The following articles provide information about counselling and have been written by Helen from her Redlands base. Helen has been helping clients offering counselling services throughout Redland City for many years. Helen is now located at Mandala House in Cleveland. It’s a great location, near Raby Bay and a short walk from the Cleveland RSL and the local shopping strip.
On average I would get one couple a week who’ve experienced infidelity. People experience an array of emotions from sadness to anger, shock, disbelief. If your partner cheats, it's hard to understand why they would do that. What you do and what you decide to do afterwards is so important and so, therefore, I've created the 11 tips from the shock of infidelity. 1. Take a very, very big deep breath because you will be in shock. Scream, yell and cry. I think far too often people just don't give themselves the time and space to simply be. And what I mean by be, … Read More
Who doesn't want a heart centred marriage? When I’m writing about spirituality it's the connection with yourself and the universe and the search for the meaning of life. It’s not about religion, which is man-made but rather spiritual. God given spirituality. So, it's whatever you want to call it. In this context, spirituality or God or the universe. It's the creator, it's grace. It's an energy that's responsible for the planet and all the things in it and it is something so much bigger than us. I've been working in my private practice for 11 years and spirituality is different for every … Read More
When you're feeling hurt about something in your marriage it can build up over time. It's lots of little resentments that have built up and built up and you feel that you've been wronged in some way. You’re not being heard, validated, perhaps you feel invisible and not important. They begin to multiply if they haven't been dealt with at the time resentment begins to build. Feelings under resentment can include anger, sadness, doubt, grief and many more emotions. Getting to a place where you can learn to stop feeling the resentment and instead feel gratitude, peacefulness and compassion is the pathway … Read More
Self-esteem is crucial to having an empowered marriage. If you're traveling through life and we all are, each one of us we experience, thoughts and feelings and moments and memories. They all go towards building our personality, our perceptions and our behaviours. These experiences, help make us who we are, they influence the way we see ourselves in the world. If we have positive experiences, they help us feel accepted and happy within ourselves. If we have negative experiences, they eat away at our confidence and self-worth, particularly the period between zero and seven. That time we are like little sponges and … Read More
Are you wanting more emotional intimacy in your marriage? Perhaps you are at a point where actually there's no intimacy whatsoever, you're more like flatmates, no deep emotional connection. You might be sleeping in different bedrooms, you might be sleeping in different houses. You may be in a marriage where it has been good for a long time. However, perhaps you've been under a lot of stress, a lot of pressure the last six months. There's so many different variables and you're not feeling as connected to your partner and it is on your mind. It's worrying you because once, intimacy goes … Read More
Having been in business for 11 years I would have to say resentment is so common and the most damaging behaviour to have in a relationship. Resentment is an emotion that begins small and then builds and festers within you. It’s often an accumulation of months and sometimes years of unexpressed negative emotions. Sometimes it manifests itself as boredom. Other times it manifests itself as a mild persistent annoyance. And other times it appears as a snarky comment, withdrawal of affection, or a judgmental comment. Resentment is an emotion that builds and festers in the background. It usually isn’t a feeling that just … Read More
Criticism Defensiveness Contempt Stonewalling Criticism over time in a relationship will wear it down and erode it's self esteem. This behaviour doesn’t make for a happy relationship. Criticism is when you globally wrong your partner. For example, “you always ignore me in the afternoons” or “you never care about me.” It’s an attack which says there is something globally wrong with your partner. This is not supportive in a relationship and if it occurs regularly over time it is corrosive. Now there are times when feedback is necessary which is not criticizing but complaining. Complaining is feedback and is not corrosive. For … Read More
It still surprises me the amount of people who do not regularly self-reflect. I believe it’s crucial and a very powerful tool to improve the quality of your life. How often do you put up with and continue to do the same thing because its routine or habit? Self-improvement ensures you are feeling fulfilled as much as possible. 5 helpful questions to ask yourself include; Am I living true to myself, the authentic me? “A lot of the conflict you have in your life exists simply because you’re not living in alignment; you’re not be being true to yourself.” – Steve Sometimes … Read More
“If she just started doing ……………. then all would be good”! “I should be further along than this” “Why doesn’t he listen, really listen?” Hearing a theme here? All expectations of yourself or of your partner creates disappointment, heart break and in time erodes relationships. Having realistic expectations helps you accept the flaws of others and creates less pain in you. We need to take responsibility for our own life’s before we can expect others to do the same. We all have expectations in our lives of what we want and who we want to become. That is great on some level, … Read More
It’s so very common I’m sorry to say and by the time couples are seeing me the cat is out of the bag and the relationship is in crises. It’s extremely sad to experience the pain individuals go thru. It’s never going to stop, there will always be people who have affairs. Why you ask? Little Emotional Connection: The common reason I see is the lack of emotional connection. When you marry and start your life together your deeply in love and focused on each other. Your partner is a priority and then other areas of your life start to take your … Read More
