"We think we listen, but very rarely do we listen with real understanding, true empathy. Yet listening, of this very special kind, is one of the most potent forces for change that I know"
- Carl R. Rogers
When you're not feeling yourself
Perhaps for the most part, we are in the right place to make sense and deal with what is going on in our lives. When we can be open to what is happening, we can meet whatever comes our way, and things generally feel all right.
In some circumstances, we might feel like somewhere along the way things get stuck, especially with a significant event - losing a loved one or receiving a terminal diagnoses, transitioning into a different phase of life, or witnessing a traumatic event. It can be difficult to move on from some experiences.
Sometimes, attitudes or beliefs that we feel are important to us, can interfere in how we judge our genuine feelings. Consider the parent who believes the most important thing is to feel love towards one's children and be kind. On feeling any kind of annoyance or resentment toward their child, the image of being a good parent conflicts with the genuine experience. How can they even consider the possibility of something so unlike who they are?
Einstein once said: no problem can be solved from the same level of consciousness that created it. The purpose of counselling is to allow a shift in consciousness, by enabling you to distinguish accurately what is going on.
How does talking make a difference?
Engaging in counselling is knowingly and willingly encountering oneself with the companion of a skilled listener. It's about you breaking down what your reality is like for you, just the way it feels right now. It is the act of observing and exploring your current conscious thoughts and feelings that are producing the mental 'dis-ease'.
As clarity is given to your thoughts and feelings in the presence of an accepting counsellor, it becomes likely you begin to accept your situation, without trying to justify it or change it. A re-experiencing of events with a clearer view is made possible, where you can come face to face with how you genuinely feel. This puts an end to the distortion that is created and sustained when the idea of who you are and how things should be, doesn't line up with the fact of how things are.
That is why in client-centred therapy, you, the client, are the most important factor in bringing about change. Being in an environment where communication is met with clear and unbiased understanding, allows for alteration of the perceptions that are the cause of negative emotions in the first place, and capacities for growth and healing can occur.
What counselling with TalkCCT is
A climate of unconditional acceptance where free expression of thoughts and feelings is met with empathic understanding.
A talking relationship where you are accompanied by a listener who is invested with their whole attention, and therefore does not communicate from a personal opinion, but from a position of pure understanding.
An ethical therapy rooted in client-centred values, where the therapist is highly aware of the harm that may come to you from dubious and forceful counselling practice, and mitigates this to the highest degree possible.
A chance to welcome a revelation or "a-ha" moment
A process of deconditioning. The revision and sorting of attitudes, beliefs, and values that hold in place the distortion that leads to mental distress.
A chance for the psyche to work itself out, by paying close attention and seeing things without the ingrained symbols and meanings that you normally attach to them.
An unpredictable and non-linear process, which happens on its own without you needing to 'do' anything, and is therefore hard to pin down and explain in words.
Providing you with the opportunity to make changes in yourself that result in you feeling less threatened, confused, and reactive in life, to feeling freer, more secure, and respecting your own preferences in relationships and social environments.
The coming to terms with the changes life brings, through psychological growth and adaptation.
What counselling with TalkCCT isn't
Having your life explained to you through theories devised from the counsellor's own interpretation, which are inevitably always separate from your reality.
Reducing the complexity and richness of your individual experience to a stereotypical understanding.
Being rescued from the necessity to face what it is you're going through.
An attempt at being manipulated into accepting an idea about yourself from the counsellor's perspective.
Being told what specific parts of your life you should talk about, which implies that the counsellor knows more than you about what is urgent and meaningful, preventing you from putting your attention where you need it.
Some kind of punishment where you are demanded to reveal things that you are uncomfortable talking about, or be confronted and made to feel remorse or shame for your own good.
A highly controllable and predictable movement of the mind where fixed methods are used to force a specific result, regardless of the harm it may cause.
A service you can only attend when you are at your lowest point.
A place where you are expected to be sensitive and soft, and if you are not then you will be judged as insensitive.
A bad life-coaching service where I tell you what you should do, and what you ought to have done regarding the choices in your life.
A problem-centred approach that is goal-oriented, constructing tasks and homework to achieve specific aims, and being expected to meet those aims and have the value of therapy measured as such.
Looking exclusively or necessarily at painful experiences and being encouraged to feel sad and cry.
Diagnostic or prescriptive, paying more attention to what conditions you may have, instead of your subjective human experiences.
