Hello, I am a marital therapist, communications trainer and author. I have thirty-five years helping couples and individuals make better relationships. I have written twenty-plus self-help books which include the international best-sellers ‘I love you but I’m not in love with you’ and ‘How can I ever trust you again?’ My books have been translated into twenty languages. I trained with RELATE the UK’s largest counselling charity. Perhaps it has been turning sixty but I have become interested in spiritual as well as psychological questions. Who am I? What are my values – as opposed to my parents, my teachers and the wider society? What makes my life meaningful? What do I believe about life, the universe and everything? Although my clients might come to me because of destructive arguments, falling out of love and infidelity, they are also interested in having more meaningful relationships and a more meaningful life. So what is the meaningful life? Why do we so easily lose our way and get lost in depression, anxiety, doubt, addictions and obsessions: the swamplands of the soul? One thing I know for sure is that there is not one answer...
https://andrewgmarshall.com/podcasts/
episode 7: Charlotte Fielder: Dogs and Volunteering, and how they change your life
So much of the meaning we find in life comes from reaching out to help others. Charlotte Fielder has been the Head of Volunteering and Fostering at London’s famous Battersea Dogs and Cats Home since 2015. She finds intense meaning in giving animals a second chance and supporting the Battersea volunteers who work for love, not money.
Charlotte is herself a failed foster carer after rehoming Max in August 2017. Dogs have been an enormous part of her life, and she talks with Andrew about the magic of dogs in family relationships and the joy and meaning they bring to individuals.
Charlotte has also worked extensively to support children with upper limb difference. She is a patron of EDRIC (The European Dysmelia Reference Information Centre) a not for profit organisation that shares knowledge with those affected by congenital limb loss. She is also the author of ‘Shared Experiences,’ a resource for the families of these children.
Charlotte worked for 33 years in UK Government agencies including the Home Office and National Criminal Intelligence Service before leaving to work in volunteer services at a hospice. Her desire was to spend the last ten years of her working life making a difference, and when she arrived in Battersea in 2015 she felt she was “coming home”.
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https://www.patreon.com/andrewgmarshall - Learn about the European Dysmelia Reference Information Centre
https://www.dysnet.org - Discover Andrew’s memoir, The Power of Dog, about how his dog Flash helped him recover from the loss of his partner.
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