Counselling Therapies

Cognitive behavioural therapy (CBT) is a talking therapy which looks at current problems rather than past traumas. It focuses on our ability to change, by altering how we think, feel and behave in certain situations. 

The idea behind CBT is that our thoughts and behaviours influence each other, so the premise is, that by changing the way we think or behave in a situation, we can change the way we feel about life. The therapy examines learnt behaviours, habits and negative thought patterns with the view of adapting and turning them into a positive.

The process helps you manage problems by encouraging you to recognise how your thoughts can affect your feelings and behaviour as well as help you consider how both cognitive and behavioural processes affect one another with the aim to help you get out of negative cycles. CBT combines a cognitive approach (examining your thoughts) with a behavioural approach (the things you do). It aims to break overwhelming problems down into smaller parts, making them easier to manage.

Most people who experience anxiety tend to have negative as well as catastrophic thinking. This is uncontrollable and is a feature of their day to day life. For instance that negative voice saying “ you are going to fail and mess up the exam” or “you are going to make a fool of yourself”. This negative thinking leads to typical worse case outcomes such as avoiding a situation or making excuses not to take part. CBT challenges such thoughts constructively while helping you to create more realistic and resourceful thinking patterns which leads to more positive feelings and desirable behaviours.

The therapeutic approach is used to help people overcome a wide variety of issues, ranging from fears and phobias to stage fright, as well as challenging existing perceptions you may have about past mistakes, events, or failures. Many use Neuro Linguistic Programming (NLP)  to help overcome limiting thoughts and beliefs, reduce stress and anxiety levels, as well as to inspire motivation in their life.

Its foundation considers how we experience our world, gained from the neurological processes that govern our five senses: taste, touch, smell, sight and sound. Additionally, how we make sense of these experiences through a set of filters, including language, as the language we use can also affect the way we experience things. 

Although this field is wide and varied, the therapeutic benefit that we are interested in, is the ability to learn techniques that change our emotional state. So imagine you are feeling pretty anxious and you are able to change your state to calm and relaxed in a matter of moments? How useful would that be? 

Using NLP challenges some of the assumptions and beliefs that we hold, so for example, if something goes wrong in a particular set of circumstances does that mean that the same thing will happen the next time we are faced with those same circumstances? Regardless of what happens to a person during their life, it is the way they perceive the situation that affects the experience and influences their thoughts, feelings, self talk and images. For example, two different people at the same event will come out with a different experience. Whether we are aware of it or not, every event in our lives impacts our future in some way. This may be our beliefs, behaviours, reactions or the decisions we make, but each one will make a mark on our future.

Therefore, NLP has become a favoured alternative as its technique focuses on the future rather than encouraging you to unearth past memories or experiences. It works to explore future possibilities and solutions, adding opportunities and widening perceptions, rather than dwelling on the negatives. Altering the use of language, a person can expand the limits of themselves as they can begin to change the way they think and their perception of the world.

Humanistic principles used within gestalt & person centred therapy techniques provide a framework for individuals to explore self development and human needs and how outcomes are currently affecting life choices and patterns of behaviour. In gestalt therapy, self-awareness is key to personal growth and developing full potential. The approach recognises that sometimes self-awareness can become blocked by negative thought patterns and behaviours that can leave people feeling dissatisfied and unhappy.

Comparatively, the person-centred approach ultimately sees human beings as having an innate tendency to develop towards their full potential. However, reaching this can become blocked or distorted by certain life experiences, particularly those experiences which affect our sense of value. The approach can help the client to reconnect with their inner values and sense of self-worth, thus enabling them to find their own way to move forward and progress.

The foundation of human development and growth in humanistic psychology will help you evaluate your current human needs considering personality values of significance, certainty, love and connection as well as spiritual and personal growth and whether values are being fulfilled or met. The aim of therapy can help you attain values that you need to be met and how achieving potential and growth means you can meet your needs and achieve potential and growth in a higher spiritual level: reflecting other areas of life considering well-being and relationships.

Also known as couples counselling is specifically designed for two people within a relationship and involves talking therapy. This type of therapy looks to help communication and facilitate change within an intimate relationship with the dynamics of a couple.

Relationship therapy can be supported with interactive strategies and principles using CBT, Transactional Analysis, NLP and Human Needs Psychology.

Transactional analysis (TA) is a talking therapy and a widely recognised form of modern psychology based on the theory that each person has three ego-states: parent, adult and child. The therapy is designed to explore an individual’s personality and how this has been shaped by experience – particularly those stemming from childhood; where there is a need for understanding of individuals, communication and relationships. (TA) encourages clients to address problems that have built up over time and is greatly beneficial for helping relationship problems between families, friends and couples – where there are issues of conflict, confusion or where something is lacking.

This talking therapy’s use of various counselling models of humanistic and integrative techniques and tools is designed to promote personal growth and change. It is considered a fundamental therapy for well-being and for helping individuals to reach their full potential in all aspects of life.

Transactional analysis is recognised as a brief and solution-focused approach, however, it can also be applied as an effective long-term therapy.

Inner Child Therapy is a form of effective counsel to help the adult self clients to facilitate cognitive restructuring. This gives them empowerment regarding a fear or feeling, for instance relating to a trauma or memory they hold.

This is a flexibly structured therapy that helps the adult self-client who finds it difficult to say what has happened due to a trauma felt from a past experience or situation. The process can help the client make sense of their life and the core of why they are the way they are. The aim of helping the client to create a new perspective to help them heal and empower themselves to attain inner harmony and balance.

The effectiveness of this therapy involves a sensitive approach and compassionately encourages change without the client needing to disclose details of traumatic events. The empathetic approach of inner child therapy is to address the effects of the trauma itself rather than the event. This is to safeguard the client from re-trauma, while ensuring the client can feel comfortable during therapy by retaining their dignity and privacy of their situation.

(PICT) involves integrated counsel of Cognitive Therapy with Transactional Analysis (TA) and NLP.

Photo therapy and Parts therapy is a creative style of approach to help clients who may struggle during the engagement of counsel. These combined and interactive techniques are usually explored over a couple of sessions.

The effectiveness of photo therapy will help clients reveal their concerns and consider awareness and insight into their world as they express how they perceive their life and relationships. Within the parts therapy session, this helps clients to understand their mind and actions by further exploring and assessing any critical thoughts and beliefs that featured from the photo therapy session. The self analysis explored within these therapies can be complimented with a creative parts hypnosis that interprets and negates any critical thoughts while understanding positive changes.

The therapies are used to help clients focus about self awareness, struggles and meaning to their life and relationships as well as personal values such as self esteem and confidence.