Blog
COVID-19: Transferring your therapy practice online temporarily
First up: Don’t Panic. You can do this. Or, actually – take a moment. Bring your attention to the part of you that is panicking. This isn’t the whole of you; you are still functioning. Let that part of you that is feeling anxious know that you hear it. Say to it “No wonder”. Anxiety…
Listening to your inner child
When is it OK for a therapist to talk about their pants? The answer is (I hope ?) right now! Putting on my therapy pants! My training was in Transactional Analysis. The ‘transaction’ is any interaction with another person, and one of the aspects that we ‘analyse’ is what ego state someone is in when…
Why is Christmas so bloody hard?
Bah, humbug! A friend tagged me on a Facebook post – a video of Fascinating Aida performing their song which goes “Try not to be a c*nt at Christmas” (their asterisk). My response was that my own song would be more along the lines of “Why doesn’t Christmas just fuck off?” ……….so what is about…
How I put my needs first! (on one day of the year)
November is my birthday month and for as long as I can remember – or at least for as long as it’s been an option – I’ve always taken a day’s leave for my birthday. Now that I’m self-employed, that feels more significant than it did when I was taking a day of paid holiday…
Counselling for counsellors
The therapist as human being A while ago I read an article in a therapy magazine which referred to the reluctance of therapists to undertake personal therapy. Then I saw a question on an online forum along the lines of “Should you be working as a therapist before you’ve got all your shit together?” This…
Changing behaviours – what I learned (part 2)
Part 2: How to make changes In the first part of this blog I talked about setting myself a challenge of using my bike every day for a week, in order to change my ‘transport habits’, and what I learned from that experiment. Now I’m going to explore what makes changing behaviour hard, and offer…
Changing behaviours – what I learned
Part 1: A self-experiment Saturday 8 June was the start of National Bike Week 2019. What a great opportunity for a post on my Facebook page encouraging people to get out on their bikes, I thought. I’ll say that I’m planning to use my bike every day this week. That gave me pause, though…
Walk yourself happier: 7 ways in which walking can help your mental health
Pause for a minute. Imagine that you’re in a wood. It’s quite light and open, with space between the trees……those beautiful, spreading oak trees, with great branches like arms that reach out as if to enfold you in a safe embrace. The sun filters through the leaves, dappling the ground below, and playing on your…
10 Stress Management tips: go easy on yourself with some simple ideas
Getting stressed about stress management? Searching online for ‘stress management’ brings up A LOT of advice and tips. Sometimes in itself that can be stress-inducing – “Oh bloody hell all the things I should be doing / need to do before I’ll feel better!” – which can add to the sense of pressure we feel.…