when I was13, my father killed himself and
that was huge.
I mean, that's my biggest wound.
I mean, you know, I thinkeverything in my life really
follows from that.
Um, and, uh, and then, you know,I thought, Oh, great, you know,
(03:05):
at least I still got my mom.
And then my mom died when I was,uh, 21 or 22, um, which was
another wound.
And, um, so, and then I had sortof alongside that.
adolescence, early adulthood, Ihad a sort of few, um, sort of
(03:25):
went off the rails, basically.
So I ended up on the wrong sideof the mental health, you know,
in hospitals.
And so So I became veryinterested in that.
And then, you know, I used toread RD Lang when I was in my
sort of late teens.
Um, and then, um, so eventuallyI ended up going to a therapist
(03:51):
and then because I was seeing atherapist, I sort of saw this
flyer for an introduction tocounseling course.
That was basically trying toflog a postgraduate diploma
course, not the one I ended upon.
Um, and then I thought, well,after I did that, um, uh, I
thought, Well, I did end upinterviewing for a postgraduate
(04:11):
diploma at University ofBrighton and, you know, the rest
is history, as they say.
Yeah.
Dr Peter Blundell (04:18):
There's a lot that happened before like the
age of 22 or something.
Yeah.
Jay Beichman (04:23):
Yeah.
Yeah.
So, and then also, I mean, Ialso think my mum was a nurse
and my dad was an academic and Ioften say like, you know, if you
cross an academic with a nurse,what do you get?
You get a therapist.
So maybe it was like inevitable.
Yeah.
Dr Peter Blundell (04:40):
And the therapist is writing a book now,
you know?
Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah, so that's what led youinto the profession.
And then, and then how did yourcareer develop then?
So how long have you been atherapist for now?
Jay Beichman (04:53):
Um, I got my qualification in 1990, well the
postgraduate diploma in 1998.
Um, turned that into a master'sin 2002, and then got the
doctorate in 2018.
Um,
Dr Peter Blundell (05:09):
Is it like a therapist, like 25 years or
something?
Jay Beichman (05:11):
Yeah, I think it is.
Yeah.
Yeah, it's quite a long time.
Yeah.
Where did the time go?
Yeah.
What have I done in my career?
Like, well, I mean, to beginwith, um, I, like most people,
couldn't get much work, um, as apaid therapist.
Um, you know, so I did mevoluntary work for a bit.
(05:34):
Um, and, but also I think got ajob in something that was, you
know, basically I was a mentalhealth project worker, which,
um, you know, working in aresidential homes, actually not
just one, but, you know, a fewof them.
Um, and.
(05:54):
And I was on the bank.
So that was really a great wayof doing it because the more
clients I got, the less hours Iwould do at the mental health
project until eventually I didbuild it up.
So that the guy sort of rang meup and said, do you still want
to be on this list, Jay?
And I said, cause I hadn't takenany shifts in so long.
(06:16):
And I, and I said, no, you know,and that was like quite a moment
actually.
No, I can let go of this.
Yeah.
Um, but you know, it very nearlydidn't work out.
I was that close to becoming amind mental health advocate,
which.
You know, I would have loveddoing, but you know, the reason
I was going for that was becauseI wasn't getting work as a
therapist.
(06:36):
But then I kind of hit gold.
Um, by, um, meeting someone fromthe East Sussex County Council,
and they had their own in housecounselling therapy service.
And she said to me, oh, wereally don't have enough male
therapists, you know, maybe youshould apply.
And I'd applied for so manythings by that point, I was kind
of completely lost heart.
(06:57):
But I thought, okay, Um, sentoff me application in the post
in those days and, um, less thana week later, I sort of sort of
seeing my first clients with thecounselor and that was great,
you know, cause we were in housetherapists, they treated us with
real respect.
(07:18):
We had.
quarterly meetings where we'dsit around a table and, you
know, sandwiches were providedand cups of tea and coffee.
And we'd go through all theissues and stuff, you know, I
mean, a golden era really.
Um, and then I kind of gotpicked up work with the APs and
insurance companies.
I did spend one year of workingfor the NHS in a surgery, of
(07:41):
course, not paid.
Dr Peter Blundell (07:42):
Um, really?
Jay Beichman (07:44):
Yeah.
As an honorary counsellor.
You know, I mean, it was only acouple of hours a week, you
know, and I did it because, um,I combined it with, um, I did a
specialist training in primarycare at the Tavistock.
That was great, you know, andthat was only a few hours a
week.
So, but to do make it worth it,you need to have some
(08:06):
experience.
So, um, so, you know, basicallyI was probably taking.
Almost a day out a week to sortof make myself NHS ready.
But, um, well I was never readyenough for them because they, as
you know, keep on moving thegoalposts, um, you know, and
there's always people moreexperience than you.
I think I wanted results quickerthan they were gonna arrive, and
(08:29):
I certainly wasn't gonna workfor more than a year for free at
that stage in my career.
So I gave that up.
And, um, yeah, and then sincethen, you know, clients, EAPs,
insurance companies, um, youknow, the Masters, um,
Doctorate, um, I, I, uh, gotinvolved.
(08:51):
I don't know how I've probably,um, crossed paths with you is
maybe through the sort of morepolitical side of things.
Yeah.
I ended up joining thepsychotherapy and counseling
union.
Um, and.
I don't know if that's how wemet, like, online, because we've
only met online, we haven't metin, in real life.
Um, basically, I became involvedwith the EAP campaign group,
(09:16):
because I work for EAP, so Ibecame involved with the EAP
campaign group in the PCU.
And then through that, I becamethe South East Regional
Representative.
Um, I've left now.
Um, But that, that's been a goodexperience.
I still help moderate the forumfor better or worse.
(09:36):
Um, and then, I mean, for ages,I was part of this group called
Sussex Counseling andPsychotherapy, and we put on
seminars and socials and thingslike that.
And I edited the, the newsletterthat we did for a bit.
Um,
Dr Peter Blundell (09:54):
I feel like political activism is kind of
like being part of like, that'show we met and kind of feel like
that's been part of your careerin some way, shape or form.
Jay Beichman (10:02):
Yeah, I try not to get involved, but can't help
myself.
You know, because as you know,it can get quite time consuming.
I mean, I've, I mean, I managedto give it all up for this year
to write the book.
Um, but yeah, being part of thePCU was great.
pretty time consuming while itlasted.
(10:23):
Um, but yeah, I mean, I, I dosort of miss that.
And I really like the therapistconnect idea because Um, that's
sort of something that seems tobe missing.
I mean, you know, when I firststarted, um, as a student
trainee and after Sussexcounselling and psychotherapy
(10:44):
was sort of the go to place forseminars and meeting other
therapists and, you know,socials, you know, at seminars
and, um, and all of that.
And that, that seems to havegone now.
Um, you know, there's a lot ofonline communities now, but
trying to get people to meet upin real life.
(11:06):
Yeah.
So it seems to be quitedifficult, certainly in a place
as small as Brighton, you know.
Dr Peter Blundell (11:11):
No, I, I, I agree with that.
And I think, I wonder whether, Idon't know if you've seen a
shift, like, you know, a lot ofpeople went out the pandemic,
but since the pandemic, I thinka lot of people went online and
then a lot of things haven'tactually been returned for being
in person.
Jay Beichman (11:27):
Yeah.
And I, you know, there's goodreasons for that.
Um, but there's also a loss ofthings.
I mean, that's what killedSussex Counseling and
Psychotherapy because we stillhad a market, if you like, for
people who wanted in personevents that weren't too
expensive because it was a nonprofit.
There are things that you can goto in person in Brighton, but
(11:49):
they're pretty expensive, youknow.
Whereas we could put on aseminar for, you know, you could
come and do it for 20 quid orwhatever, you know, not much,
you know, um, and then we'd havefree socials and things like
that.
Dr Peter Blundell (12:04):
And then that's the bit that's missing
with online, isn't it?
You don't necessarily get tochat to people like you would
doing it in person.
I mean, there is breakout roomsand stuff, but it's not quite
the same.
Jay Beichman (12:15):
And then you just sort of community and, and, and
like, um, helping each othermore indirectly.
I mean, say, say something like,um, there's a group which you
probably know called privatepractice online.
It's a Facebook page or it'scalled private practice.
And then all this informationyou get there now, like about,
um, different, uh, EAPs,insurance companies, how much
(12:38):
they pay, what they're like,whether they don't pay and all
that sort of stuff.
Um, but this was all, all thisinformation was gathered much
more informally when I.
Yeah.
And then like, you know, youkind of keep who you're working
for to yourself.
You know, it's like, Oh God,everyone's telling everybody
here who they work for.
You know, and I suppose that'ssort of fine now, but you know,
(13:02):
in a local, you know, it's like,if you told everyone who you
work for, I mean, they'd takeall your work, wouldn't they?
I mean, in the local.
area, or maybe that's scarcityconsciousness.
I don't know.
But anyway, we, me and me and mycolleague, you know, we would,
um, give each other all theinformation, but it's all hush
hush.
Dr Peter Blundell (13:21):
But it's interesting that thinking about
that change of how informationis shared between people now and
how much is publicly available.
I mean, it's unbelievable,really, you know, it's pretty
much any topic.
You could have a good.
Yeah, there'd be a forumsomewhere with somebody talking
about it, you know, so yeah,yeah.
Jay Beichman (13:40):
And, and yeah, and then that information like that
sort of easier to get hold of,um, you know, which is great in
some way, you know, and, and.
Hopefully, in the end, from apolitical perspective, a union
perspective, could lead to,could lead to better outcomes
for private therapies,potentially, you know, if we
(14:02):
know, and who to, who to boycottand who to invest in.
Yeah.
Dr Peter Blundell (14:08):
I was just thinking that would make a
really interesting researchproject to see the actual impact
of some of those forums andwhere the information's held.
Um, what do you, um, think isthe biggest challenge that the
counselling and psychotherapyprofession faces at the moment?
Jay Beichman (14:24):
I mean, the most obvious thing is SCoPEd, isn't
it?
Um, you know, at the microlevel, um, you know, in terms of
just its content and the processit's sort of indicating.
Um, but also the hugeimplications of.
(14:45):
Um, the future of how counselingand psychotherapy, um, is
aligned, viewed, going forward.
Um, uh, because basically, Isuppose it's trying to form a
basic structure.
And If you have a good basicstructure to kind of house
(15:10):
everything in, then everythingelse works.
But if your foundations andstructures are kind of a bit of
a mess, then everything elseisn't, is going to be a mess
too.
Yeah.
Um, so it's not that I'm againstthe idea of some kind of
structure, not at all.
I think there should be astructure.
(15:30):
But, um, I think, um, we need a,a more coherent structure now.
So, okay.
The people that invented itwould say it's coherent, um, but
it's coherent in specific ways.
I mean, I go along withbasically the people who are
against the hierarchical natureof it, um, which I think could
(15:51):
so easily be changed.
There's a, there's a, um, when,well, I mean, I spoke about
scoped in some, when it cameout, like on some of the videos
and, uh, and, and one of thepeople on the panels was Dr.
Emma Radway Bright, I don't knowwhat's happened to her, but, um,
you know, she was talking abouthow you could even have
(16:13):
something like scoped, but justget rid of the columns, just get
rid of the columns, and thenpeople could, um, sort of earn
the badges, you know, fromwhatever column they wanted,
depending on their interest.
So, Um, so say for instance, I,I, I've got nothing to say, you
mean like working in apsychiatric or, you know,
establishment of some kind,whether it's a, um, you know, a
(16:36):
mental health project or ahospital or a sort of eating
disorder unit or whatever it is.
Um, yeah, okay.
You know, personally, I thinkpeople are just people, you
know, you don't necessarily and,you know, and this idea that all
they're so, so severe andenduring that, you know, unless
you've kind of got some sort ofspecialist training, you can't
(16:59):
possibly deal with their stuff.
It's in a way like it's likestigmatizing, you know, and
they're actually, you know, ifyou actually work in mental
health with these, you know, youstill have to, you know, the
best thing you can do is justbe.
uh, human, as human as youpossibly can.
And, and that's, that's, that'slike the beneficial, you know,
(17:19):
um, it's not like you have to bean expert in diagnosis to work
in a mental health project, farfrom it, you know.
Um, but in any case, you know,if you thought you did need a
badge, then you just kind of,okay, whether you're, um, you
know, like A, B or C, you know,but you'd get rid of those
things, you know, okay, you canget your mental health badge.
(17:40):
You know, there's no reason thatyou have to study for 10 years
so that you can work with peoplewho are diagnosed with
something.
So, yeah, and then the relatedpressure around statutory
regulation which I noticed iscoming up again and in the
mainstream media like theGuardian.
And.
(18:02):
I don't see the need or point ofstatutory regulation myself.
I understand there's goodarguments for it, but I think
some of the arguments for it aremisguided.
I mean, like the main one beingthat it's going to protect the
public.
I don't see that statutoryregulation is going to protect
the public.
You know,
Dr Peter Blundell (18:19):
I, I agree with that.
I think I see a lot ofdiscussions about that in
different social media groups.
And it seems to me that there'sa talk about protection of the
public.
And then when people raise theissue of, Oh, it's not likely to
do that because people can stillbe.
practicing unethically as theydo in all of the professions
that are regulated.
I see people quite quickly moveto the argument of, oh yes, but
(18:41):
it will increase the standing ofthe profession.
And I think one of thedifficulties that I have with
that is actually who you'regiving power to, to define what
the profession is and how itlooks.
And I think that's my issue withregulation in terms of, I think
we're kind of like opening thedoors to something there that
we're not going to have controlof very quickly.
Jay Beichman (19:03):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, absolutely.
Yeah.
I mean, like when you see what amess the state is made of
therapy in the NHS, really, thisis who you want to control all
the therapy, whether it's in theNHS or the state or the third or
privately or third sector.
And that's another thing.
Um, like.
(19:24):
Like it or not, most therapistsoperate in the private sector.
So, um, so you kind of got thisgreat big wieldy hammer of the
state that's, you know, um,wants to be in charge of people
who work as independentpractitioners.
Um, now maybe there's somejustification for statutory
(19:45):
regulation for people who workin the state.
And effectively that's whatthey're already doing with their
in house NHS trainings.
But leave us,
Dr Peter Blundell (19:54):
yeah.
But that's what happened tosocial work.
Yeah.
Social work became regulated andnow The social work roles are
statutory roles, most of thetime, and they are are
governments of agents of thegovernment and doing, you know,
legal stuff and statutory stuffand safeguarding stuff and which
(20:14):
okay is important work in somerespects.
But then actually misses thiswhole other wealth of work that
social workers used to be a partof, and that no longer are.
And instead of being calledsocial workers, they're called
support workers, and they getpaid a lot less money.
Jay Beichman (20:29):
Exactly.
Well, and that's what happens inthe NHS.
I kind of say as well.
It's like, okay, say you, um,the ideal is, is to regulate the
titles of counsellor andpsychotherapist, which is a
problematic in itself.
But say you do that, um, then.
And people, all they have to doto avoid that regulation is call
(20:52):
themselves something like, forinstance, a psychological
wellbeing practitioner.
Yeah.
Which, as far as I know, is nota regulated title even.
Dr Peter Blundell (21:00):
Or a therapist.
Or a therapist, yeah.
Jay Beichman (21:03):
Or a life coach, you know?
Yeah.
Or, or, or whatever, you know.
Uh, so you are always gonnahave, it's so easy to bypass.
Um, completely.
Yeah.
Therapist isn't, you know,regulated.
Yeah.
So, um, this kind of, um, youknow, uh, yeah.
And then also, I mean, I thinkpart of the problem is, uh, you
(21:25):
know, which is maybe morepolitical and philosophical and,
you know, that's sort of maybepart of my book is that, um, to
me, I don't recognize anydifference between counseling
and psychotherapy.
So, To me, SCOPE is all about,whether they say it or not,
trying to institutionalize thedifference between counselling
and psychotherapy.
So I don't agree with thepremise.
(21:46):
And I think, as far as thetherapy field goes, it might be
more useful if we agreed thatcounsellors and psychotherapists
are doing more or less the samething, and we're okay with maybe
a gradation within that.
You know, senior accredited orjunior or something possibly.
(22:08):
Um, or badges.
I think badges.
I like the idea of badges thatyou're basically qualified and
you can get extra badges if youwant.
Yeah.
And then that then I can see whypsychotherapists want that
because.
You know, they train for twicethe period and have twice as
many hours on the point ofgraduation, not obviously over a
(22:31):
career, but on the point ofgraduation.
So then I think there needs tobe an agreement.
Okay, let's meet each otherhalfway.
You're qualified, not after,say, two years or four years,
but maybe three.
Yeah.
Or that for people that haveonly done two years with the
accumulation of enough badges.
(22:53):
They are, you know, get the samestatus as everybody else.
Dr Peter Blundell (22:57):
What would be the point of that, just to make
people happy that their work wasrecognized in some way?
Jay Beichman (23:05):
Well, I mean, um, I think, I think there's I think
there is sort of misperceptionsof what's going on, you know,
um, you know, and a lot ofpeople sort of think of
counselling and counsellors as asort of lesser type of therapy,
and they don't even know what itis, yeah, um, you know, and
(23:28):
they'll, they'll like to findcounselling is just supportive
chat or something, yeah, whereasactually counsellors are just as
likely studied psychodynamic.
therapy, Gestalt therapy, personcentered therapy, CBT, even, you
know, um, you know, so this sortof myth that counseling is sort
of some sort of lesser, lesserform of therapy is just wrong.
(23:53):
Um, and.
So, I mean, I think the startingpoint needs to be that it's the
same thing, um, and then, thenthat would allow therapy to, I
mean, as a pluralist, I don'tnecessarily, if I really thought
that there was a huge differencebetween counselling and
psychotherapy, I think, fine,yeah, hold on to your
(24:15):
counselling identity, yeah, holdon to your psychotherapy
identity, but I don't thinkthere's any substantial
differences.
So pretending there are, um,it's just, it's just wrong.
you know, not all the evidence,like, sort of shows that there's
not much difference, yeah,anything substantial, and that
(24:35):
it would be better for everyoneif we kind of just got this, rid
of this hierarchicaldistinction.
You know, which came aboutbecause, um, actually because
the medical profession wanted toown psychotherapy.
So it goes back to people, otherpeople wanting to own
psychotherapy back in the day,
Dr Peter Blundell (24:53):
And that's where I think regulation might
lead to in terms of who ownscounselling and psychotherapy in
the long run, but.
Yes.
You know, that's a much biggerdiscussion.
Um, I was gonna skip thequestion about how you define
your therapeutic approach, butyou just said there as a, as a
pluralist, but I wanted to know,yeah, have you always been a
(25:13):
pluralist and, and has thatchanged over time or, or, yeah.
Jay Beichman (25:18):
I don't think, yeah, I mean, I don't, I don't
think I would have even knownthe word very well until 2011.
Um, I, I identified withhumanistic and still do.
I'm mostly a humanisticpractitioner.
Um, some people thought my.
postgraduate diploma at Brightonwas person centred, but I still
(25:38):
got a handbook.
It's very plainly stated thatit's a humanistic course,
because we also studied TA andGestalt and stuff.
Um, and, uh, so identify withthat, you know, and, and
definitely the values ofhumanistic therapy, you know,
I'm, I'm not.
medical model.
Um, you know, I've got problemswith the psychodynamic take on
(26:02):
things, not, not the theory, butthe practice.
Um, and I also, you know, don'tthink, you know, behavioral is
enough and it's not enough of anexplanation.
So I'm into the sort of morehuman potential orientated.
therapies, uh, that are informednot just by medicine or
(26:25):
psychology, but also literatureand art and everything.
Um, and then, you know,integrative isn't too much of a
jump from that.
So I suppose I was looselyintegrative as well as
humanistic, maybe humanistichyphen integrative.
And then now, I mean, my, on mycard, I basically put all three
(26:47):
words, I put humanistic,integrative, pluralistic, and
you know, and I, and one of thearguments in my book is that
integrative and pluralistic areactually quite, have quite
different values.
Dr Peter Blundell (26:58):
Even though you label yourself as an
integrative pluralistic.
Jay Beichman (27:01):
Yeah, yeah.
In some ways it doesn't makesense.
But you know, that's like aconversation that me and clients
can have, you know, if we needto go that far.
But, uh, yeah, I mean, I mean,to my mind, pluralistic.
Encapsulates everything sopluralistic if you like is the
word at the top of the tree andthen underneath that you would
(27:23):
have humanistic, integrative,psychodynamic, etc, etc.
Um, but whereas for some people,integrative is at the top of the
tree and pluralistic comesunderneath integrative.
Now I don't buy that myself.
That's not the way I look at it,but I might be in a minority of
one there I'm not sure.
Dr Peter Blundell (27:44):
Well, that's, and I think you're going to
unpack some of that in yourforthcoming book, aren't you?
But I also think that that'skind of what's needed first,
isn't it?
Is that first book to kind ofgo, look, this is all the
different types of pluralism,what we're actually talking
about.
Jay Beichman (27:57):
Writing that chapter at the moment.
I'm writing about a chaptercalled Common Factors and the
Integrative Movement, in which Itry and sort of say, look, it's
not this quite, it's, you know,we like common, as a pluralist,
I like common factors.
I like the integrative movement,but it, there are dangers in it.
Yeah.
For instance, um, a push for asort of unified.
(28:20):
type of generic therapy whereall your, your, it all has to be
evidence based, includinginterventions.
And some people suggest if it'snot, that you might actually be
unethical.
Whereas I can't go, I sort of,as a pluralist, support the
right of a therapeutic approachto be Irreducible, you know, and
(28:46):
just the whole thing, you know,without every single aspect of
it being evidence based, even ifyou could evidence base every
single aspect of it.
Dr Peter Blundell (28:55):
And for me, that's where, I mean, as a
person centred practitioner, Isuppose I struggle because I
don't always feel like we canfully evidence based what we're
doing.
Some of it is based on myexperience as a therapist with
my, with my clients and notnecessarily on the research
evidence that is out there.
Jay Beichman (29:14):
Absolutely.
I mean, I, I mean, one of my bigangles in the book and
everything is that I, I seetherapy is more of an art than a
science and that it's like thequality of it is through
practice.
It's a practice.
There's, there's a postmodernisttherapist or psychologist called
Polkinghorne who basicallytalked about the practice of
(29:37):
psychology as sort of being thesecond psychology, you know, and
that it should be looked at in acompletely different way to the
first psychology, which is sortof about theory and research,
you know, but, you know,practicing being a a, a person
whose in interaction withpeople.
Your learning is actually on thejob with people, but you know,
(30:01):
there's a lot of people investedin it being different to that,
um, you know, if you are aresearcher, you're probably
going to tell everybody thatresearch really matters.
You'd be out of a job if youdidn't keep on plugging that.
Dr Peter Blundell (30:21):
Well, absolutely.
And I suppose that's what Isuppose I find that interesting
because I feel like I am, I am aresearcher, but also person
centered practitioner and so I,I, I, I can understand how my
world view might change if Istopped the therapy and only
went down the research route andthat kind of just re informing
(30:42):
yourself.
Oh, this is, this is, you'refinding the solutions, you're
finding the answers and this isthe only path.
And quite often working as atherapist, that challenges my
own view as a researcher andwhat can actually be discovered
and researched and found out.
You know, um, it's interesting.
And I imagine the same for youas the therapist and writing
this book at the same time.
Jay Beichman (31:02):
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Um, yeah, I mean, yeah, yeah.
I mean, I'm actually, I mean, interms of common factors.
Um, I've sort of just plowedthrough yesterday, actually, um,
the great psychotherapy debateby Wampold and Immel, you know,
which just has so much researcharound why common factors might
(31:26):
be the answer, aren't theanswer.
You know, this researcher saysthis and, you know, and like
real kind of standarddeviations.
All that quantitative stuff aswell as quality.
Oh God.
But I don't think I don't thinkI'm going to put it in there.
I mean, it's too much for me.
I think it's almost too much formy reader.
(31:46):
I don't know.
Maybe.
Dr Peter Blundell (31:47):
Does it help us become better therapists?
I suppose that's my question.
That kind of stuff.
Like, does this help me to be inbetter relationship with my
client?
Jay Beichman (31:58):
Yeah.
Yes.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
I mean, it just, it just offers,I mean, I think, you know, he's
just, he's got an agenda.
Yeah.
He wants to prove that, um, youknow, these sort of common
factors around the relationshipof, or whatever, uh, what
matters and that, all this,which I, which is really
important because if, if you'vegot the medical model, which,
(32:20):
you know, the assumption is, isthat one treatment is better
than another.
So then you kind of, and thenone, one thing that I kind of
thought about putting in, whichis I found the most interesting
thing of my trudging throughthis yesterday was, um, there
was one report, one study, Ithink it cites in America, um,
basically comparing one therapywith another therapy, um,
(32:44):
randomized control trial tobasically come to the conclusion
that there's not muchdifference.
And then he kind of, thetangerine is, he says, and that
trial.
cost 11 million dollars and, um,and you, you know, the
randomized control trials arehugely expensive.
(33:06):
And if you think of all themoney that could be better spent
doing, not necessarily betterresearch even, but just Actually
giving people therapists.
Dr Peter Blundell (33:16):
Yeah.
Yeah.
Jay Beichman (33:18):
You know, 11 million.
That's a lot of therapy hours,isn't it?
It is.
Dr Peter Blundell (33:22):
Um, yeah.
Oh no, I think, I think it'sgonna be really interesting.
I'm looking forward to readingit, so, yeah.
Jay Beichman (33:26):
Yeah.
Great.
Great.
Yeah.
I'm looking forward to finishingit.
Dr Peter Blundell (33:29):
Is there anything surprised you right in
the book when you kind of wereexploring some of this stuff?
Is anything come as a surprise?
Jay Beichman (33:36):
Yeah, how much I don't know.
Because once you get into it,it's like just vast literatures,
because the problem you see,because I'm trying to like, um,
explain how the philosophy ofpluralism can be applied to
therapies and therapists.
Yeah.
Um, from a philosophical pointof view, but you know,
(33:57):
immediately you then got a splitbecause there's the pluralistic
philosophy.
And then there's also thepluralistic political
philosophy, which also has a fewdifferent meanings.
Yeah.
Um, depending on whether you'retalking about Isaiah Berlin's
value pluralism, which basicallymeans that sometimes you have
(34:19):
values, which are almostirreconcilable.
You can't.
have both.
So, for instance, you mighthave, um, a value of freedom,
which seems like a good value,uh, a reasonable value, but you
also then might have a value of,um, the right to peace and
(34:40):
quiet.
Yeah.
Yeah.
So then, if you've got a noisyneighbor, Yeah, whose whose
value is more important.
Yeah.
Uh, so that that applies to lotsof things and that sort of
political philosophy.
But then when Americans talkabout it, they kind of quite
often the meaning that you'vegot different centers of power,
(35:03):
you know, like the judiciary,the Congress, etc.
And when the, UK people talkabout it.
They're kind of going back to,um, uh, sort of unions, you
know, being a sort of center ofpower as well as You know, so
there's all these different,that's just the political
philosophy and then when youkind of get to the philosophy
(35:24):
philosophy, you've got lots ofpeople who either call
themselves pluralists, or havebeen called pluralists, and they
can differ quite a lot.
So then you've got, say, WilliamJames, who's, um, pluralism
really covers.
Ontology, which is, um, youknow, like, um, what you think
(35:46):
the nature of being is.
Epistemology, what you thinkactually can be known.
Um, and ethics, um, and otherthings, but, um, methodology
too.
Uh, so you got James, like, youknow, it's quite a broad vision
of pluralism.
And then you've got Levinas,who's also, um, a pluralist, but
(36:10):
he's talking about, um, ethicsover ontology, which is part of
what the debate has beenbetween, um, pluralistic people
and person centered people.
You know, whether ethics is moreimportant than ontology and the
person centered, people knowthat the ontology is actually
really important about the, um,uh, I always forget the name.
(36:33):
It's not organismic valuingtendency.
It's the growth valuing processor organismic valuing process or
the something tendency, um,actualizing, actualizing
tendency.
I don't know.
I've got a real block on that.
Dr Peter Blundell (36:47):
It's not the easiest of language.
Actually.
Jay Beichman (36:48):
Yeah.
Yeah.
Um, so.
You know, so then again, like,you've got a plurality of
pluralisms, and in fact, I mean,one, one book which has really
informed my thinking about thisbook, um, kind of godsend that
it came out when it did, is abook by, called, um, uh, Ever
(37:09):
Not Quite.
Pluralisms in William James, um,in which he basically says, you
know, that you're never everquite there and sort of knowing
everything you need to know.
And that's partly because oftime.
So say like we worked outeverything we needed to know
about therapy today.
So what, because tomorrowsomething new would come along.
Dr Peter Blundell (37:31):
So.
You guys are therapists, you'reconstantly, you're just
constantly in the learningprocess.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Aren't you?
Yeah, yeah.
Jay Beichman (37:38):
And that, and that, that is like, um, a
dimension of pluralism, if youlike, is the time dimension.
It's not just talking about whatwe know already.
It's talking about, well, whatelse is coming up, you know?
Dr Peter Blundell (37:52):
Yeah, I'm, I'm really looking forward to
reading it.
It's gonna be very interesting.
Jay Beichman (37:55):
Mm-hmm.
I hope so.
Yeah.
Dr Peter Blundell (37:58):
It will be.
I think we're coming to the endnow, but I suppose I just want
to check in with you.
What are your future plans?
I know you've got, you'reworking on your book at the
moment, so that's kind of themain thing, isn't it?
Jay Beichman (38:09):
Yeah, I mean, um, yeah, finish that off and then I
suppose like promote that asmuch as I can.
So hopefully sells more than 15copies or whatever.
Um, I want to get more and moreinto writing.
I mean, I kind of see that somuch.
I want to do more writing, morethinking, more reading.
(38:31):
still have a client caseload,but less so that I've got more
time for writing, thinking, andreading.
And maybe not as big a projectas this one.
Like I say, sort of things I caneasily handle, like 500 word
blogs, thousand word blogs, andmaybe looking towards, um, doing
some kind of self help book nextfor people.
(38:54):
Yeah.
For people generally from, youknow, what I sort of reckon has
helped people over the years inmy practice.
Dr Peter Blundell (39:05):
Fantastic.
Well, you're a busy man.
Yeah.
Well, when you, when your book'sready, Jay, you've got to come
back on and we'll, we'll, we'lldo a little interview about the
book and promo and we can putthe link.
podcast.
Jay Beichman (39:17):
I'd love to do that.
Yeah.
And it probably, probably willbe at least a year from now.
Dr Peter Blundell (39:21):
Brilliant.
Thanks.
Jay Beichman (39:22):
Thanks a lot.
I really enjoyed doing theinterview.
Thanks a lot.
Thanks for asking me and uh,hopefully see you soon and maybe
one day in the real world.
Dr Peter Blundell (39:30):
Maybe you never know.
Stranger things have happened.
It's good to see you, Jay.
Stay safe.
Take care.
Jay Beichman (39:37):
Cheers.
Bye now.
Hello and welcome to another episode of
(00:02):
the Therapist Connect podcast.
My name is Dr Peter Blundell andI'm back interviewing therapists
about their life and work.
Now the next selection ofepisodes that are coming out
over the next few months areslightly delayed and they were
recorded back in 2024 so some ofthe references that are made in
in the recordings might betalked about in the past tense
(00:22):
or times that have gone by.
Um, and it's just been someissues in terms of editing and
making sure that these gotreleased.
So apologies to all my guestsfor that delay.
Um, but I hope you still enjoythese episodes as much as I did
recording them.
So, in this particular episode,I'm interviewing Dr.
Jay Beichman, who is a humanistintegrative pluralistic
therapist, and we talk abouteach of these aspects of his
(00:44):
practice in this episode.
Jay has over 25 years experienceas a therapist and has a private
practice in central Brighton.
He's also writing a book onpluralism and how this relates
to therapists and therapy, whichwe also talk about.
If you'd like to support thispodcast, please share with
colleagues and leave us a reviewon your favorite podcast
(01:04):
platform.
Hi, Jay.
How are you doing?
Jay Beichman (01:07):
Okay, thanks.
How are you?
Dr Peter Blundell (01:08):
Yeah, I'm not too bad.
Long time no see or speak.
I dont know this about you, butwhat made you train as a
therapist then in the firstplace?
Jay Beichman (01:16):
Yeah.
Um, uh, well, I mean I alongwith the model of, I'm not sure
that all therapists are woundedhealers, but I think certainly a
lot of them are, and I'm one ofthem.
Um, basically, so my wounds, ifyou like, um, the first thing I
(01:37):
was actually brought up inAmerica until I was about six or
seven.
Oh.
Um, and then.
And then because my parents gotdivorced and my mum came back to
England and my dad stayed inAmerica, um, I kind of lost my
home, uh, you know, which Ididn't actually think about
until I went into therapy.
(01:58):
But, you know, when I did gointo therapy in my late 20s, my
first therapist, you know, said,um, oh, that must have been, and
this is what's so great about,you know, like the way it
validates her and it's big ormakes you think about it.
You know, she said, oh, thatmust have been tough sort of.
leaving your home and countryand everything when you're six,
seven, um, nine.
(02:19):
Yes.
Yes.
Maybe it was.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Oh, I hadn't really thought, youknow, cause it's my normal, if
you like.
Um, um, but I do retrospectivelysee that as a kind of wounding
and then, and the divorce ofcourse.
Yeah.
Um, and then because of thedivorce, my parents wanted me to
be out of the way.
So I had a brief spell in aboarding school, which was
(02:42):
another kind of, um, pain losswound.
And, and then, uh, when I was13, my father killed himself and
that was huge.
I mean, that's my biggest wound.
I mean, you know, I thinkeverything in my life really
follows from that.
Um, and, uh, and then, you know,I thought, Oh, great, you know,
(03:05):
at least I still got my mom.
And then my mom died when I was,uh, 21 or 22, um, which was
another wound.
And, um, so, and then I had sortof alongside that.
adolescence, early adulthood, Ihad a sort of few, um, sort of
(03:25):
went off the rails, basically.
So I ended up on the wrong sideof the mental health, you know,
in hospitals.
And so So I became veryinterested in that.
And then, you know, I used toread RD Lang when I was in my
sort of late teens.
Um, and then, um, so eventuallyI ended up going to a therapist
(03:51):
and then because I was seeing atherapist, I sort of saw this
flyer for an introduction tocounseling course.
That was basically trying toflog a postgraduate diploma
course, not the one I ended upon.
Um, and then I thought, well,after I did that, um, uh, I
thought, Well, I did end upinterviewing for a postgraduate
(04:11):
diploma at University ofBrighton and, you know, the rest
is history, as they say.
Yeah.
Dr Peter Blundell (04:18):
There's a lot that happened before like the
age of 22 or something.
Yeah.
Jay Beichman (04:23):
Yeah.
Yeah.
So, and then also, I mean, Ialso think my mum was a nurse
and my dad was an academic and Ioften say like, you know, if you
cross an academic with a nurse,what do you get?
You get a therapist.
So maybe it was like inevitable.
Yeah.
Dr Peter Blundell (04:40):
And the therapist is writing a book now,
you know?
Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah, so that's what led youinto the profession.
And then, and then how did yourcareer develop then?
So how long have you been atherapist for now?
Jay Beichman (04:53):
Um, I got my qualification in 1990, well the
postgraduate diploma in 1998.
Um, turned that into a master'sin 2002, and then got the
doctorate in 2018.
Um,
Dr Peter Blundell (05:09):
Is it like a therapist, like 25 years or
something?
Jay Beichman (05:11):
Yeah, I think it is.
Yeah.
Yeah, it's quite a long time.
Yeah.
Where did the time go?
Yeah.
What have I done in my career?
Like, well, I mean, to beginwith, um, I, like most people,
couldn't get much work, um, as apaid therapist.
Um, you know, so I did mevoluntary work for a bit.
(05:34):
Um, and, but also I think got ajob in something that was, you
know, basically I was a mentalhealth project worker, which,
um, you know, working in aresidential homes, actually not
just one, but, you know, a fewof them.
Um, and.
(05:54):
And I was on the bank.
So that was really a great wayof doing it because the more
clients I got, the less hours Iwould do at the mental health
project until eventually I didbuild it up.
So that the guy sort of rang meup and said, do you still want
to be on this list, Jay?
And I said, cause I hadn't takenany shifts in so long.
(06:16):
And I, and I said, no, you know,and that was like quite a moment
actually.
No, I can let go of this.
Yeah.
Um, but you know, it very nearlydidn't work out.
I was that close to becoming amind mental health advocate,
which.
You know, I would have loveddoing, but you know, the reason
I was going for that was becauseI wasn't getting work as a
therapist.
(06:36):
But then I kind of hit gold.
Um, by, um, meeting someone fromthe East Sussex County Council,
and they had their own in housecounselling therapy service.
And she said to me, oh, wereally don't have enough male
therapists, you know, maybe youshould apply.
And I'd applied for so manythings by that point, I was kind
of completely lost heart.
(06:57):
But I thought, okay, Um, sentoff me application in the post
in those days and, um, less thana week later, I sort of sort of
seeing my first clients with thecounselor and that was great,
you know, cause we were in housetherapists, they treated us with
real respect.
(07:18):
We had.
quarterly meetings where we'dsit around a table and, you
know, sandwiches were providedand cups of tea and coffee.
And we'd go through all theissues and stuff, you know, I
mean, a golden era really.
Um, and then I kind of gotpicked up work with the APs and
insurance companies.
I did spend one year of workingfor the NHS in a surgery, of
(07:41):
course, not paid.
Dr Peter Blundell (07:42):
Um, really?
Jay Beichman (07:44):
Yeah.
As an honorary counsellor.
You know, I mean, it was only acouple of hours a week, you
know, and I did it because, um,I combined it with, um, I did a
specialist training in primarycare at the Tavistock.
That was great, you know, andthat was only a few hours a
week.
So, but to do make it worth it,you need to have some
(08:06):
experience.
So, um, so, you know, basicallyI was probably taking.
Almost a day out a week to sortof make myself NHS ready.
But, um, well I was never readyenough for them because they, as
you know, keep on moving thegoalposts, um, you know, and
there's always people moreexperience than you.
I think I wanted results quickerthan they were gonna arrive, and
(08:29):
I certainly wasn't gonna workfor more than a year for free at
that stage in my career.
So I gave that up.
And, um, yeah, and then sincethen, you know, clients, EAPs,
insurance companies, um, youknow, the Masters, um,
Doctorate, um, I, I, uh, gotinvolved.
(08:51):
I don't know how I've probably,um, crossed paths with you is
maybe through the sort of morepolitical side of things.
Yeah.
I ended up joining thepsychotherapy and counseling
union.
Um, and.
I don't know if that's how wemet, like, online, because we've
only met online, we haven't metin, in real life.
Um, basically, I became involvedwith the EAP campaign group,
(09:16):
because I work for EAP, so Ibecame involved with the EAP
campaign group in the PCU.
And then through that, I becamethe South East Regional
Representative.
Um, I've left now.
Um, But that, that's been a goodexperience.
I still help moderate the forumfor better or worse.
(09:36):
Um, and then, I mean, for ages,I was part of this group called
Sussex Counseling andPsychotherapy, and we put on
seminars and socials and thingslike that.
And I edited the, the newsletterthat we did for a bit.
Um,
Dr Peter Blundell (09:54):
I feel like political activism is kind of
like being part of like, that'show we met and kind of feel like
that's been part of your careerin some way, shape or form.
Jay Beichman (10:02):
Yeah, I try not to get involved, but can't help
myself.
You know, because as you know,it can get quite time consuming.
I mean, I've, I mean, I managedto give it all up for this year
to write the book.
Um, but yeah, being part of thePCU was great.
pretty time consuming while itlasted.
(10:23):
Um, but yeah, I mean, I, I dosort of miss that.
And I really like the therapistconnect idea because Um, that's
sort of something that seems tobe missing.
I mean, you know, when I firststarted, um, as a student
trainee and after Sussexcounselling and psychotherapy
(10:44):
was sort of the go to place forseminars and meeting other
therapists and, you know,socials, you know, at seminars
and, um, and all of that.
And that, that seems to havegone now.
Um, you know, there's a lot ofonline communities now, but
trying to get people to meet upin real life.
(11:06):
Yeah.
So it seems to be quitedifficult, certainly in a place
as small as Brighton, you know.
Dr Peter Blundell (11:11):
No, I, I, I agree with that.
And I think, I wonder whether, Idon't know if you've seen a
shift, like, you know, a lot ofpeople went out the pandemic,
but since the pandemic, I thinka lot of people went online and
then a lot of things haven'tactually been returned for being
in person.
Jay Beichman (11:27):
Yeah.
And I, you know, there's goodreasons for that.
Um, but there's also a loss ofthings.
I mean, that's what killedSussex Counseling and
Psychotherapy because we stillhad a market, if you like, for
people who wanted in personevents that weren't too
expensive because it was a nonprofit.
There are things that you can goto in person in Brighton, but
(11:49):
they're pretty expensive, youknow.
Whereas we could put on aseminar for, you know, you could
come and do it for 20 quid orwhatever, you know, not much,
you know, um, and then we'd havefree socials and things like
that.
Dr Peter Blundell (12:04):
And then that's the bit that's missing
with online, isn't it?
You don't necessarily get tochat to people like you would
doing it in person.
I mean, there is breakout roomsand stuff, but it's not quite
the same.
Jay Beichman (12:15):
And then you just sort of community and, and, and
like, um, helping each othermore indirectly.
I mean, say, say something like,um, there's a group which you
probably know called privatepractice online.
It's a Facebook page or it'scalled private practice.
And then all this informationyou get there now, like about,
um, different, uh, EAPs,insurance companies, how much
(12:38):
they pay, what they're like,whether they don't pay and all
that sort of stuff.
Um, but this was all, all thisinformation was gathered much
more informally when I.
Yeah.
And then like, you know, youkind of keep who you're working
for to yourself.
You know, it's like, Oh God,everyone's telling everybody
here who they work for.
You know, and I suppose that'ssort of fine now, but you know,
(13:02):
in a local, you know, it's like,if you told everyone who you
work for, I mean, they'd takeall your work, wouldn't they?
I mean, in the local.
area, or maybe that's scarcityconsciousness.
I don't know.
But anyway, we, me and me and mycolleague, you know, we would,
um, give each other all theinformation, but it's all hush
hush.
Dr Peter Blundell (13:21):
But it's interesting that thinking about
that change of how informationis shared between people now and
how much is publicly available.
I mean, it's unbelievable,really, you know, it's pretty
much any topic.
You could have a good.
Yeah, there'd be a forumsomewhere with somebody talking
about it, you know, so yeah,yeah.
Jay Beichman (13:40):
And, and yeah, and then that information like that
sort of easier to get hold of,um, you know, which is great in
some way, you know, and, and.
Hopefully, in the end, from apolitical perspective, a union
perspective, could lead to,could lead to better outcomes
for private therapies,potentially, you know, if we
(14:02):
know, and who to, who to boycottand who to invest in.
Yeah.
Dr Peter Blundell (14:08):
I was just thinking that would make a
really interesting researchproject to see the actual impact
of some of those forums andwhere the information's held.
Um, what do you, um, think isthe biggest challenge that the
counselling and psychotherapyprofession faces at the moment?
Jay Beichman (14:24):
I mean, the most obvious thing is SCoPEd, isn't
it?
Um, you know, at the microlevel, um, you know, in terms of
just its content and the processit's sort of indicating.
Um, but also the hugeimplications of.
(14:45):
Um, the future of how counselingand psychotherapy, um, is
aligned, viewed, going forward.
Um, uh, because basically, Isuppose it's trying to form a
basic structure.
And If you have a good basicstructure to kind of house
(15:10):
everything in, then everythingelse works.
But if your foundations andstructures are kind of a bit of
a mess, then everything elseisn't, is going to be a mess
too.
Yeah.
Um, so it's not that I'm againstthe idea of some kind of
structure, not at all.
I think there should be astructure.
(15:30):
But, um, I think, um, we need a,a more coherent structure now.
So, okay.
The people that invented itwould say it's coherent, um, but
it's coherent in specific ways.
I mean, I go along withbasically the people who are
against the hierarchical natureof it, um, which I think could
(15:51):
so easily be changed.
There's a, there's a, um, when,well, I mean, I spoke about
scoped in some, when it cameout, like on some of the videos
and, uh, and, and one of thepeople on the panels was Dr.
Emma Radway Bright, I don't knowwhat's happened to her, but, um,
you know, she was talking abouthow you could even have
(16:13):
something like scoped, but justget rid of the columns, just get
rid of the columns, and thenpeople could, um, sort of earn
the badges, you know, fromwhatever column they wanted,
depending on their interest.
So, Um, so say for instance, I,I, I've got nothing to say, you
mean like working in apsychiatric or, you know,
establishment of some kind,whether it's a, um, you know, a
(16:36):
mental health project or ahospital or a sort of eating
disorder unit or whatever it is.
Um, yeah, okay.
You know, personally, I thinkpeople are just people, you
know, you don't necessarily and,you know, and this idea that all
they're so, so severe andenduring that, you know, unless
you've kind of got some sort ofspecialist training, you can't
(16:59):
possibly deal with their stuff.
It's in a way like it's likestigmatizing, you know, and
they're actually, you know, ifyou actually work in mental
health with these, you know, youstill have to, you know, the
best thing you can do is justbe.
uh, human, as human as youpossibly can.
And, and that's, that's, that'slike the beneficial, you know,
(17:19):
um, it's not like you have to bean expert in diagnosis to work
in a mental health project, farfrom it, you know.
Um, but in any case, you know,if you thought you did need a
badge, then you just kind of,okay, whether you're, um, you
know, like A, B or C, you know,but you'd get rid of those
things, you know, okay, you canget your mental health badge.
(17:40):
You know, there's no reason thatyou have to study for 10 years
so that you can work with peoplewho are diagnosed with
something.
So, yeah, and then the relatedpressure around statutory
regulation which I noticed iscoming up again and in the
mainstream media like theGuardian.
And.
(18:02):
I don't see the need or point ofstatutory regulation myself.
I understand there's goodarguments for it, but I think
some of the arguments for it aremisguided.
I mean, like the main one beingthat it's going to protect the
public.
I don't see that statutoryregulation is going to protect
the public.
You know,
Dr Peter Blundell (18:19):
I, I agree with that.
I think I see a lot ofdiscussions about that in
different social media groups.
And it seems to me that there'sa talk about protection of the
public.
And then when people raise theissue of, Oh, it's not likely to
do that because people can stillbe.
practicing unethically as theydo in all of the professions
that are regulated.
I see people quite quickly moveto the argument of, oh yes, but
(18:41):
it will increase the standing ofthe profession.
And I think one of thedifficulties that I have with
that is actually who you'regiving power to, to define what
the profession is and how itlooks.
And I think that's my issue withregulation in terms of, I think
we're kind of like opening thedoors to something there that
we're not going to have controlof very quickly.
Jay Beichman (19:03):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, absolutely.
Yeah.
I mean, like when you see what amess the state is made of
therapy in the NHS, really, thisis who you want to control all
the therapy, whether it's in theNHS or the state or the third or
privately or third sector.
And that's another thing.
Um, like.
(19:24):
Like it or not, most therapistsoperate in the private sector.
So, um, so you kind of got thisgreat big wieldy hammer of the
state that's, you know, um,wants to be in charge of people
who work as independentpractitioners.
Um, now maybe there's somejustification for statutory
(19:45):
regulation for people who workin the state.
And effectively that's whatthey're already doing with their
in house NHS trainings.
But leave us,
Dr Peter Blundell (19:54):
yeah.
But that's what happened tosocial work.
Yeah.
Social work became regulated andnow The social work roles are
statutory roles, most of thetime, and they are are
governments of agents of thegovernment and doing, you know,
legal stuff and statutory stuffand safeguarding stuff and which
(20:14):
okay is important work in somerespects.
But then actually misses thiswhole other wealth of work that
social workers used to be a partof, and that no longer are.
And instead of being calledsocial workers, they're called
support workers, and they getpaid a lot less money.
Jay Beichman (20:29):
Exactly.
Well, and that's what happens inthe NHS.
I kind of say as well.
It's like, okay, say you, um,the ideal is, is to regulate the
titles of counsellor andpsychotherapist, which is a
problematic in itself.
But say you do that, um, then.
And people, all they have to doto avoid that regulation is call
(20:52):
themselves something like, forinstance, a psychological
wellbeing practitioner.
Yeah.
Which, as far as I know, is nota regulated title even.
Dr Peter Blundell (21:00):
Or a therapist.
Or a therapist, yeah.
Jay Beichman (21:03):
Or a life coach, you know?
Yeah.
Or, or, or whatever, you know.
Uh, so you are always gonnahave, it's so easy to bypass.
Um, completely.
Yeah.
Therapist isn't, you know,regulated.
Yeah.
So, um, this kind of, um, youknow, uh, yeah.
And then also, I mean, I thinkpart of the problem is, uh, you
(21:25):
know, which is maybe morepolitical and philosophical and,
you know, that's sort of maybepart of my book is that, um, to
me, I don't recognize anydifference between counseling
and psychotherapy.
So, To me, SCOPE is all about,whether they say it or not,
trying to institutionalize thedifference between counselling
and psychotherapy.
So I don't agree with thepremise.
(21:46):
And I think, as far as thetherapy field goes, it might be
more useful if we agreed thatcounsellors and psychotherapists
are doing more or less the samething, and we're okay with maybe
a gradation within that.
You know, senior accredited orjunior or something possibly.
(22:08):
Um, or badges.
I think badges.
I like the idea of badges thatyou're basically qualified and
you can get extra badges if youwant.
Yeah.
And then that then I can see whypsychotherapists want that
because.
You know, they train for twicethe period and have twice as
many hours on the point ofgraduation, not obviously over a
(22:31):
career, but on the point ofgraduation.
So then I think there needs tobe an agreement.
Okay, let's meet each otherhalfway.
You're qualified, not after,say, two years or four years,
but maybe three.
Yeah.
Or that for people that haveonly done two years with the
accumulation of enough badges.
(22:53):
They are, you know, get the samestatus as everybody else.
Dr Peter Blundell (22:57):
What would be the point of that, just to make
people happy that their work wasrecognized in some way?
Jay Beichman (23:05):
Well, I mean, um, I think, I think there's I think
there is sort of misperceptionsof what's going on, you know,
um, you know, and a lot ofpeople sort of think of
counselling and counsellors as asort of lesser type of therapy,
and they don't even know what itis, yeah, um, you know, and
(23:28):
they'll, they'll like to findcounselling is just supportive
chat or something, yeah, whereasactually counsellors are just as
likely studied psychodynamic.
therapy, Gestalt therapy, personcentered therapy, CBT, even, you
know, um, you know, so this sortof myth that counseling is sort
of some sort of lesser, lesserform of therapy is just wrong.
(23:53):
Um, and.
So, I mean, I think the startingpoint needs to be that it's the
same thing, um, and then, thenthat would allow therapy to, I
mean, as a pluralist, I don'tnecessarily, if I really thought
that there was a huge differencebetween counselling and
psychotherapy, I think, fine,yeah, hold on to your
(24:15):
counselling identity, yeah, holdon to your psychotherapy
identity, but I don't thinkthere's any substantial
differences.
So pretending there are, um,it's just, it's just wrong.
you know, not all the evidence,like, sort of shows that there's
not much difference, yeah,anything substantial, and that
(24:35):
it would be better for everyoneif we kind of just got this, rid
of this hierarchicaldistinction.
You know, which came aboutbecause, um, actually because
the medical profession wanted toown psychotherapy.
So it goes back to people, otherpeople wanting to own
psychotherapy back in the day,
Dr Peter Blundell (24:53):
And that's where I think regulation might
lead to in terms of who ownscounselling and psychotherapy in
the long run, but.
Yes.
You know, that's a much biggerdiscussion.
Um, I was gonna skip thequestion about how you define
your therapeutic approach, butyou just said there as a, as a
pluralist, but I wanted to know,yeah, have you always been a
(25:13):
pluralist and, and has thatchanged over time or, or, yeah.
Jay Beichman (25:18):
I don't think, yeah, I mean, I don't, I don't
think I would have even knownthe word very well until 2011.
Um, I, I identified withhumanistic and still do.
I'm mostly a humanisticpractitioner.
Um, some people thought my.
postgraduate diploma at Brightonwas person centred, but I still
(25:38):
got a handbook.
It's very plainly stated thatit's a humanistic course,
because we also studied TA andGestalt and stuff.
Um, and, uh, so identify withthat, you know, and, and
definitely the values ofhumanistic therapy, you know,
I'm, I'm not.
medical model.
Um, you know, I've got problemswith the psychodynamic take on
(26:02):
things, not, not the theory, butthe practice.
Um, and I also, you know, don'tthink, you know, behavioral is
enough and it's not enough of anexplanation.
So I'm into the sort of morehuman potential orientated.
therapies, uh, that are informednot just by medicine or
(26:25):
psychology, but also literatureand art and everything.
Um, and then, you know,integrative isn't too much of a
jump from that.
So I suppose I was looselyintegrative as well as
humanistic, maybe humanistichyphen integrative.
And then now, I mean, my, on mycard, I basically put all three
(26:47):
words, I put humanistic,integrative, pluralistic, and
you know, and I, and one of thearguments in my book is that
integrative and pluralistic areactually quite, have quite
different values.
Dr Peter Blundell (26:58):
Even though you label yourself as an
integrative pluralistic.
Jay Beichman (27:01):
Yeah, yeah.
In some ways it doesn't makesense.
But you know, that's like aconversation that me and clients
can have, you know, if we needto go that far.
But, uh, yeah, I mean, I mean,to my mind, pluralistic.
Encapsulates everything sopluralistic if you like is the
word at the top of the tree andthen underneath that you would
(27:23):
have humanistic, integrative,psychodynamic, etc, etc.
Um, but whereas for some people,integrative is at the top of the
tree and pluralistic comesunderneath integrative.
Now I don't buy that myself.
That's not the way I look at it,but I might be in a minority of
one there I'm not sure.
Dr Peter Blundell (27:44):
Well, that's, and I think you're going to
unpack some of that in yourforthcoming book, aren't you?
But I also think that that'skind of what's needed first,
isn't it?
Is that first book to kind ofgo, look, this is all the
different types of pluralism,what we're actually talking
about.
Jay Beichman (27:57):
Writing that chapter at the moment.
I'm writing about a chaptercalled Common Factors and the
Integrative Movement, in which Itry and sort of say, look, it's
not this quite, it's, you know,we like common, as a pluralist,
I like common factors.
I like the integrative movement,but it, there are dangers in it.
Yeah.
For instance, um, a push for asort of unified.
(28:20):
type of generic therapy whereall your, your, it all has to be
evidence based, includinginterventions.
And some people suggest if it'snot, that you might actually be
unethical.
Whereas I can't go, I sort of,as a pluralist, support the
right of a therapeutic approachto be Irreducible, you know, and
(28:46):
just the whole thing, you know,without every single aspect of
it being evidence based, even ifyou could evidence base every
single aspect of it.
Dr Peter Blundell (28:55):
And for me, that's where, I mean, as a
person centred practitioner, Isuppose I struggle because I
don't always feel like we canfully evidence based what we're
doing.
Some of it is based on myexperience as a therapist with
my, with my clients and notnecessarily on the research
evidence that is out there.
Jay Beichman (29:14):
Absolutely.
I mean, I, I mean, one of my bigangles in the book and
everything is that I, I seetherapy is more of an art than a
science and that it's like thequality of it is through
practice.
It's a practice.
There's, there's a postmodernisttherapist or psychologist called
Polkinghorne who basicallytalked about the practice of
(29:37):
psychology as sort of being thesecond psychology, you know, and
that it should be looked at in acompletely different way to the
first psychology, which is sortof about theory and research,
you know, but, you know,practicing being a a, a person
whose in interaction withpeople.
Your learning is actually on thejob with people, but you know,
(30:01):
there's a lot of people investedin it being different to that,
um, you know, if you are aresearcher, you're probably
going to tell everybody thatresearch really matters.
You'd be out of a job if youdidn't keep on plugging that.
Dr Peter Blundell (30:21):
Well, absolutely.
And I suppose that's what Isuppose I find that interesting
because I feel like I am, I am aresearcher, but also person
centered practitioner and so I,I, I, I can understand how my
world view might change if Istopped the therapy and only
went down the research route andthat kind of just re informing
(30:42):
yourself.
Oh, this is, this is, you'refinding the solutions, you're
finding the answers and this isthe only path.
And quite often working as atherapist, that challenges my
own view as a researcher andwhat can actually be discovered
and researched and found out.
You know, um, it's interesting.
And I imagine the same for youas the therapist and writing
this book at the same time.
Jay Beichman (31:02):
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Um, yeah, I mean, yeah, yeah.
I mean, I'm actually, I mean, interms of common factors.
Um, I've sort of just plowedthrough yesterday, actually, um,
the great psychotherapy debateby Wampold and Immel, you know,
which just has so much researcharound why common factors might
(31:26):
be the answer, aren't theanswer.
You know, this researcher saysthis and, you know, and like
real kind of standarddeviations.
All that quantitative stuff aswell as quality.
Oh God.
But I don't think I don't thinkI'm going to put it in there.
I mean, it's too much for me.
I think it's almost too much formy reader.
(31:46):
I don't know.
Maybe.
Dr Peter Blundell (31:47):
Does it help us become better therapists?
I suppose that's my question.
That kind of stuff.
Like, does this help me to be inbetter relationship with my
client?
Jay Beichman (31:58):
Yeah.
Yes.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
I mean, it just, it just offers,I mean, I think, you know, he's
just, he's got an agenda.
Yeah.
He wants to prove that, um, youknow, these sort of common
factors around the relationshipof, or whatever, uh, what
matters and that, all this,which I, which is really
important because if, if you'vegot the medical model, which,
(32:20):
you know, the assumption is, isthat one treatment is better
than another.
So then you kind of, and thenone, one thing that I kind of
thought about putting in, whichis I found the most interesting
thing of my trudging throughthis yesterday was, um, there
was one report, one study, Ithink it cites in America, um,
basically comparing one therapywith another therapy, um,
(32:44):
randomized control trial tobasically come to the conclusion
that there's not muchdifference.
And then he kind of, thetangerine is, he says, and that
trial.
cost 11 million dollars and, um,and you, you know, the
randomized control trials arehugely expensive.
(33:06):
And if you think of all themoney that could be better spent
doing, not necessarily betterresearch even, but just Actually
giving people therapists.
Dr Peter Blundell (33:16):
Yeah.
Yeah.
Jay Beichman (33:18):
You know, 11 million.
That's a lot of therapy hours,isn't it?
It is.
Dr Peter Blundell (33:22):
Um, yeah.
Oh no, I think, I think it'sgonna be really interesting.
I'm looking forward to readingit, so, yeah.
Jay Beichman (33:26):
Yeah.
Great.
Great.
Yeah.
I'm looking forward to finishingit.
Dr Peter Blundell (33:29):
Is there anything surprised you right in
the book when you kind of wereexploring some of this stuff?
Is anything come as a surprise?
Jay Beichman (33:36):
Yeah, how much I don't know.
Because once you get into it,it's like just vast literatures,
because the problem you see,because I'm trying to like, um,
explain how the philosophy ofpluralism can be applied to
therapies and therapists.
Yeah.
Um, from a philosophical pointof view, but you know,
(33:57):
immediately you then got a splitbecause there's the pluralistic
philosophy.
And then there's also thepluralistic political
philosophy, which also has a fewdifferent meanings.
Yeah.
Um, depending on whether you'retalking about Isaiah Berlin's
value pluralism, which basicallymeans that sometimes you have
(34:19):
values, which are almostirreconcilable.
You can't.
have both.
So, for instance, you mighthave, um, a value of freedom,
which seems like a good value,uh, a reasonable value, but you
also then might have a value of,um, the right to peace and
(34:40):
quiet.
Yeah.
Yeah.
So then, if you've got a noisyneighbor, Yeah, whose whose
value is more important.
Yeah.
Uh, so that that applies to lotsof things and that sort of
political philosophy.
But then when Americans talkabout it, they kind of quite
often the meaning that you'vegot different centers of power,
(35:03):
you know, like the judiciary,the Congress, etc.
And when the, UK people talkabout it.
They're kind of going back to,um, uh, sort of unions, you
know, being a sort of center ofpower as well as You know, so
there's all these different,that's just the political
philosophy and then when youkind of get to the philosophy
(35:24):
philosophy, you've got lots ofpeople who either call
themselves pluralists, or havebeen called pluralists, and they
can differ quite a lot.
So then you've got, say, WilliamJames, who's, um, pluralism
really covers.
Ontology, which is, um, youknow, like, um, what you think
(35:46):
the nature of being is.
Epistemology, what you thinkactually can be known.
Um, and ethics, um, and otherthings, but, um, methodology
too.
Uh, so you got James, like, youknow, it's quite a broad vision
of pluralism.
And then you've got Levinas,who's also, um, a pluralist, but
(36:10):
he's talking about, um, ethicsover ontology, which is part of
what the debate has beenbetween, um, pluralistic people
and person centered people.
You know, whether ethics is moreimportant than ontology and the
person centered, people knowthat the ontology is actually
really important about the, um,uh, I always forget the name.
(36:33):
It's not organismic valuingtendency.
It's the growth valuing processor organismic valuing process or
the something tendency, um,actualizing, actualizing
tendency.
I don't know.
I've got a real block on that.
Dr Peter Blundell (36:47):
It's not the easiest of language.
Actually.
Jay Beichman (36:48):
Yeah.
Yeah.
Um, so.
You know, so then again, like,you've got a plurality of
pluralisms, and in fact, I mean,one, one book which has really
informed my thinking about thisbook, um, kind of godsend that
it came out when it did, is abook by, called, um, uh, Ever
(37:09):
Not Quite.
Pluralisms in William James, um,in which he basically says, you
know, that you're never everquite there and sort of knowing
everything you need to know.
And that's partly because oftime.
So say like we worked outeverything we needed to know
about therapy today.
So what, because tomorrowsomething new would come along.
Dr Peter Blundell (37:31):
So.
You guys are therapists, you'reconstantly, you're just
constantly in the learningprocess.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Aren't you?
Yeah, yeah.
Jay Beichman (37:38):
And that, and that, that is like, um, a
dimension of pluralism, if youlike, is the time dimension.
It's not just talking about whatwe know already.
It's talking about, well, whatelse is coming up, you know?
Dr Peter Blundell (37:52):
Yeah, I'm, I'm really looking forward to
reading it.
It's gonna be very interesting.
Jay Beichman (37:55):
Mm-hmm.
I hope so.
Yeah.
Dr Peter Blundell (37:58):
It will be.
I think we're coming to the endnow, but I suppose I just want
to check in with you.
What are your future plans?
I know you've got, you'reworking on your book at the
moment, so that's kind of themain thing, isn't it?
Jay Beichman (38:09):
Yeah, I mean, um, yeah, finish that off and then I
suppose like promote that asmuch as I can.
So hopefully sells more than 15copies or whatever.
Um, I want to get more and moreinto writing.
I mean, I kind of see that somuch.
I want to do more writing, morethinking, more reading.
(38:31):
still have a client caseload,but less so that I've got more
time for writing, thinking, andreading.
And maybe not as big a projectas this one.
Like I say, sort of things I caneasily handle, like 500 word
blogs, thousand word blogs, andmaybe looking towards, um, doing
some kind of self help book nextfor people.
(38:54):
Yeah.
For people generally from, youknow, what I sort of reckon has
helped people over the years inmy practice.
Dr Peter Blundell (39:05):
Fantastic.
Well, you're a busy man.
Yeah.
Well, when you, when your book'sready, Jay, you've got to come
back on and we'll, we'll, we'lldo a little interview about the
book and promo and we can putthe link.
podcast.
Jay Beichman (39:17):
I'd love to do that.
Yeah.
And it probably, probably willbe at least a year from now.
Dr Peter Blundell (39:21):
Brilliant.
Thanks.
Jay Beichman (39:22):
Thanks a lot.
I really enjoyed doing theinterview.
Thanks a lot.
Thanks for asking me and uh,hopefully see you soon and maybe
one day in the real world.
Dr Peter Blundell (39:30):
Maybe you never know.
Stranger things have happened.
It's good to see you, Jay.
Stay safe.
Take care.
Jay Beichman (39:37):
Cheers.
Bye now.
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