📅 Thought for today:

‘I do not know whether it is obvious to other people which is their own or other’s right or left. In my case I had to think which was my right; no organic feeling told me.’

— Sigmund Freud

#thoughtfortoday #creativity #leftbrain #rightbrain #SigmundFreud #leftrightconfusion #sensing #psychotherapy #neuroscience

Often in my work, there is a palpable sense of relief for my clients when they realise they are “not the only ones”.

Not the only ones to feel the way they do.

Not the only ones to think the way they do.

All my life I have been unable to tell my left from my right instinctively I cannot tell you the number of times someone has said, “No Stuart, your other left”.

This can have serious implications for driving. I am truly grateful that Google Maps puts up symbols for the next direction change in addition to saying, “Take the next left”.

Sigmund Freud and I have this in common. And like him, I know that I write with my right – so if I need a reminder of which side is right, I start to write.

I am reading “Drawing on the Right Side of the Brain” by Betty Edwards. It is not really a book about drawing as in artist rendering of an image in pencil or charcoal.

From this book, I have learned that I am not alone – in fact, I am in such good company. I have also learned that what I thought was a disability is actually a strength, it enables me to do some creative tasks that some others cannot easily do.

Coming to me now, at my age, I feel rejuvenated in some way!

On reading the neuroscience I discover this “left-right confusion” (as neuroscientists call it) could be due to a very dominant side to the brain or equally to the configuration of the parietal lobe of the brain (which can cause other phenomena).