I first had a glimpse of Lucian Freud’s works in National Gallery, London two decades ago.  I was struck by his obsession with the body…the unforgiving body. He obsessively paints each fold of flesh, traces each scar, zit, bluish vein, as if these are the marks the outside world has inflicted on the body. Many of the figures were asleep, exposed, and vulnerable. They were snapshots of loneliness and alienation.
Was Lucian Freud, a Freudian?
After his father’s death, his mother drifted into a deep, incapacitating depression. Freud and his mother had never gotten along. He found her overbearing, excessively maternal. She was made uncomfortable by much of his work. But he brought her up to his studio and painted her day after day for the next decade. "I started painting her because she had lost interest in me," said Freud. "I couldn't have if she'd been interested. She barely notice, but I had to overcome avoiding her." Lucie Freud sat for her son more for more than 2,000 sessions, continuing until her death in 1980. Eventually, she emerged from her despair and Lucian repaired his brittle relationship with her.
All in all, the sessions themselves proved to be a more benevolent form of therapy than Sigmund Freud ever achieved!

Recently while traveling in Uttaranchal, the following lines of Sarojini Naidu echoed in my mind:
Where the voice of the wind calls our wandering feet,
Through echoing forest
With lute in our hands ever-singing,we roam,
All men in kindred

Have you ever wondered about what happens in a BPO and more importantly how people are trained there?
A very insightful look at: http://motherjones.com/politics/2011/05/indian-call-center-americanization

Post traumatic syndrome may not be a pan American creation after all! It has been pointed out that The Iliad may be the first work of literature based on combat stress. And Samuel Pepys may  be the earliest historical figure diagnosed with PTSD! The Diary of Samuel Pepys includes a vivid description of the Great Fire of London in 1666. Pepys goes on to describe the mounting horror of the fire, and Daly notes the mounting evidence of what would now be called PTSD.

First, Pepys personalized the threat. The fire was “a most horrid malicious bloody flame, not like the fine flame of an ordinary fire.”

Afterward, he suffered insomnia. “The fears we have of new troubles and violence’s, and the fear of fire among ourselfs, did keep me awake a good while,” Pepys wrote about a week afterward.

Then came anxiety and vigilance, though his description of riding through smoking parts of London: “A foul evening this was tonight, and mightily troubled to get a coach home; and, which is now my common practice, going over the ruins in the night, I rid with my sword drawn in the Coach.”

Even during the fire he began to forget events during the day — including meals — and he inserted some details afterward in the margin of his diary. He had nightmares afterward, and, writes Daly, “various ideas and physical situations brought forth anxious feelings” for about eight months.

There was also anger at authority, not unlike the anger some modern vets feel toward sub-competent former leaders. When the feckless Lord Mayor complained after the fire that Londoners were just worried about their own lives and property, Pepys noted, “A very weak man he seems to be.”

The great London diarist doesn’t write down a remedy for his condition. Thankfully he doesn’t even seem to notice that he has a condition that would warrant a psychiatric consultation!

I have been reading the Black Swan and have been impressed by the many insightful observations made by the author.
One of them struck a deep chord in me
“We tend to use knowledge as therapy.”
In an era where cognitive interventions are making steady inroads in psychiatric practice, this observation is quite timely
Can one address the distress of another through mere cognitive explorations and rational discourse?
It is also a pointer to the inadequacies in therapeutic initiatives in psychiatric practice.
Increasing number of clients who seek psychiatric consultation are voicing their concern about purely medication based interventions in practice. Much of 'modern' psychiatric practice seem to be prescription based. While medications do have a role in attenuating emotional distress, isn't there a need to venture further? And therein lies the problem. Even though centers of post graduate training in psychiatric practice are increasing significantly, very few of them offer adequate and supervised training in psychological methods of intervention. When the lure of addressing personal problems through prescriptions is strong (and implicitly facilitated by pharmaceutical lobbies), it is hardly surprising that the motivation to venture into this arena is also waning among professionals and trainees. Unfortunately, the vacuum created by this is filled by self styled 'counselors' whose professional training and credibility seem rather inadequate.