Love is action. This includes self love. For anyone familiar with bell hooks, you will know that she was a social activist, writer and professor, who offered blazing and vital critiques on class, race and sexism. Her work is brilliant, though provoking and necessary. In ‘All About love’ she critiques the passive notion of romantic …
Tag Archives: counsellinginbelfast
Healing with the help of a community.
Over New Years, I attended a retreat for gay, bi, queer and trans men. It was a really challenging and powerful experience. Since returning home, I have been thinking alot about the role of a community in healing an individuals emotional pain. We (In the Western world) live in such an individualistic society and increasingly …
ADHD in the Therapy room with Aspire Autism Consultancy.
I have recently finished some enlightening training on working with ADHD in the counselling room with the lovely Deborah & Ruth at Aspire Autism Consultancy. I have done alot of training courses over the years, and this has felt like one of the most important. I often work with queer, trans or LGB clients who …
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Dr Meg-John Barker-Fear/Shame & the anatomy of a trauma response.
As I have mentioned before in earlier blogs, I am a big fan of the work of Dr Meg-John Barker. Their website rewritingtherules.com contains many useful writings and resources that can help with understanding our identities and the mental health challenges we humans can sometimes face. They are a queer, non-binary psychotherapist, lecturer, author …
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Internalized homophobia
Internalized homophobia (or queer, bi, and transphobia) is a phenomenon that effects LGBTQ people in varying degrees. Internalized homophobia is ‘internalizing’ of negative messages from the environment around us (media, politicians, family members, schools, religious figures) and turning this negativity towards ourselves. It is what happens when negative voices that start outside ourselves are absorbed …
Why learning to be a better friend to your self might be the best thing you can do for your mental health…
This article originally appeared in GNI magazine May edition, link below: https://issuu.com/lambpromotions/docs/gni_mag_51_print Mental Health week, which runs from 9-15th May each year, is an opportunity to reflect as a society on how to increase good mental health and wellbeing and look at some of the things that contribute to poor mental health in our population. …
Belonging.
“When I get to be myself I belong, if I have to be like you I fit in”. Belonging and connection are themes that are often appear in counselling. It sometimes feels that most often at heart of what clients bring to counselling are feelings of not belonging and not connecting. This can be with …
Languishing…maybe one of the most relatable moods of this last year?
“The absence of wellbeing..languishing is the vast, meh-coloured desert between flourishing and depression, a general condition of non-thriving” You know you are languishing if you experience burnout, you feel numb, it’s hard to focus and your mojo has disappeared. And most important, it is a rational reaction to a very irrational year. What to do …
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On Connection
“We are empathic beings who feel for each other. Our very success as a species is rooted in our ability to be aware of each other’s needs, to notice each other’s pain and to experience deeply felt physiological and emotional empathy.”― Kae Tempest, On Connection I recently read the beautiful book “On Connection” by poet, performer, …
A counsellor in lockdown.
We are now over two months into lockdown. Throughout this time I have continued working with clients (through the agency I work for as a co-cultural counsellor), moving my practice to video or phone sessions, which are working well. My work with clients during this time has in many ways mirrored my own thinking and …
Nat Creighton Counselling 