Positive CBT and Narrative Therapy
aka Talk Therapy
"Words of comfort skillfully administered are the oldest therapy known to man" - Louis Nizer
One of the best predictors of good therapy outcomes is the relationship between therapist and client. Talk Therapy or psychotherapy is one of the oldest forms of psychology. Cathy is well-versed in narrative therapy as well as Positive CBT. These approaches are proven highly effective for those with a trauma background, depression, anxiety, exposure to domestic violence, grief and loss, etc.
Narrative therapy is a respectful, non-blaming approach to counselling, which centers people as the experts in their own lives. It looks at the story the individual comes in with, and works to help them re-story the narrative to highlight strength and resilience rather than maladaptive patterns.
CBT is one of the long-running gold-standard therapies for working on various problems that impact functioning. CBT works on catching the automatic thoughts and messages and making them conscious, and then allowing people to change one of the three elements of the cognition triangle: Thoughts, Behaviours or Emotions.
Mindfulness and Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction (MBSR)
"Take a deep breath and let yourself open like the sky. Feel your mind and heart open to vastness…. rest in this spaciousness, the clear sky of awareness—it is your own true nature, it is home.” – Jack Kornfield
Mindfulness has both active and passive techniques and can help reduce stress and nurture deep, embodied well-being. It is based on using a time-tested and research-supported approach to healing that has the potential to be of significant benefit no matter what obstacles we may be facing. Mindfulness is about staying in the present and living a life worth living and is good for those who struggle with anxiety, depression, or other mood concerns.
Cathy was one of the first to bring MBSR approach to Medicine Hat. Mindfulness is a powerful technique that came out of the research of Jon Kabat Zinn on preventing negative outcomes in those who had cardiac issues. Cathy has previously offered workshops and groups for mindfulness as well as one to one coaching.
According to Jon Kabat Zinn, the word for 'mind' and the word for 'heart' are the same. If you're not experiencing mindfulness in some deep way as heartfulness, you're not really understanding it. Compassion and kindness towards oneself are intrinsically woven into mindfulness. You could think of mindfulness as wise and affectionate attention.
Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing (EMDR)
Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing has made waves after Prince Harry did a documentary around mental health and disclosed that he has used this method in his own recovery. EMDR is from Francine Shapiro’s work on recovery from highly emotionally charged events by using dual attention stimulation to remove the negative charge of memories and to reprocess traumatic memories to address negative core beliefs.
EMDR uses visualization and narrative techniques to help address the memory and the core beliefs attached to the incident itself. It is accepted as another gold standard for treating trauma, phobias, eating disorders, grief, and other somatic complaints.
For more information, please watch this intro to EMDR Video: click here
Accelerated Resolution Therapy (ART)
Cathy holds basic, advanced and enhanced certificates in ART. ART is fast becoming the go to therapy for clients experiencing Occupational Stress Injuries. It provides relief of life altering mental health challenges, including, addiction, phobia, anxiety, depression, OCD, grief, and PTSD. It frequently serves as a last recourse for people who have exhausted numerous other techniques. ART is being adopted by Alberta Health Services across the province as part of their Trauma Informed Practice model.
ART is unique because the ART Therapist guides the client to replace the negative images in the mind that cause the symptoms of Post-Traumatic Stress with positive images of the client’s choosing. This can be done without having to tell your therapist all the details of the memory being reprocessed.
See this video about ART from it’s creator Laney Rosenzweig: click here
Make today the start of a supportive, confidential and healing conversation.
Connect with Inviting Conversations today for a complimentary consultation and take the first step towards change.