What is Psychodynamic Counselling? How can it help you at this time in your life?
I'm a firm believer that a collaborative approach and strong relational emphasis is a helpful way of supporting people as they uncover, explore and address many of the kinds of difficulties we all may face in our relationships and in the challenges of everyday living.
Contemporary Psychodynamic Counselling aims to help you to emotionally understand what might lay behind your current (di)stress. 'Symptoms' of (di)stress, of which there are endless, do not spring full blown out of the air. They are part and parcel of being a human and a human with a history. Behind every individual's life difficulties there are historical causes.
Frequently the things we find the most difficult to know and accept in ourselves are the very things that cause us the most problems.
It is the parts of ourselves, the unknown, irrational parts, that repeatedly continue to motivate and influence how we feel, how we are and how we deal with life. This is the reason why people say they struggle to make sense of why they feel and live life in the ways that they do, why they react as they do, why they repeatedly experience the anguish of broken/unsatisfying relationships and so on.
Psychodynamic Counselling is not about offering advice or positive thinking techniques. There are no homework assignments to complete. There are no little tricks to help you feel better about yourself. There are no tactics or illusions to magic a better life. It's not about a temporary quick fix to paste over the cracks. In my view, all of that would be like rearranging the furniture on the Titanic while ignoring the big holes in the hull. It is about sensitively helping you to gain your own personal insight and become more emotionally aware of what is going on within you and between yourself and others. It's real.
.It's about really understanding what's behind your symptoms.
The symptoms are endless. Depression and anxiety for instance are symptoms. Something is not right. Symptoms really don't just drop out of the sky. They mean something. And that's important - what does it mean?
It's about understanding how experiences in the past, perhaps long forgotten, have shaped you, impacted upon you. And how they continue to wreak havoc and wreck your relationships. This kind of deeper self-understanding can help people in a profound, meaningful and lasting way.
My core professional training was undertaken within the Counselling and Psychotherapy department at the University of Leicester, a training body with a reputation for clinical and academic excellence. I am a registered member of the British Association for Counselling and Psychotherapy and subject to their rigorous ethical code of practice.
You may have concerns or feel anxious about seeking help click here. Completely understandably. It is after all, your own well-being we are talking about here; a very important and deeply personal part of you, your life, your future. These feelings are often replaced by a great sense of relief after taking the first step.
Do you sometimes look at other people wistfully? What's missing in your life? What experiences are lost to you?
In what ways do your difficulties hold you back? What experiences are you losing out on?
You can do nothing at this point. Or you can take an important step.
The Introductory Session is a valuable opportunity for you to dip your toe in the water, to test out how it feels, how you feel with me and for us both to think about the best way forward.
Contact me. . Let's have a talk about what you feel you need right now and go from there. We may decide to meet for an Introductory Session, we may not. Your best interests come first.
