Need more information to help you decide whether counselling or psychotherapy is right for you? Check out the answers to some common questions below:
Q&A’s:
- What is Counselling and Psychotherapy?
- Is therapy only for people with diagnosable psychological conditions?
- What are some specific conditions that therapy can help alleviate?
- What is a holistic approach to therapy?
- What are the benefits of getting therapy?
- What are the beliefs and visions that underpin therapy?
- What can I expect from therapy sessions?
- How can I book and pay for sessions?
What is Counselling and Psychotherapy?
Counselling and Psychotherapy are similar growth-oriented, typically talk-based therapies that differ primarily in scope and depth.
Counselling is perfect for addressing short-term issues that require additional support and guidance to get through.
Psychotherapy goes deeper, and tends to be longer-term in duration. It will help you safely confront, shift and transform deeply ingrained patterns or issues that are holding you back.
On the whole, therapy is a completely confidential, collaborative, and cathartic process. It enables you to access and embody your true authentic Self, where everything you most deeply desire and need really resides. As such, therapy is best understood as a commitment and investment in your greatest asset: you.
Together, we will explore your inner and outer worlds, and uncover and release the limiting blocks to your experience of inner peace, strength, love, clarity and joy .
Is therapy only for people with diagnosable psychological conditions?
Counselling and psychotherapy can benefit anyone experiencing distress and difficulties, at any stage of life. Whether your issue can be, or has been, clinically diagnosed or not, is irrelevant.
Life can and will deal us many blows over the course of our lives. Our emotional, psychological and behavioural responses to those difficulties do not need to be deemed pathological or abnormal to justify getting support. We all need additional external help at times; there’s nothing strange or shameful about that.
We are innately social and multi-faceted beings living in complex times. Admitting we need extra help and actually seeking the right support is the healthiest thing we can do when challenges arise. This is also the best predictor that we will be able to successfully navigate our challenges and bounce back, stronger and wiser than before.
It’s very common to not have enough support, let alone the impartial and non-judgemental support, we often desire from those closest to us. Not everyone has the skill, capacity, or know-how to be there for us in our times of need, even if they are good people who genuinely care about us.
It can also be liberating, and feel easier to speak honestly about our problems with a complete stranger who doesn’t have ingrained expectations of us: who’s view of us is not limited by our past, or determined by established interpersonal roles.
Therapy is a form of personalised, professional and confidential support that is designed to solve these problems, and help you deal with the difficulties you experience in life with a view to helping you grow beyond them and ultimately flourish.
Getting Counselling or Psychotherapy does not mean you’re crazy, weak, or a lost cause. It’s not only completely normal, but also healthy to reach out and get a kind helping hand from an objective, trained professional.
Getting support simply means you get to feel better, clearer, stronger and happier, sooner, rather than later.
What are some specific conditions that therapy can help alleviate?
Therapy has wide-ranging applications for the alleviation of mental and emotional suffering in many different forms. However, some of the more common conditions it can help you with include struggles with anxiety, depression, relationship difficulties, grief and loss, addiction, abuse, trauma, and body image issues.
What does a holistic approach to therapy mean?
A holistic approach to therapy is one that takes into account all the different aspects of your being, explores different levels of awareness, and aims to align and integrate the mind, heart, body and soul.
My background Psychology and training in Process Oriented Psychology, Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT), Positive Psychology, The Gottman Couples Therapy Method, Soul-Centered Psychotherapy, and various mindfulness and somatic approaches, gives me the flexibility to work with you in different ways, and tailor my approach to what most resonates and works best for you.
Your mental, emotional, physical and spiritual dimensions of self are taken into account, along with cultural and relational factors that have shaped who you are, where you are, and where you’re wishing to go.
As with every good therapeutic approach, our sessions will also be warm and professional: completely confidential, non-judgmental, safe, gentle and transformative.
What are the benefits of getting therapy?
Feel better sooner. Life’s too short to spend struggling or just getting by. You always have the freedom to choose a different state, a different outcome. Sometimes we just need a push in the right direction to remember what we already knew and had within us all along.
Achieve change and healing from the inside-out. Commit to lasting change by addressing the underlying source of your distress. Develop your inner resources, resistance and self-knowledge, without the risks associated with superficial, symptom-targeted, medicated approaches.
Get empowered and integrate your wholeness. A holistic drug-free approach is one that does not pathologise or reduce you, or your experiences, by attempting to put you in a box and label you. Choose to expand yourself; not to minimise, weaken, or restrict your awareness.
Take back your agency. You don’t need to wait for ‘permission,’ or for anyone or anything else to change first. Investing in your inner growth puts you back in control of you and enables you to take charge of your life. It helps you feel clearer, stronger, happier and calmer no matter what else may be occurring or stagnant around you.
Detoxify, heal and strengthen every aspect of your life. Therapy is an investment in yourself. This inevitably means that you’re also investing in all of your relationships, and in every aspect of your life, because you are the common denominator in every scenario.
What are my beliefs and vision of you that underpins therapy?
You are able to get through anything: no matter how troubling, or seemingly insurmountable. It is possible to walk in acceptance, self-respect, and appreciation.
Every experience is meaningful: within it are contained the seeds for change, deep strength, and evolving wisdom. Grow into your emergent self.
You are stronger, wiser, and more beautiful than you know. Remember your unalterable worth.
You have the solutions you seek buried within you: your inner guide knows exactly what you need, and where you need to go. Reconnect to your innate GPS.
You can get back to your best self, no matter how far you think you have fallen, or how much time has passed. Bounce back now.
You are the source of your own healing. Embrace your inherent, irrepressible power.
What can I expect from therapy sessions with you?
You can expect care, compassion, warmth, understanding, non-judgemental support, encouragement and confidentiality.
You can expect to be asked about what brings you to therapy, about your life circumstances, relationships, personal history and upbringing.
You will be asked what you most desire; what your hopes and vision for yourself and your life are.
The aim of therapy is to dive deep, explore, excavate the hidden treasures from your experiences, and learn new skills to heal and activate a different, better present, now.
How can I book and pay for sessions?
Booking a session is as easy as emailing me your preferred available days and time frames, as well as where you’d like to have your session. You are welcome to get in touch by texting or calling as well.
Bear in mind that my phone is set to silent while in therapy, so the best way to get in touch is to email or text me. If you do call, don’t be concerned if I don’t pick up- I may simply be unavailable. Just be sure to leave a voicemail if you would like me to return your call.
Whether you email, text or contact me through a website booking form, if you’re in Sydney, specify whether you’d prefer to meet at my Newtown or CBD location, or have a home visit. If you live out of state or abroad, sessions are held remotely via a secure online video platform, unless you would prefer to have sessions over the phone.
Payment for sessions can be made in person with cash, debit, or credit card. Alternatively, I will email you an invoice that you can pay via direct deposit, or through PayPal.