“Things do not change, we change.” – Henry Thoreau
Psychotherapy is the treatment of emotional, behavioral and mental difficulties in the relationship between a therapist and a client. The techniques that a therapist uses will vary but they are based on guided conversations that allow the client to gain new perspectives on their issues and learn new ways of being. In my practice I work in a number of modalities with a preference for Cognitive Behavioural Therapy (CBT), Clinical Hypnosis, Mindfulness and Sandplay.
Cognitive Behavioural Therapy
“There is nothing good or bad but thinking makes it so.” – Hamlet
The premise of Cognitive Behavioural Therapy (CBT) is that what people think affects how they feel emotionally and how they behave. During times of emotional distress the way a person sees and judges themselves may become more negative. In CBT I aim to work jointly with the client to help them begin see the link between unhelpful thinking styles and mood. This may empower a person to have more control over negative emotion and to bring about changes in unhelpful behaviour. It can be particularly effective for stress related conditions, anxiety, phobias, obsessions, eating disorders and depression.
Mindfulness
“The first priority of the well-ordered mind is to be able to pause and linger within itself. ” – Seneca
The practice of mindfulness works to make a distinction between who we are and what we think. So often what we think is going to happen, what we think other people are thinking and our own inner judgements and criticisms make life seem more stressful than it really is.
Mindfulness uses techniques for breathing and observing our thoughts that allow new perspectives and fresh solutions. By learning to live in the present many clients find they are able to release negativity about the past and fear of the future.
Schema Therapy
“Experience is the teacher of all things.” – Julius Caesar
Schema Therapy is an integrative approach to treatment that combines the best aspects of cognitive-behavioral, experiential, interpersonal and psychoanalytic therapies into one unified model. Schema Therapy has shown remarkable results in helping people to change negative patterns which they have lived with for a long time, even when other methods and efforts they have tried before have been largely unsuccessful.
Schema-Focused Therapy consists of three stages. First is the assessment phase, in which schemas are identified during the initial sessions. Questionnaires may be used as well to get a clear picture of the various patterns involved. Next comes the emotional awareness and experiential phase, wherein patients get in touch with these schemas and learn how to spot them when they are operating in their day-to-day life. Thirdly, the behavioral change stage becomes the focus, during which the client is actively involved in replacing negative, habitual thoughts and behaviors with new, healthy cognitive and behavioral options.
Gottman Method Couples Therapy
“It is not a lack of love, but a lack of friendship that makes unhappy marriages.”
– Friedrich Nietzsche
Gottman Method Couples Therapy helps couples break through barriers to achieve greater understanding, connection and intimacy in their relationships. Through research-based interventions and exercises, it is a structured, goal-oriented, scientifically-based therapy. Intervention strategies are based upon empirical data from Dr. Gottman’s study of more than 3,000 couples. This research shows what actually works to help couples achieve a long-term healthy relationship.
Gottman Method Couples Therapy was developed out of this research to help partners:
- Increase respect, affection, and closeness
- Break through and resolve conflict when they feel stuck
- Generate greater understanding between partners
- Keep conflict discussions calm
Sandplay
“Logic will get you from A to B but imagination will get you everywhere.” – Einstein
Carl Jung described Sandplay as ‘allowing our hands to solve problems our minds have wrestled with.’ Working with conscious and unconscious processes, Sandplay is a simple yet profound therapeutic experience that can provide insight into our current situations and allow us to access internal resources and problem solving skills.
Sandplay therapy is a dynamic and expressive form of psychotherapy that allows clients to express their inner worlds through symbol and metaphor. Sandplay therapy emphasises a deep and accepting therapeutic relationship and an approach to processing that focuses on here-and-now experiences. It is possible that as people grow and develop in childhood and adolescence, they may lose touch with who they are. We are often taught that certain feelings are acceptable while others are not. In this process of denying who we truly are, we can become disconnected from our true selves. Sandplay provides an experience of reconnecting to one’s true self, of rediscovering dreams, hopes and visions.
Clinical hypnotherapy
“Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate, our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure.” – Marianne Williamson.
The current cognitive-behavioural view of hypnosis sees the highly focused state of consciousness, often called a “trance” state that is achieved in hypnotherapy, as being a completely normal facet of everyday life. There are many examples of operating in a trance state ranging from “day-dreaming” through wondering where the last 2-3 kms went when we are driving, to being completely immersed in reading a story, watching a film or simply “fantasising”. Of course many of the routine actions in which we engage in during the average day are also often performed in a trance-like state whilst we consciously attend to something which has caught our attention.
In clinical hypnotherapy I can draw my client’s attention to new possibilities, to alternative patterns of thought, emotions and behaviour and to an understanding of their conditioned responses as a basis for exercising new choices. The tactics and strategies employed are designed to use the resources which reside in all of us and do not require the individual to fit into a standardised protocol. Clinical hypnotherapy is guided by the client’s own wishes and expressed needs.
