Wired for connection Communication is more than just a way to express our thoughts and feelings. It’s a basic human need that helps us connect with others. As Brene Brown says, “Connection is why we're here. We are hardwired to connect with others, it's what gives purpose and meaning to…
Stop being so hard on ourselves! Following on from my previous blog about emotional dysregulation and how to name and tame our strong emotions, this blog looks at the importance of validating our emotions. When we experience intense feelings of anger or frustration, anxiety or disappointment, we often judge ourselves…
Emotional dysregulation is a term that seems to be used quite a lot these days meaning an inability to manage our emotional states. We may struggle to return to “baseline”, to soothe ourselves, after getting really angry or anxious or sad. Intense feelings seem to come too often, too quickly,…
My next few blogs, in a series about managing intense emotions, look at two particularly challenging emotions - panic attacks and emotional flashbacks. I will look at the differences between the two, suggest how to handle both, and focus, in this blog, on high levels of anxiety and panic attacks.…
One of the most common reasons people come to counselling is to find an answer to the question: “Why do I feel so emotional?” They may look for help around a wide range of emotions - managing anger, controlling anxiety and panic, guilt and shame, loneliness or overwhelming sadness. So…
This is the first in a series of blogs about managing emotions and is an introductory look at how we all experience a whole spectrum of emotions - and rather than instantly labelling then “good” or “bad”, we could simply see them as messengers, sources of information that can be…
The phrase "Tune into your Supersense" comes from the work of Steve Biddulph. Closely linked to my previous blog about the work of Lisa Feldman Barrett are powerful tools to manage our emotions, suggested by Biddulph and also by Eugene Gendlin. I really love Steve Biddulph’s ideas in his book…
Talking about fifty shades of crappy always brings a smile to people’s faces! This is the fourth in a series of blogs about managing stress. Stress is part and parcel of every day life, and can affect how we feel emotionally, mentally and physically and also how we behave. We…
This blog focuses a bit more on stress and the body. My previous blog looked at how as humans, we tend to spend so much time caught up in our thoughts, we can forget that we even have a body! Also that during the pandemic options to exercise were very…
This is the third in a series of blogs about stress and looks at effective ways of managing stress. If you search online for stress management tools, you will come across a huge variety of suggestions. These include progressive muscle relaxation, biofeedback, emotional freedom technique (sometimes called tapping), guided imagery,…
This is the second of two blogs looking at the grief and loss associated with loss of health - this blog looks at ways of adapting to loss of health. My first blog is here. A serious health problem can disrupt all aspects of our lives, whether it’s a chronic…
This is the third in a series of blogs about loss, focussing on loss of health. When we talk about loss we often mean the death of someone that we love. But actually our lives are full of small and not so small losses and we can experience grief when…