Therapeutic Journalling

What is Therapeutic Journalling?

Firstly, journalling is writing down what you’ve been doping and what has been going on in your life.

This can be done in a variety of styles, such as content and detail driven -

“I went to meet a friend in a cafe after not seeing them since last year. It took half and hour to get there. It took a bit of time to get the conversation going and then we chatted for a few hours.”

Or more feeling, emotionally driven -

“I went to meet a friend in a cafe. On the way I felt excited and nervous about meeting my friend. I hadn’t seen them in so long. It felt awkward at first but after a while we managed to reconnect and it felt easy to talk and then the time seemed to fly by and before I knew it a few hours had passed."

Therapeutic Journalling focuses more on the feelings and emotions of our experiences. This gives us a space where we can express ourselves fully with out any judgement, other than our own, and if you notice this write about it too. When writing your journal really focus on your feelings and on the emotions you experienced. This may be difficult at first, especially if you aren’t used to it as it can take time to develop our emotional vocabulary. Once you get better at this try to be even more precise about what you were feeling. If you were feeling happy, what kind of happy?  Was it joyous, exuberant, thrilled, delighted, euphoric, and/or glad, contented, relaxed. If you were feeling sad, what kind of sad?

This can be help in a number of ways. It is a space where we can express and have an outlet. It encourages us to give words to our feelings helping us to reflect upon what is really going on for us. It also helps us organise and understand our feelings, helping us gain self awareness and develop our emotional intelligence. Giving language to our feelings can help us grasp, process and communicate them.

Therapeutic journalling can be done at anytime. It is also a useful accompaniment to counselling as it can help continue the focus and processing between sessions and help us find areas and subjects we may want totally about in the sessions.

If you’d like to know more about how counselling can help your journalling journey please get in touch

New Year, New Beginnings

The beginning of a new year is often a time of reflection, of assessment, of looking back over the last 12 months. Looking at what we achieved or not achieved, of the goals we’ve set ourselves and completed, as well of those we are still working on, or ones that we have abandoned. We look at the relationships that have blossomed or withered and those that we have maintained. We contemplate the major events that have occurred during the year, from births, deaths, and marriages, to moving areas, changing jobs. Some of the things we reflected upon may be huge shifts and changes, while others smaller yet significant.

Time pass constantly and markers in this passage such as a new year offer us this time to reflect.

As everyone experiences the New Year there is a sense of a collective assessment. This can be seen in the Best of/Worst of lists for books, films, and music to name a few as well as noticing social and cultural shifts that have occurred. Many people make New Years resolutions, a list of changes they wish to make, of goals they want to strive towards. Some collectively such as Dry January and Veganuary, others more personal. 

A New Year is often seen as a change of a new beginning, a fresh start. While we can not erase the past, we can learn from it and move on from it.

What have you been reflecting on? What changes do you want to make? What do you want to be different and what to you want to stay the same?

Taking a moments pause to reflect and contemplate can really help us to figure out what it is we really need or want from our life ahead. We can learn a lot from looking back and seeing where we’ve come from. But sometimes this can be difficult and confusing.The past might be hard to let go off and we may not know what it is that we want from the future. Counselling can help you work through this and help you understand yourself a little better. 

What ever your goals, plans or wants for the new year therapy can help you with self discovery and development. 

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Counselling for Personal Development

Like the old Yellow Pages advert- “We don’t just help with the nasty things in life.”

While counselling is incredibly helpful for Anxiety, Depression, Loss, Relationship difficulties… The list goes on. You don’t have to be struggling to gain from Counselling.

Counselling can help you develop as a human being, assist you in getting more out of life and living more fully. Counselling can aid you in discovering what you truly want from life and to get more from life and living.

Many of us meander through life, taking it as it comes, as if life is happening to us. Doing things because they need doing, because it’s the “right” thing to do. Jobs become a means to an end. Dreams and ambitions fade into the background. Days, weeks, months, years, start to merge into each other.

Then ten, twenty, thirty years fly by and we wake up one day and wonder “What if…?” 

What if… 

We all have our own unique What if’s and it is never too late to explore them. 

It is always valuable to take the time to contemplate and examine our lives. Explore which aspects of our lives make us feel truly alive and which parts feel like dull repetition.

Do you want to live your life on autopilot or do you want to take charge of who you are?

How can counselling help?

Counselling is a great space to explore these ideas. To discover who we are and what drives us. To figure out what is holding us back, in work, our relationships, personal lives. What is stoping us living life fully as we truly want to and what changes and choices we can and wish to make. Counselling can help you form deeper and more meaningful relationships with those around you and help you live more authentically.  

A place without judgements or preconceptions. A place to examine and explore. A place to reflect and grow. A place to wonder. A place to honestly examine those What if’s…

Get in touch now to find out how counselling can help you develop and grow.

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