Counselling, Psychotherapy, Mental Health & Happiness Blog.

Empower Yourself

17/7/2019

Over at The Counselling Centre (www.thecounsellingcentre.net) we have just launched the Empower Yourself series of articles. The books that these articles originate from (with kind permission from the authors) evolved as a common sense step by step approach to personal dilemmas that can happen to anyone, at any time, during their lifetime.

Think of this collection of articles as a toolbox that will assist you in building up your own skills, and in so doing help you to use the talents that you have to deal with what is causing anxiety, stress, panic attacks, and anger in your life.

Each category of articles in the series is a stand alone, single problem solution based aid. The categories are:

Manage Your Anxiety and Stress
Manage Your Anger
Say Goodbye to Panic Attacks

The series will continue with new articles every couple of weeks. Be sure to bookmark the page over at www.thecounsellingcentre.net/updates or join the RSS feed there so that you don't miss out.

Namasté :)

Long Overdue...

5/7/2019

It's fair to say that an update here is more than a little bit overdue. It's hard to believe that it's been so long! I want to start bringing you new content and information that will hopefully be of help to you, but before I do that I think it's only fair that I give you an update and explain what I've been doing for the last two and a half years.

My last post was about The Counselling Centre (www.thecounsellingcentre.net). A lot of my time since then has gone towards making The Counselling Centre what it is today: one of the biggest and busiest centres for professionally accredited Counselling & Psychotherapy in south Dublin. Our Therapists now provide in excess of 5,000 hours of Counselling & Psychotherapy to clients each year.

In January 2017 I joined an organisation as a full time Family Therapist. I cannot say very much about this work as it is all confidential, but I can say that it has been both incredibly challenging and extremely rewarding, and that even to this day I continue to learn a lot from the delivery of this service. Very recently I made the decision to go part time in this, which has freed up time for me to focus more on my other work.

I have continued to work with clients individually in private practice, no matter how busy I have been. This is the work that I love the most, and now that I have more time I will make myself available to work with more people on a 1:1 basis again.

The Mindful Meanings Podcast ceased on episode 11. With The Counselling Centre, the Family Therapy, and my own private practice, there was simply no time left to create new content. Even though the last episode of the podcast published in September 2016, I still to this day have people reach out to me to let me know how the podcast helped them in some way. I love that because helping people was the very reason that I launched the podcast in the first place. I am happy to keep the podcast live, but whether or not new episodes are on the cards for the future, I do not yet know.

I did complete the Marathon that I was training for (in 2016!), and thanks to the generosity of folks from the Mindful Meanings community I was able to raise money for Mental Health charities in the process.

In a nutshell that's what I have been up to since you last heard from me. Now that my working schedule is due to change in the coming months, I want to get back to putting out content that can hopefully be of help to more people than I could ever work with on a 1:1 basis. I have not yet set a concrete plan for this content, but at a minimum you can expect to see more articles on mental health and happiness on this blog, new content for the Mindful Meanings email list, and I think that the website itself needs a fresh coat of virtual paint.

If there is something that you would particularly like to see me create, please let me know via the contact page. I'm open to all suggestions and if it's something that I can do and it has the potential to be of benefit to people, then I'll quite possibly do it.

Namasté :)

Counselling Rooms to rent

17/11/2016

The Counselling Centre in Firhouse is Dublin's premier provider of Counselling & Psychotherapy rooms for rent /hire. As co-owner I would say that, but it's true! - and I am particularly proud of what we've created here.

The rooms at The Counselling Centre are purpose built by therapists for therapists. The centre itself is discreet yet bright, modern and professional at the same time. The individual therapy rooms are all unique, but what they have in common is that they are all warm, inviting, and perfectly suited to therapeutic work.

The feedback that we have received from clients and therapists since we opened earlier this year has been amazing.

Located in Firhouse, The Counselling Centre is ideally situated between Firhouse, Knocklyon, Tallaght, Rathfarnham, Templeogue and the M50.

If you are looking for counselling rooms to rent in Dublin, then check out the website of The Counselling Centre and see what we have to offer.

Namasté :)

Marathon for Mental Health

11/10/2016

Earlier this year I decided that this would be the year that I finally enter and complete a marathon. It’s something that has long been on my bucket list but I’ve managed to make an excuse not to do it every year up until now.

You know how that goes – it’s easy to make an excuse to not go after something we want, when we’re not prepared to make the needed sacrifices to get it.

The Dublin City Marathon is on in October every year and given the fact that Dublin is my hometown, this is the one I decided to do. So in February of this year I put on my running shoes (or what I thought qualified as running shoes) and began to run. About two weeks later I quit running.

Free Mindfulness Body Scan Meditation

7/2/2016

I’m really happy to announce that the next in my series of free meditations is now live. You can download the free MP3 through my newsletter. If you’re not already a member you can join for free here:

Get your free Mindfulness meditations here.

This meditation is also Mindfulness based. You can expect to gain all the benefits that you would from the previous Mindfulness Meditations, plus a few more.

If you have any questions about this meditation, or previous meditations, or if I can help you in any way at all, please feel free to contact me via any of the social media links on this page.

Namasté, and good luck ;)

The Mindful Meanings Podcast

7/2/2016

Update: The Mindful Meanings Podcast is live since February 2016 and is topping the rankings for Mental Health on iTunes. You can find the show on iTunes or on this site here:

The Mindful Meanings Podcast

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At the end of last year I set a goal to have launched a new podcast by the end of January this year. It’s the first Sunday in February as I write this, and while I haven’t launched the podcast – I’m almost there - so I’m happy enough with that.

There was a lot for me to learn in order to be able to launch a high quality podcast. It was frustrating at times, and a lot of work at other times, but I feel that it’s been worth it. Not everything has gone exactly as I had hoped, but overall I’m pretty happy with how it’s turning out.

The Mindful Meanings Podcast will cover all things Psychotherapy, Mental Health, and Happiness. Its aim is to provide in an entertaining way, information and actionable advice that you can use to improve the quality of your life – no matter where you are starting from.

I was pushing to get the podcast launched by today, but that’s just not going to happen. My new mantra is “Done is better than perfect”, but there is still a level of quality that I’m not prepared to drop below. Although it’s a lot of fun putting together the podcast episodes, if they’re not going to be of real value to people then there’s not much point in me putting the time into them.

And so, my new aim is to have the podcast launched and submitted to iTunes by this time next week (Sunday). I’ve created this page in anticipation of that, and once the show is live I will add all the episodes here as they come out, along with the show notes, etc.

The messages of support and appreciation I’ve received on social media over the past couple of months about the podcast have been humbling. I could never doubt that there is a real need for a podcast like this and I feel very privileged to be a position to create it.

The new deadline and target for the podcast is: Three episodes live, downloadable, and submitted to iTunes by 14/02/2016, and one new episode uploaded per week after that – for a minimum of one year.

I’m super excited to be this close to launch, and I’m already looking forward to the next post announcing that the Mindful Meanings Podcast is live.
Have a great week, and be sure to check this page again from 14th Feb onward.

Namasté :-)

3 Easy Ways to Feel Better Now

3/1/2016

Much of the upset that we endure in day to day life can be healed with a little understanding of how our thought affects us. Our minds influence our emotions, which in turn influence our bodies.

When we understand how this connection works it becomes a lot easier to choose how we want to feel, rather than being victim to whatever the day throws at us. I’m going to give you three easy ways that you can stop fear, stress, anxiety or anger from getting in the way of your happiness.

These emotions are typically our bodies’ response to a perceived threat. It’s what’s known as the fight-or-flight response. It would be more accurate to name it the fight-flight-or-freeze response however, as these are the ways that our body adapts to deal with danger. The medical term for this is the sympathetic nervous system.

Historically this response system has served us very well, as our bodies would adapt to face danger. Various physiological changes occur, such as increased blood flow to our arms (for fighting) and legs (for running) and numbing of the pain receptors in our body, and a rush of adrenaline to help us respond faster to whatever threatens us.

When the threat is real this response system works brilliantly, and gives us our best chance of survival. Today though, rather than the threat being real (something like a predatory animal), it is often imagined (judgement or criticism for example).

Free Mindfulness Meditations

18/12/2015

As the members of my newsletter will already know, recently I made available the first in a series of free meditations. My aim in creating this series is to give you a selection of resources that you can use in your own time, whenever you choose. The first of these is called 5 Minute Mindfulness Meditation and you can get it for free when you join the Mindful Meanings newsletter.

5 Things We All Need To Be Happy

13/12/2015

My work as a psychotherapist varies all the time, and it differs with every person who sits in front of me. No two people are the same, and even when two people experience an almost identical set of experiences and difficulties, their journey through that is completely unique.

For therapy to be effective then, it has to be fluid and tailored to the individual person. Having said that however, there is something that I keep coming back to time and time again.

Everything we do in life is a behaviour, and all of our behaviours are motivated by one of two things. To feel good, or to avoid pain. Whether we realise it or not, in order to feel good we strive to satisfy the basic psychological needs that all of us have. It's not possible to be happy unless we are satisfactorily meeting these needs.

A Bittersweet Parting

7/12/2015

I've made the decision to change the comment software of my blog to Disqus. It's something I've been wanting to do for a while now but I've put it off until now. I love how Disqus handles blog comments, but I knew that changing the comments on my blog would mean losing all of the comments and discussions that I've had here to date.

So it is with bittersweet parting that I say goodbye to this blog's old comment format, and welcome in the new. I appreciate each and every one of you that has left me a comment in the past, and I hope that you will continue to do so with the new format.

I'm sorry to say goodbye to all of the comments this blog has had up until now, but I'm excited to see a smoother, more visually appealing format take over. Goodbye to the old, and roll on the new.

See you in the comments ;)

Namasté,

David

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I am a psychotherapist, trainer, coach and meditation teacher, working with people face to face in Dublin, Ireland, and worldwide via Skype. I blog about mental health, happiness, personal growth & development, spirituality, and other things that interest me.

Disclaimer

The author(s) of this blog express thoughts and opinions based on personal and professional experience. Please note that as there is no established professional relationship between author and reader, that this blog does not constitute therapy or professional advise and should not be taken as such.

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