Therapy and Counseling Articles

Even in the face of an immediate danger, the kind of fear that best serves to ensure the survival and well-being of the endangered is not panic. Panic is a dysfunctional, out-of-control sort of fear. Panic is something one wants to take off and throw away, so to speak. If panic is a recurring problem, some call it a disorder. If you had a panic attack while driving, what is the worst thing that would really happen? While you might have to pull over to the side of the road, yo

We human beings are social creatures who are high wired for connection with other human beings. Connection with what is alive, in other words what is real, true and genuine in others with that what is real, true and genuine in us is one of our deepest basic needs and it is universal which means we all have it. What differs for all of us is not the need, but how we choose to meet that need. So what differs is a strategy that we apply to meet our need for connection (or any other need for that matter) and there are many strategies to meet that shared need for connection we all have.

Prevalence of Mental Illness Approximately 1 in 5 adults in the U.S.—43.7 million, or 18.6%—experiences mental illness in a given year. Approximately 1 in 25 adults in the U.S.—13.6 million, or 4.1%—experiences a serious mental illness in a given year that substantially interferes with or limits one or more major life activities. 1.1% of adults in the U.S. live with schizophrenia. 2.6% of adults in the U.S. live with bipolar disorder. 6.9% of adults in the U.S.—16 million—had at least one major depressive episode in the past year.r

Biological Connections in Eating Disorders Eating disorders are not to be taken lightly - 20% of anorexia sufferers lose their lives to their eating disorder, its important to remember these are very serious illnesses which pose a great risk.

Competition is a fact of life; the desire to win at games, get the highest grade in the class or bring home a blue ribbon from the county fair is a feeling most of us can understand. Playing sports provides an outlet for competitive urges; watching your favorite professional teams allows us to compete vicariously.

The Existential approach to psychotherapy has been a growing in popularity in Britain for almost thirty years. Despite this, very little is known by other therapeutic modalities about what the existential approach actually is and how its practitioners actually work with clients. In this paper, I want to sketch as simply as I can the existential phenomenological approach to interpretation and an approach to interpretation called the hermeneutic circle. The hermeneutic circle i

This is the second in a series of articles looking at how our feelings affect our lives and bodies. It is powerful knowledge that can help eliminate pain in all areas of your life. If you are struggling with something, send me an email or call. Healing happens when you forgive This is a more in depth look at a component of forgiveness, that we often don't acknowledge. Forgiveness is essential in every major religion on our planet.

Anger is a lit match that can be blown on and cooled or thrown onto a pile of paper on which kerosene is poured. It’s an opportunity for friends and lovers to resolve conflicts to the benefit of both parties and bring these parties closer to each other or it can be an invitation to start a war ...

TO WATCH & LISTEN TO THIS POST - PLEASE CLICK THIS LINK ON YOU TUBE: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m8iq80amcI0 Today, countless millions of people throughout the world are bearing unprecedented levels of emotional distress and deteriorating happiness in their lives each day. They are innocent victims of their own, individually unique habitual thought systems. The way we traditionally think allows negative thoughts, resulting feelings and moods to virtually control our emotional lives and relationships.

Our kids need us to spend time with them. Kids develop values, security, positive self esteem and the ability to make good connections with others when parents spend positive time with them. Think of the time we spend with our kids now as an investment in their future.

1) Review your child's IndividualEducation Plan (IEP). Schedule a team meeting with the school. It is not uncommon to discover that as you child has grown and matured their needs may have changed. Make sure they get all the accommodations in school they are entitled to and that really help them thrive.

What if there were no television, no Internet, and no parenting books? What would we do differently? Would we treat each other with more compassion? Would we feel better about ourselves? Would we have less anger? How would we raise our children, if we weren't constantly being told that we were doing it wrong? It was questions like these that led me to my belief that not only are the "mommy war" are stupid--they're not natural. And they don't exist.

The reason for Andropause or Male Menopause is to signal the end of the first part of a man’s life and get him ready for the second half. Male Menopause is not as many fear the beginning of the end but the end of the beginning. It is the passage to the most passionate, powerful, productive, and purposeful time of a man’s life.

Energetic Support Animals(ESAs) like healthiest dog breeds are associates that are gotten or gotten back especially for the eager and mental improvement of their human accomplices. Animals have been exhibited to have a calming and productive result on those including them and investing vitality with animals whether livestock or pet animals can have a remedial effect. ESAs take after service animals yet with their accentuation on people with energetic issues. The ESA Letter gr

There are more people on capacity benefits due to mental health problems than the total number of unemployed people on job seekers allowance. By 2030 depression will be the world’s most common illness according to the World Health Organisation.r

Many first-time mothers are baffled when they find their new life with baby doesn’t match up to the myths of motherhood. We are led to believe that having a baby should be a glorious, magical time. We are taught not only that we will but that we must bond immediately with our babies. We believe ...

I am willing to wager that you have a secret. Your secret is a story--or many stories--that culminate in a shameful "truth" about yourself and who you think you are. You go through life hoping nobody discovers this truth. It would all fall apart if everybody figured out what you "really" are. Or maybe you're trying to bend reality, to make the most out of a difficult situation. Maybe if you can be strong, brave, and inspiring, then you won't come across as hurt, damaged, and unstable.

Survivor Guilt On the evening of the 6th anniversary of 9/11 I watched the heart wrenching television images of children of those whose lives were tragically taken on that ill fated morning in 2001. These images stirred me to write about the topic of survivor guilt that is never too far from ...

THINKIATRY & “LIFE WITHOUT NEGATIVE THOUGHTS” Posted on Thursday, January 6th, 2011 at 9:43 amr THINKIATRY & LIFE WITHOUT NEGATIVE THOUGHTS - CLICK THIS LINK TO VIEW VIDEO.

The therapist has to be prepared to handle a number of mental disorders, and traumas. An experienced therapist is a person who is qualified and helps his patients cure mental disorders or problems and create the very best and effective outcome of the therapy session. The therapy needs to be result-oriented and ought to be in a position to assist you to learn the skills needed in managing different facets of your life. Behavioral therapy intends to trade any behaviors that are

Moving can feel overwhelming to anyone, but especially to those with ADHD or who struggle with organizational skills. The following are the six major steps I took to plan, organize, and execute my recent move from CT to NY. They can be applied to any move whether it is moving your home or office to a new local location, or moving your life to another state.

Learning to process and accept our past is a necessary step in one’s search for adulthood. Instead, people often choose neurotic suffering as a way of coping with painful memories. Neurotic suffering consists of coping mechanisms that put a salve over our wounds. Rather than confront one's painful past, adults will convert their grief into physical symptoms, and mask their losses through over-activity, intellectualization, avoidance, self-blame and projected anger. Neurotic sufferers ignore the stop signs, transcending their grief as if it weren't there.

Traumatic experiences can be a painful experience for your life. It can take a lot of time for you to process the entire event. But with the help of EMDR therapy, it will help you to work through some of the difficult feelings. So, how does EMDR therapy work? In order to understand the process in a better way, we have to turn our attention to the way memories are stored in your brain. To know more about EMDR therapy and how it works, read on. How Does EMDR Therapy Work - What

Puppets really engage and delight children. Watching them is in itself a form of art therapy for the audience. In some parts of the world performances contain a moral message and are watched with deep reverence. A wonderful illustration of this is Indonesia.There puppets continue to be used to ...

When Le Music Stops It can happen in many ways. Sometimes, suddenly, out of the blue, with no warning whatsoever. Other times, the music slowly, gradually, fades to a deafening silence. Divorce is the great plague on American families today. More than 40% of adults under 40 are children of divorced parents. The U.S. now has the highest divorce rate (roughly 44%) of the Western nations, though it's slightly declining. Avoiding it, preparing for it and dealing with the consequences of when the music stops involve millions of us every day.

The Striving Styles Personality System, an evolution of Carl Jung’s Psychological Type, was developed in 2008 by Dr. Anne Dranitsaris, Ph.D. It is an easy, yet profound way of understanding what motivates different personalities and the predominant need that must be satisfied for them to achieve their potential and become who they are meant to be. It differs from other personality typing methods, such as the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator, by getting to the heart of what motivates and drives behavior - need satisfaction and the ability to use emotional energy.r

He came to see me as a middle-aged man. He was suffering from social anxiety. As we worked through his fear of connecting with others, a significant, unidentified issue emerged - he was conflicted about his sexual identity. My patient had never dated, nor established a meaningful, intimate ...

Carl Jung, Freud’s protégé gone esoteric, glorified the passage into the menopausal years as a transformation into the “Crone”, the “Wise Old Woman”. An archetypal (universal) element in fairy and folk tales, the Crone, freed of the bonds of childrearing, now had access to a deeper spiritual ...

In our society we often lead very busy and stressful lives. This can lead to a stress response not unlike being chased by a saber toothed tiger. Our body releases stress hormones that make us fast and strong – in order to survive. This is called the fight or flight response. But being in a chronic state of stress can be, and often is, deadly. And seventy to eighty percent of visits to primary care physicians are due to stress related illness.

The most important decluttering we can make is to remove mental clutter. Mental clutter is anything going around in your head, that is keeping you from achieving your dreams. Having a tidy, uncluttered house is great, but achieving the goals that you set at the beginning of this course will not be possible unless we tackle the mental clutter.

nSit down, and let me tell you a story, a fable that tells of a wolf in sheep’s clothing. It is a fable, written by Aesop, that you may be curious to learn, and can tell us of addiction’s common deceptions. Perhaps you will find the lesson in the beginning, or even at the end, but you will be curious about what you will soon learn, as you read on.nn“A wolf found great difficulty in getting at the sheep owing to the vigilance of the shepherd and his dogs. But one day it

The Striving Styles System goes deeper than other systems of typology by looking at the predominant needs of each of the Styles and how they behave when they are self-actualizing and self-protecting.r

Depression is experienced by a lot of us. Sometimes it’s situational (job lay off), sometimes it’s related to past issues (e.g. childhood) and for others it’s hereditary. When you have situational depression something unexpected has happened over which you feel you have no control, i.e. death ...

I’m just guessing, but here’s what your experience with back pain has probably been like: You probably went to your family doctor first, or a chiropractor. Your visit likely only lasted 15 minutes or so… they poked around and confirmed that you do have back pain and gave you a prescription for ...

Online therapy - also known as e-therapy, e-counselling or cyber-counselling – involves a therapist providing support over the Internet. But does it work? How does it compare to face-to-face therapy? And is it worth a go? Firstly, does it work? The short answer is yes. Much like face-to-face therapy, the value of online therapy depends on: 1. The skill of the therapist. 2. Having the ‘right fit’ between the therapist and client.

When Alex was a kid, he recalls his father chastising him for not washing the car properly. Alex volunteered his services as a five-year-old child, but his dad showed little appreciation. On the contrary, when he "missed a spot," his father would berate him by calling him stupid. He was a sensitive child who wanted to please his father, but ended up feeling devalued. Over time, Alex associated his less than perfect performance with his personal identity. If what he did was less than acceptable, then by all means he must be defective.

"Only passions, great passions, can elevate the soul to great things" Dennis Diderot I have gotten the question lately "Can I really make money at my life purpose--my passion?" And my answer is YES! I remember hearing about a study that compared people who followed a career path to strictly make money vs. people who followed their passion.

"He used to be the nicest guy you could imagine, now he's become moody and mean." I hear this bewildered conce from women all over the world. “She used to be gentle and caring, now she treats me like her worst enemy.” Men are equally frustrated and confused. Millions of women and men are finding that something strange is happening to them when their relationship moves into mid-life.

FINDING YOUR VOICE – FINDING YOUR SELF A Beginning Journey of Overcoming The Darkness of Shame. These first few paragraphs are share with you some points of view of the psychological aspects of shame and then share with you how shame influences your daily life. This is the first article in many to come on Hub Pages.

American kids (and adults) consume way too much sugar. According to the American Heart Association, toddlers are getting 12 teaspoons (tsp.) of sugar per day compared to the recommended 4 tsp., school-aged children are consuming 21 tsp instead of the recommended 3 tsp, and teens are getting up to 34 tsp instead of the recommended 5 to 8 tsp. That’s a lot of sugar! Think about it. A 20 ounce bottle of Crush soda can contain 83 grams of sugar. That’s almost 21 teaspoons of sugar in one drink!

Hi! I am Santa Rosa Califo ia psychologist, therapist, and counselor Dr. Eric Ryan—I often use mindfulness techniques and principles in my psychotherapy practice to help you experience greater focus, attunement, and become fully present. Learning to be present, to truly live in the moment, rather than getting caught up in the past or future is a powerful antidote for negative moods like depression and anxiety. The result is a greater sense of aliveness and openness to all the

Becoming a therapist - Firstly let us look at why you wish to. Is it to understand yourself better? Or your partner? Or potential lovers and partners? Or are you actually thinking of this as a tool that you can use career wise and sell to clients to earn a living from it? If so are your motives pure? I sometimes come across people who get it into their head that even though they cannot sort out their own lives and desperately need counselling or advice themselves they can sud

When it comes to what we eat, we tend to worry more about our waistlines than we do our brains. But a diet that contains a wide assortment of healthy fruits and vegetables doesn’t just benefit your body, research indicates it can protect your brain from cognitive decline as you age. In order to defend against a variety of age-related conditions that can impair your memory and the general functioning of your brain, a good first step is to concentrate on incorporating nutrients into your diet from a variety of fruits and vegetables.

What is hypnotherapy and why is it important? Hypnosis is a naturally occurring state of mind that people dip in and out of every day. It is simply a focused state of attention in which one chooses to ignore exte al stimuli and concentrate on the issue at hand, much like when reading an enthralling book. By the same token, a person under hypnosis always remains in control even while outside events are going on unnoticed. The goal in using hypnotherapy is to make constructive

Imagine The Parent Farm sounds funny I know, yet it would be nice to know that there is a place where parents can go to learn how to nurture and teach their children, how to become great adults. It is commonly said that there is no rule book or instruction manual on how to be a good parent, yet ...

As children, we think we have the magical powers to change all that is wrong with our world. We need to believe that we can control problems in order to survive emotionally. For example, we may have parents who are not emotionally healthy. They may lack the capacity to be nurturing, supportive ...

Dreams are a source of inspiration and creativity that can lead us to a deeper understanding of who we are. They are a way for us to connect with hidden parts of ourselves that may not be easily accessible to us in our conscious, awakened states. Dreams may be explored on many levels, usually ...

With this article I am mindful of running the risk of opening a cosmic can of spiritual worms. So, I will stubbornly stay above the fray and opt out on debating the righteousness of any one set of spiritual beliefs versus another. I write this article hopeful it may engage your curiosity about ...

When you put your hands around your eyes you narrow your view. When in a room first you could see the whole room and now only part of it. Although the room didn’t change your perception of the room did. It is the same with your view on life. When your outlook on life is narrow this has nothing to do with life and only indicates there are some ‘hands narrowing your view’. Shuem makes use of widened states of consciousness to widen this view again. Making use of the shamanic tradition emotional and psychological problems can be solved and harmony and happiness can shine through.