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 :)

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Marathon for Mental Health

11/10/2016

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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.

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Free Mindfulness Body Scan Meditation

7/2/2016

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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 ;)

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The Mindful Meanings Podcast

7/2/2016

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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 :-)

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3 Easy Ways to Feel Better Now

3/1/2016

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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).

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Free Mindfulness Meditations

18/12/2015

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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.

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5 Things We All Need To Be Happy

13/12/2015

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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.

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What is a Good Man Anyway?

6/12/2015

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I had the following post originally published as a featured article on The Good Men Project, on 3-12-15

What is a good man anyway?

I told my young sons the other day that I was going to write an article for the Good Men Project. My eldest, who is eight years old asked me "what is a good man anyway Dad?” Suspecting that this could be one of those moments where what you say to your kids can have a lasting effect, I thought about the question for a moment before I sat down with the three of them and gave them this answer.

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Using Dream Journals to Discover what Your Dreams Mean

13/11/2015

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In this post I'm going to talk a little bit about dreams and developing dream recall. Dreams are fascinating, and they can provide us with so much information that can help us in many ways. For a dream to be useful however, we first have to remember it.

That's where dream journaling comes in. An adult will typically dream several times every night, with our most active dreaming done during the REM (rapid eye movement) stages of the sleep cycle. Our most active dreaming is done during REM sleep, but how many of these dreams can you remember when you wake up in the morning?

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Thoughts on Being Busy

27/7/2015

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My practice is going from strength to strength and I’ve never been as busy as I am these days. Now, I am very grateful that things are going well, but it has got me thinking about the nature of busy.

It is one thing being busy in a productive way, but it’s another thing altogether being a busy fool.

Being busy has been glorified in our culture today. People assume that being busy means you are doing well and that the opposite is also true. It has become almost a badge of honour to be busy. The busier you are, the better you are perceived to be doing.

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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.

Empower Yourself

Marathon for Mental Health

Free Mindfulness Body Scan Meditation

The Mindful Meanings Podcast

3 Easy Ways to Feel Better Now

Free Mindfulness Meditations

5 Things We All Need To Be Happy

What is a Good Man Anyway?

Using Dream Journals to Discover what Your Dreams Mean

Thoughts on Being Busy

Featured on:

Author

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