Empatherapies in Sunshine Coast, Queensland | Counsellor

Empatherapies

Locality: Sunshine Coast, Queensland

Phone: +61 411 304 883

Address: 21 Bunya St. MALENY & 58 Ballinger. Rd BUDERIM Sunshine Coast, QLD, Australia

Website: http://empatherapies.com

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• Medical and health
• Counsellor
• Psychotherapist
• Marriage therapist

25.01.2022 Go gently in these turbulent times

25.01.2022 Some useful context to anxiety felt in adult life

24.01.2022 It gets better

24.01.2022 There is no new life without death

24.01.2022 A beautiful reflection on the importance of honouring our feelings

24.01.2022 Many people are feeling burnt out at this time of year and THIS year in particular. It’s ok to slow down, to pause, rest, say no and grant yourself what you truly need.

23.01.2022 Good reminder at a time where we are facing travel restrictions

23.01.2022 A great reminder for parents

22.01.2022 There is a great deal of data emerging on the benefits of singing as a way to regulate (calm & balance) our nervous system. Intuitively we all know this. Sing at every opportunity. You will be happier

22.01.2022 A beautiful reflection on grief by the extraordinary Matt Licata

21.01.2022 When I say the feminine, I don’t mean gender. I mean the feminine principle that is livingor suppressedin both men and women. The feminine principle attempts ...to relate. Instead of breaking things off into parts, it says, Where are we alike? How can we connect? Where is the love? Can you listen to me? Can you really hear what I am saying? Can you see me? Do you care whether you see me or not? Now, these are very serious questions. And the feminine is difficult to talk about because so few people have experienced it. The feminine is presence, and relatedness, and a heart that can open so that when you meet another person you actually are seeing that person’s authentic self. What meaning does human life have if nobody has ever seen you? I can’t tell you the number of peoplemen and womenwho have sat in my office sobbing, saying, Nobody ever saw me. Nobody ever had time to listen. So I am unlovablethe saddest word in the language. Sometimes I’ve had a real flood of feeling about somebody, and I put out my hand and they say, Don’t touch me. I’m unlovable. And they mean it. As a child, that person was raised where the feminine was not present. You have to experience the feminine to understand it. Ask yourself: As a child, who saw you? Who heard you? Was there anyone with whom you could be totally yourself and to whom you could trust your heart responses and speak your soul responses? Someone who made you think, Gosh, I am somebody. They’re happy that I’m here. The great work of our time is to bring the feminine into this culture. And it’s not an easy path. How does each one of us contribute? Believe it or not, it’s done in the most personal ways. Take time to listen to your dreams, to write them down. Take time to recognise that there are things going on within you that need to be felt, or said, or lived, or grieved. Pay attention to these things both in yourself and in the people in your life. Pay attention to the authentic self. ...Love is the real power. It’s the energy that cherishes. The more you work with that energy, the more you will see how people respond naturally to it, and the more you will want to use it. It brings out your creativity and helps everyone around you flower. Your children, the people you work witheveryone blooms everyone blooms. ~ Marion Woodman. art | George Yepes

20.01.2022 We often hear people say, I cried like a baby, after they listen to or watch something that touches them deeply. Of course, crying is a very good thing, essen...tial for healthy functioning. But its not just a baby thing. Its also an adult thing. You didnt just cry like a baby. You also cried like an adult. And thats a beautiful thing, too. We have been shaming and shunning healthy emotional release for centuries. Its a mark of adulthood to put your feelings away. And it is killing us. So, the next time you have a good cry, make a different kind of pronouncement: I CRIED LIKE AN ADULT. And then, take it to the next level... I CRIED LIKE A HUMAN! And set the world free. See more

20.01.2022 With practice, we can see that our wounded child is not only us. Our wounded child may represent several generations. Our mother may have suffered throughout he...r life. Our father may have suffered. Perhaps our parents weren’t able to look after the wounded child in themselves. So when we’re embracing the wounded child in us, we are embracing all the wounded child in our past generations. This practice is not a practice for ourselves alone, but for numberless generations of ancestors and descendants. Thich Nhat Hanh art | Christian Schloe

19.01.2022 Exquisite advice

19.01.2022 A wonderful reminder that we are all connected. When we deeply consider or meditate on this it can ease the pain of physical isolation

18.01.2022 I commonly recommend yoga to clients to manage depression and anxiety. Centuries of evidence and modern research is consistently pointing to the incredible benefits of yoga. It has been an integral self care practice for me for over thirty years.

18.01.2022 Think about it, philosophically, there is so much to unpack here. .............................................................. ~ Learn the way of the dude, dudeism.com ~

18.01.2022 follow your wild. she is guiding you home. ~ Tania Hart IG: @iamtaniahart... Art by Lucy Campbell www.lupiart.com

18.01.2022 It’s like a dance. And we have to give each being space to dance their dance. Everything is dancing; even the molecules inside the cells are dancing. But we mak...e our lives so heavy. We have these incredibly heavy burdens we carry with us like rocks in a big rucksack. We think that carrying this big heavy rucksack is our security; we think it grounds us. We don’t realize the freedom, the lightness of just dropping it off, letting it go. That doesn’t mean giving up relationships; it doesn’t mean giving up one’s profession, or one’s family,or one’s home. It has nothing to do with that; it’s not an external change. It’s an internal change. It’s a change from holding on tightly to holding very lightly. ~ Jetsunma Tenzin Palmo [Image: Rob Howarth]

18.01.2022 Were in a moment that highlights the fault lines in our society. I ask you to consider the difference between solidarity and reform. To understand that when we... say things like we just want to go back to the way things were, that we fundamentally exclude those for whom the status quo has always been unjust. When it comes to addressing the collective trauma that defines the Black American experience, there is a systemic unwillingness to recognize the conditions under which our country was founded and to make reparations for these specific historical injustices. For our continued work as a community, I ask every one of us who benefit from this system to look backwards in discomfort and to have the difficult conversations. To relearn our shared history. And to ask ourselves: What are my blindspots? What specific actions will I take to make this a more just world? Am I willing to engage and to make mistakes? As a cross-cultural therapist, my renewed commitment is to helping people live their relationships in a society that grants them justice, equality, and dignity. And that means working to make the field of psychotherapy diverse, accessible, and culturally and structurally competent. I acknowledge my own white privilege and the responsibility of my platform. Right now I believe it is a time to listen attentively, to accept the discomfort when my own blindspots are revealed to me, and to amplify black voices. I encourage you to learn from and support these accounts: Afrosexology Baratunde Thurston Boris L Henson Foundation Dr. Erlanger Turner, Clinical Psychologist Equal Justice Initiative Ibram X. Kendi Awesomely Luvvie Brittany Packnett Rachel Cargle (instagram.com/rachel.cargle) The Conscious Kid Arron Muller (instagram.com/theblack_therapist) The Loveland Foundation Therapy For Black Girls TherapyForBlackMen.org (instagram.com/therapyforblkmen) To educate and act, visit blacklivesmatters.carrd.co. (If you havent already, you must read and listen to The 1619 Project.) I welcome you to add your own recommendations in the comments below.

17.01.2022 Each of us can contribute to the sanity of this world

16.01.2022 Even if we disagree about everything, we can still be kind to each other. Matthew L. Jacobson My Mum used to say to me when I was sounding off about someone, ...It would be a sad world if we were all the same Pennie". I was too young to know it then, but diversity is the big feature of life on this planet. Nevertheless, some of us have a bit of a problem when it comes to diversity of views, opinions, theories and ideas. Wed like to think that our view is right. And it is. Its right for us, just as their view is right for them. Kindly agreeing to disagree is a skill worth mastering. It leaves everyone a place to stand with dignity. #wouldyouratherberightorhappy #agreetodisagree #bekindalways #bekind #dountoothersasyouwouldhavethemdountoyou

15.01.2022 Healthy anger is essential for individual and collective change. This is why it has been shunned and contained in religion, in spirituality, and in various poli...tical environments. By suppressing our capacity for anger, they keep us compliant and manipulated. They cant control us if we have access to our healthy anger... See more

15.01.2022 Just be alive today. It is enough

13.01.2022 If you want a relationship that stands the test of time, commit to each other knowing your number one reason is to create a secure-functioning, thriving partner...ship. You cant grow and develop toward higher complexity as a creative, productive, and socially advanced human being if your sense of safety and security in your relationship is compromised. If either of you feels unsafe, untrusting, or insecure, you will lack the internal resources for personal and mutual growth. Your mind will instead be preoccupied with doubt and threat.

13.01.2022 We are all connected.

12.01.2022 Some simple strategies to prepare your children to manage risks

11.01.2022 Read here >> https://www.elephantjournal.com//a-letter-to-my-younger-s/

11.01.2022 Micro Mindful Moments throughout the day can completely change your mental and emotional state. Try it

10.01.2022 Distress causes the primitive parts of our brain to take control, which inhibits our ability to act rationally. This is one reason why it’s important to learn... to read your partner well. What do they do when they begin to feel threatened or hurt? How does their face look? What does their voice sound like? When you notice them becoming distressed during an argument, take a moment to pause and relieve them. Don’t return to the fight until they are feeling calm and in control. Your ability to do this will make it easier to properly resolve issues between the two of you.

09.01.2022 Great reminder that fear and courage are great companions

08.01.2022 A beautiful blessing to release disappointment and resentment within ourselves

07.01.2022 When we scapegoat, we project what is dark, shameful, and denied about ourselves onto others. This shadow side of our personality, as Carl Jung called it, rep...resents hidden or wounded aspects of ourselves, the thing a person has no wish to be, and acts in a complementary and often compensatory manner to our persona or public mask, what oneself as well as others think one is. ...Sylvia Brinton Perera in her book, The Scapegoat Complex, writes: We apply the term scapegoat to individuals and groups who are accused of causing misfortune. This serves to relieve others, the scapegoaters, of their own responsibilities, and to strengthen the scapegoaters' sense of power and righteousness. ...Scapegoating means finding the one or ones who can be identified with evil or wrong-doing, blamed for it, and cast out of the community in order to leave the remaining members with a feeling of guiltlessness. ...The tyrannical force of scapegoating, with its cruel thrusts of accusatory judgments, can also erupt in our own backyards. This closer-to-home variety of scapegoating is especially important to note since we may find ourselves condemning bullies and world leaders while denying our own inclination to split off and project fears and anxieties onto our intimates and neighbors. The scapegoat-victim in families is often the black sheep, the child who, like the ancient sacrificial goat, serves the miserable role of carrying the unconscious shadow parts of her parents. These children may present with psychological problems and exhibit addictive or self-destructive behavior, but a deeper look into family dynamics points to a lack of awareness of the influence of parents’ unconscious feelings. Carl Jung believed that scapegoating revealed something fundamental about our psyche. He maintained that we all have a shadow side to our personality. As he wrote in Archetype and the Collective Unconscious, The shadow personifies everything that the subject refuses to acknowledge about himself. Our shadow aspects cause us anguish, and much of our mental energy is enlisted in the denial of our perceived imperfections, but we cannot see our shadow aspects except through projection. In Alchemical Studies, Jung wrote, One does not become enlightened by imagining figures of light, but by making darkness conscious." It is everybody’s allotted fate to become conscious of and learn to deal with this shadow ...The world will never reach a state of order until this truth is generally recognized. Carl Jung. --Dale M. Kushner (From the article, How Facing our "Shadow" can release us from Scapegoating.) art | Andrey Remnev

06.01.2022 Sometimes, #children who have issues self-regulating or who regularly fall off their chairs or who are in constant motion or who have uncommon troubles with ...toilet training may be having #sensory difficulties that need to be compassionately recognised and addressed. We’ve all heard of the 5 senses. Yet there are actually 8 main senses that are part of the sensory system of the body. Some would say there are even more, depending on how they define the word senses (main, basic, primary, etc). Unfortunately, even just considering the main 8 senses, 3 of them are virtually unheard of, not just because they are hard to explain and pronounce, but also because they only come up when there’s a problem. Another reason many have not heard of sensory processing or integration issues confined to the additional 3 senses is because of a debate that continues to unfurl in the wider clinical community. It is occupational therapists (OTs) who first theorised that sensory processing and sensory integration issues are a source of distress for many children and their families. Many issues still progress unrecognised by other specialists as they are sometimes not diagnosed under neurodevelopmental disorders or sensory processing issues. Yet it is indisputable across the disciplines that identifying sensory issues and working with an OT helps many children become calmer and better regulated. All parents and educators who wish to optimise children's physical development should have a recognition of a child's 8 developing senses, and not just limit #play and learning opportunities to the realms of #sight, #sound, #smell, #taste and #touch. The other 3 senses and how to recognise problems with them are explored below #VESTIBULAR SYSTEM The vestibular system includes the parts of the inner ear and brain that help control balance, eye movement and spatial orientation. It helps keep you stable and upright. It is the leading system informing us about movement and position of head relative to gravity. A body's movements include two positions rotations and linear directionality, all of which need development. The vestibular system sends signals primarily to the neural parts of the #brain that control our eye movements and that keep us balanced and upright. #PROPRIOCEPTION The proprioceptive system senses the position, location, orientation, and movement of the body muscles and joints. Proprioception provides us with the sense of the relative position of neighbouring parts of the body and effort used to move body parts. Proprioception is activated by input to a proprioceptor in the periphery of the body. The proprioceptive sense combines sensory information from neurons in the inner ear (detecting motion and orientation) and stretch receptors in the muscles and the joint-supporting ligaments for stance. Because of proprioception, if you raise your hand, you know that your arm is over your head. You don't have to think about it or look in a mirror. Kids who have trouble with the vestibular sense or proprioception could struggle with motor skills in a number of ways. They may seem awkward and clumsy. An activity like running or even going up and down stairs may be hard for kids who have difficulty knowing how their body is oriented and whether it's stable. They may move slowly or avoid activities that are too challenging. They may not know their own strength and use more muscles than they need for simple tasks, breaking pencil tips, ripping pages or giving overenthusiastic hugs. They may not like physical activities that other kids find fun. For example, they may not feel safe on the swings because they're not getting the sensory input that tells them they're securely seated. They may be in constant motion, bump into things or seem out of control. When kids don't get enough feedback from the sensory system, they may exaggerate their movements to get the information they need from the environment. When they walk down a hallway, they may knock into the wall to feel more anchored. They may kick their legs under their desk for the same reason. They may love physical activity like doing flips off the diving board or just jumping up and down. #INTEROCEPTION Interoception refers to sensations related to the physiological/physical condition of the body. Interoceptors are internal sensors that provide a sense of what our internal organs are feeling. Hunger and thirst are examples of interoception. It detects responses that guide regulation, including hunger, heart rate, respiration and elimination. The stimulation is detected through nerve endings lining the respiratory and digestive mucous membranes, and it works alongside the vestibular and proprioceptive senses to determine how a person perceives their own body. Well-modulated interoception helps the person detect sensations normally. For example, if a person feels their heart pounding, while it is not comfortable, trauma from the stimulation is not likely; nor will the stimulation be craved. The same is true for hunger and thirst, as well as the feeling of the need to urinate or have a bowel movement. Kids who struggle with the interoceptive sense may have trouble knowing when they feel hungry, full, hot, cold or thirsty. Having trouble with this sense can also make self-regulation a challenge. Most of us know if we're hungry, full, hot, cold, thirsty, nauseated, itchy or ticklish. For kids with sensory processing issues, the brain may have trouble making sense of that information. They may not be able to tell when they're feeling pain or when their bladder is full. An itch may feel like pain or pain may feel ticklish. Kids who struggle with the interoceptive sense can also have trouble feeling their emotions. They may not be as tuned in to the body cues that help interpret emotion. Without being able to feel and interpret those body sensations, it's harder to clearly identify the emotion. For instance, a child may not feel fear because they don't recognise that their muscles are tense, their breathing is shallow and their heart is racing. Kids who are under-responsive to interoceptive sensory input may not feel or respond to sensations when they should. They may take longer than other kids to learn to use the toilet or have more frequent accidents. They may not eat as often as others because they may not feel hunger or thirst. WHAT CAN YOU DO? If you suspect your child has sensory processing issues, consider having them evaluated by an occupational therapist (OT) who specialises in sensory integration. Follow the instructions from your therapist and spend some quality time together having fun. With vestibular sense or proprioception, you may find yourself helping your child complete activities that give them opportunities to use their arms and legs at the same time. Encourage your child to spend time in free play. Make a home obstacle course, show them how to do a push-up, or just have them help rake leaves and carry groceries. With interoception, you may find that a therapist directs your child more towards mindfulness activities like meditation, which can help kids be more aware of interoceptive sensations in their bodies. Heavy work (activity that pushes or pulls against the body) or a sensory diet may be helpful as well. The point is to give your child the sensory input that they need to feel in control of their body. When they get this information, it will help them feel more stable and focused. One of the reasons that children so naturally want to fidget, jump, balance, climb, and run around with each other is because of their natural instincts to develop all of their 8 senses as they grow. Over time, most kids will figure out their own strategies to work around their weaknesses and play to their strengths. https://childmind.org/ar/the-debate-over-sensory-processing https://www.misophoniainternational.com/you-have-8-senses-n https://www.understood.org//interoception-and-sensory-proc https://www.understood.org//how-sensory-processing-issues- #neurochild #letthemplay #sensory #physicality

06.01.2022 Joy appears now in the little things. The big themes remain tragic but a leaf fluttered in through the window this morning, as if supported by the rays of the s...un, a bird settled on the fire escape, joy in the taste of coffee. Joy accompanied me as I walked to the press. The secret of joy is the mastery of pain. ~ Anaïs Nin [Art: Tetsuhiro Wakabayashi]

06.01.2022 Until you make the unconscious conscious, it will direct your life and you will call it fate. -C.G. Jung... Art by Catrin Welz-Stein

06.01.2022 Excellent advice in these uncertain times.

05.01.2022 Beautiful Wisdom

05.01.2022 Wherever you go, you can find beauty there. Take a few minutes to find beauty today - and you can some suggestions on where to look here: https://bit.ly/2AGYmzK

04.01.2022 In 1966, a friend took me to the Atlanta Airport. When we were saying good-bye she asked, Is it all right to hug a Buddhist monk? In my country, we’re not use...d to expressing ourselves that way, but I thought, I’m a Zen teacher. It should be no problem for me to do that. So I said, Why not? and she hugged me, but I was quite stiff. While on the plane, I decided that if I wanted to work with friends in the West, I would have to learn the culture of the West. So I invented hugging meditation. Hugging meditation is a combination of East and West. According to the practice, you have to really hug the person you are holding. You have to make him or her very real in your arms, not just for the sake of appearances, patting him on the back to pretend you are there, but breathing consciously and hugging with all your body, spirit, and heart. Hugging meditation is a practice of mindfulness. Breathing in, I know my dear one is in my arms, alive. Breathing out, she is so precious to me. If you breathe deeply like that, holding the person you love, the energy of your care and appreciation will penetrate into that person and she will be nourished and bloom like a flower. - Thich Nhat Hanh, in How to Love.

04.01.2022 Excellent read for all parents, teachers & caregivers of tweens & teens.

03.01.2022 Feel your feet on the floor as you breathe deeply, directing your energy toward the ground. ... Roots emerging out of the bottom of your feet and extending down into the earth. Into the mud and womb, holding you exactly as you are. Photo by Pezibear

02.01.2022 Saying NOconfidently and clearly is difficult for many people who have a long history of prioritising others needs before their own. Saying NO is a critical part of self care. So often when we say NO to others we are saying YES to ourselves.

02.01.2022 This is how Iceland turned its teenagers from heavy drinkers to model citizens.

01.01.2022 It is such a blessing to have a Counselling Therapy Room in this practice with the extraordinary Jo Sexton. Not only has she successfully treated a lifetime of my chronic back pain, she improves the well being of so many clients and friends I send her way.