Discover how Candy Salad is breaking down societal expectations and beliefs about 'healthy' eating! Click here to learn more about how Candy Salad encourages us to tap into sweetness and indulge without feeling guilt.
Living in Philadelphia can be vibrant and exciting, but it can also come with its share of stressors that contribute to anxiety. From bustling city life to work pressures and personal challenges, it's essential to have effective coping strategies in place. In this blog post, we'll delve into practical tips and techniques specifically tailored to help individuals in Philadelphia manage their anxiety and improve their mental well-being.
Discover valuable insights and support for navigating infertility challenges with this blog post. As a mental health guide specializing in infertility, Karen offers compassionate guidance on acknowledging emotions, creating meaningful traditions, setting boundaries, and practicing self-compassion. Her blog is a resource for couples seeking resilience, hope, and connection on their journey to parenthood.
Explore the intersection of spirituality and therapy as we embark on a transformative journey towards holistic well-being. Dive deep into the realm of self-discovery, healing, and personal growth, blending the wisdom of spiritual practices with the insights of therapeutic modalities. Discover how integrating spirituality into therapy can nurture profound healing, cultivate resilience, and foster inner peace.
"Discover ways to overcome PTSD and trauma symptoms caused by abuse, neglect, narcissistic abuse, grief, and loss. Explore your patterns to bring intention and affirmation into your life. Click our blog to learn more!
Effective communication is based more on how you say things rather than on what you actually say. A conversation can go very well or wind up in a lot of anger and upset, depending on the communication style used. Our means of communication impacts all facets of life.
Before searching for a trauma specialist in Bryn Mawr, Pennsylvania, you may want to consider what, exactly you are looking for. Do you want to learn skills to help you tolerate the trauma memories? Or would you prefer to engage in deeper therapeutic work to get underneath the trauma so that it can heal at the core?
DBT has 4 tenants: distress tolerance, interpersonal effectiveness, emotion regulation and mindfulness. These skills are essential when doing trauma work for PTSD and for many other difficulties such as anxiety, depression, anger management, eating disorders, self-harm and addiction.
These skills are the building blocks that will allow you to be able to function and tolerate uncomfortable memories and emotions as you dive deeper into the healing work.
When looking for a trauma specialist in Bryn Mawr, you’ll also want to take the time to find out the model or theory that the therapist uses to help navigate your therapy. If you’re looking for a safe space to process and talk things out make sure you find a counselor who is great at talk therapy. If you are looking for evidence based interventions to help you DO something with the traumatic material, you may want to investigate something like EMDR. If you want to work more from the body or a creative place, you may want to look for an art therapist, a yoga therapist or an experiential or psycho-dramatic therapist. Ideally, you’ll find a therapist who is able to choose a therapeutic tool from a large tool belt with many choices.
Successful therapy is mostly about your commitment to healing. Your counselor may ask you to consider abstaining from addictive substances, behaviors or eating disordered behaviors, especially while you’re engaged in trauma work. If you’re doing drugs, engaging in self harm or throwing up your food while you’re trying to heal from PTSD, it can side-track the process. Instead of taking the time in between sessions to allow your psyche to continue to process and digest the trauma, engaging in behaviors can numb the emotions and make it less likely that you will process and be ready for your next session. When you commit to your own healing process, it means you are willing to look at all aspects of your life and work towards shifting the things that no longer serve you.
If you engage in therapy every week, it creates synergistic momentum as opposed to dropping in only when you’re experiencing anxiety or depressive symptoms. Committing to consistent therapy will help you heal faster and more completely. What is your level of commitment to healing from a traumatic past?
If you’re looking for a trauma specialist near Bryn Mawr, Pennsylvania and need some helping finding the right person for you, please feel free to give us a call at 484-784-6244 for a free 15 minute initial consultation. We are happy to help you find the right trauma therapist for you.
Anger is a tricky emotion, especially in our society. We get messages that anger is “bad” and that we should never show it. While we certainly don’t want to take our anger out sideways on innocent bystanders and we don’t want to rage at people we have anger towards, anger isn’t a “bad” emotion to be pushed away and shamed for. It is healthy to acknowledge, honor and express our anger as long as we’re not hurting anyone in the process. Here are three ways to channel your anger:
Mindfully check in with your body and notice where the anger lives. You may notice that when you’re angry, you clench your jaw. Many of us store anger in our jaws. Perhaps when you get heated, you feel your face flush. Do you notice that you make a fist? Or are you more someone who feels ashamed for having anger, so it’s stuffed down and manifests itself in an upset stomach or feelings of self-loathing? However your anger manifests itself, the first step towards freedom is to acknowledge that you are, in fact, angry, even if you’re not quite sure why.
Trying to put the judgment aside, see if you can think back to when you first started noticing the anger. Sometimes people believe that the key to anger management is to push the anger away and try to ignore it. But, I’m of the belief system that what we resist, persists. So if you want to get free of your rage and really learn anger management, try allowing yourself to be angry without doing anything about it, just noticing it in your body.
For more help with anger management, contact us here.
What else do you find helpful for anger management? Write your responses here:
The Dialectical Behavioral Therapy (or DBT) tenant called Interpersonal Effectiveness teaches us how to be a more effective communicator through learned to be a better listener. We have always known that progress depends on the ability to communicate effectively. The most effective communication does not begin with what a person says, but how well they hear the person they are communicating with. Only by listening effectively can you respond appropriately inany situation.
Throughout all forms of communication (reading, seeing, speaking, listening), we spend 40% of that time listening. And yet, we get less training in listening than in any other kind of communication. All throughout childhood, we are taught how to speak, how to read, but very little time is spent on learning how to listen. Learning to listen is difficult, but worth it.
For instance:
You can not NOT communicate. We're communicating verbally or nonverbally all the time.
Whenever contact is made, some form of communication does occur.
The true meaning of something is not in the words we use, it's in how people interpret the words.
Yet the meanings cannot be transferred. We can't just put a computer file directly in someone's head. We can only send the words. So listening becomes a critical skill if we are going to fully understand the meaning someone is trying to send us.
We have the ability to listen in many different ways - it is important to be able to distinguish how we are approaching our communication so that we are prepared to handle it effectively.
People are more likely to listen if you feel inspired by what you are hearing or if you are enjoying yourself. You’re not necessarily interested in the details when you are using Appreciative Listening, rather you are more focused on the impression of the experience.
This style is often a sounding-board to others. A person would offer support to the person they are listening to. They focus specifically on the feelings revealed by the person they are listening to. If you are often approached by people who need to confide or vent about something, you will know that's your typical approach to listening! This style is much more focused on offering compassion.
A comprehensive listener can recognize key details between one message and another even when the speaker is less than organized. They can also recognize when someone doesn't understand what is being said and can re-explain clearly in their own words.
This approach of listening wants to get all the information and may take detailed notes. Distractions can be very disturbing when using this listening approach. An example would be when other people are talking in class and you are trying to get all the notes.
When listening with an evaluative approach, the listener will not automatically accept what is being said as true just because an expert says it. If they disagree, they will simply stop listening. They will also be more doubtful if the speaker is too passionate about their topic. This approach can be helpful when evaluating something and making a decision about it.
It can be highly useful to adapt your listening approach to the needs of the situation. For example, if a close friend is sharing their difficulties with you, you would want to be empathic and not evaluative. You have probably had the experience of someone giving you unsolicited advice when you really just wanted them to empathize with you! The opposite can also be true. When you recognize the correct listening approach in any situation, and use the appropriate listening approach, you can build better relationships, make the correct decisions and use your interpersonal effectiveness skills. It all starts with learning how to listen!
Megan Delp, MFTI
Megan is a pre-licensed Marriage and Family Therapist specializing in couples counseling and individual therapy for those struggling with depression, anxiety and relationship issues. Megan practices with Spilove Psychotherapy in West Chester, Pennsylvania and on the Main Line of Philadelphia in Bryn Mawr. For more information or to schedule a free 15 minute phone consultation, contact us here.
