Counselling
Counselling gives you space, time and encouragement to explore your problems, come to terms with the past, and clarify what you want now.
- When you have experienced loss or change or difficult situations, counselling can help you to come to terms with what has happened.
- When you know you want to change your life but don’t know exactly what to do, counselling helps you become more clear and supports you in moving on.
You would generally see me once a week for a 50 minute session. How many sessions you have is up to you. Just one can be powerful, but generally I see people for anything from a few months to over a year.
Counselling is essentially just two people in a room. You - the client - talk, mostly, and the counsellor mostly listens. It's relaxed and informal, thugh it may at times feel intense.
Though 'just talking' sounds simple, counselling can be astonishingly powerful. A light is shone on you, your hopes and dreams, and your past. That spotlight might feel strange at first, but this sense of strangeness usually doesn't last long.
Although counselling may deal with difficult or painful issues and memories, it can also be surprisingly enjoyable. How few of us have been listened to as much as we need? How few of us have someone there to listen to the really heavy stuff, or the stuff which is preying on your mind but you feel embarassed to talk about?
In counselling you're allowed to be heavy. You're allowed to be silly. You're allowed to be you as you are, without pretences or defences.
People are sometimes nervous about coming and certainly it is a big and important step in helping yourself. But you will never be forced to talk about things which are too painful. How 'deep' you go is up to you. Very difficult experiences are only talked about if you want to and when you are ready.