Counselling offers you a safe and confidential space to talk to a trained professional about your feelings and concerns. You might talk about difficult events in your life or your relationships, or want to explore difficult feelings. There may be negative thoughts and emotions that seem difficult to handle and you may want to explore this.
Not everyone however approaches counsellors to explore ‘problems’. It may be that you would like to develop a greater self awareness or become more emotionally literate. Sometimes you might be asking yourself, “why did I do that?” These are all valid reasons to access support.
Counsellors are not there to ‘fix’ or ‘solve’ problems, rather, offer a relationship that might feel different and outside your normal network and which is collaborative. Sometimes we may even take our eyes off the ‘problem’ and notice when the problem isn’t evident, drawing on your capacities and strengths. By drawing alongside, a counsellor is able to journey with you in whatever you would like to explore, ‘offer back’ what they are hearing, suggest different perspectives, explore healthy coping patterns and help you build on these and together, find some workable ways forward. Sometimes, it’s about having the freedom to say all the things you feel you’ve not been able to say to someone else in your life so far, and know that this will be respected, honoured and ‘held’ without the need to ‘move on’ for the time being.
My own approach to counselling prioritises the importance of the relationship – aspects of trust, agreeing boundaries, working together, respect – amongst others. Sometimes counselling will be about the ebb and flow of the process and allowing you space and time to explore all you would like to in the time frame agreed. At other times, we may be working specifically in the area of thinking patterns, matters of the heart (drives), working on interpersonal relationships, stress reduction and seeing what might be lying at the heart of an anxious or depressive response to life situations.
I will tailor the counselling approach to the person I see in front of me – this is called ‘Integrative Counselling.’ I am a member of BACP and ACC and adhere to their code of ethics.
I believe each person is unique, designed for relationship, significance and purpose and indeed, of utmost worth. I consider it a privilege to share in anyone’s story.