Counselling Articles

10 Suggestions to Improve Your Mental Health Today!

Having good mental health, or “balance” in our social, emotional, and psychological states, does not have to be complicated. The key to working towards this balance is to recognize that our lives are made up of several components such as work, social, spiritual, and family, to name a few. It is the sum of these parts which creates our daily existence. Striking a healthy balance in these gives us the sense of “wholeness” or good mental health. When we try to reap all life’s satisfaction out of one area of life, the other areas often become neglected and imbalance occurs which might lead to poor mental health. This being said, there are simple things that you can start doing today to work towards keeping, or improving, the “psychological balance” in your life. The following 10 easy steps are designed to help you find your own optimal “balance.”

The 10 Steps to improve mental health:   (more…)

The Most Common Reasons for Embarking on Therapy

When going through emotionally difficult times, individuals often seek help from a therapist. This is partly due to the greater acceptance for psychotherapy in our society. Several decades ago, psychotherapy, or counselling, was viewed as something that should be kept a secret; but times have changed, and now people talk about the experience of their latest session over coffee with their friends who are also in therapy. The frequency of which people now undergo therapy could be attributed to many factors, and could even be viewed as a “trend.” However, the real reason for why people have therapy is because it works. This article will discuss the top reasons for embarking on therapy.

The most common reasons for having therapy are: (more…)

Turn Negative Emotions into Something Positive

Negative emotions can take a number of forms including anger, anxiety and jealousy, and are linked with behaviours such as eating disorders, substance abuse, obsessions, self-harm and violent outbursts. Although negative emotions might be surprising and unwelcome, they occur for a good reason – usually one of our fundamental needs is unmet. These can include physical needs, for example adequate diet, quality sleep, and emotional ones such as social interaction, privacy, self-determination and sense of achievement. Neglect of emotional needs is likely to result in negative feelings.

Understanding why the negative emotion has arisen, by identifying which of our needs are not met, is important to help manage it and restore balance. Suppressing emotions is unhelpful and if our needs remain unattended, they will find another way of expressing their demands, often through physical illness or emotional flooding. Negative emotions are inevitable and in fact useful because they signal to us that something is lacking. (more…)

Taking the time to understand and recreate yourself can be the start of a healthy process of change and personal development; a process termed ’therapy’. If you have never had therapy or you are thinking about making your first appointment, you may wonder what therapy will entail. Questions such as, “Will my therapist think I’m crazy?” or “Do I really have to tell my shrink everything?” or “Will my therapist be able to help?” are actually quite common. So what happens in therapy and what should you know?

You are not alone

Feeling sceptical or hesitant about something you have never tried before is natural, and this applies to therapy too. One of the secrets shared among experienced therapists: YOU ARE NOT THE ONLY ONE EXPERIENCING THE ISSUES THAT BROUGHT YOU TO THERAPY! Yes, it is true, other people are also trying to handle the same or similar issues. Many of them are in therapy as well. The issues you confront can raise feelings of isolation or uniqueness. Combating pre-therapy jitters is easier when you remember that you are not alone in your struggle, and that seeking therapy is quite common. (more…)