Farewell to the late Asher Quinn

I learned of the sad death of Asher Quinn this week. Asher was well known in the London psychotherapy community and died in Hungary on 4 October, where he had been apparently living in recent years. I got in touch with him in 2014 when I was still a (final year) student, and we did a podcast together. He had been living in Putney at the time and I was in East Putney. The attached link is an audio only interview on Youtube. He had associations with CCPE in London, but Asher was a free thinker and he ran into hierarchical issues there when teaching. In the interview we discuss a wide range of topics from his ideas on integrative psychotherapy, as well as his passion for music.

Learning of the death of someone like this is not only sad on account of the passing of the person themselves and their friends and family, obviously, but it can have a profound effect on anyone who knew the person. Hearing of a death can make us take stock of our own lives, what we are doing and not doing, at this point in our lives. It can also remind us of how we essentially are all just passing through this world. But this is not an excuse to be glum. The positive aspects of realising this existential reality could be to embrace the value of life and to get on with the business of living. With renewed vigour we can do the things today that might be the subject of regular procrastination. This is when we can perhaps treat each day as if it were our last. One day we will be right!