Abraham obeys when he is called out from his home by God, even though this must have been difficult for him not knowing exactly where he was being sent. God, sometimes calls on us to face these kinds of spontaneous changes.
Often, when we are seeking therapy, we are seeking something different in our lives, seeking a change or, for how to cope with a change. Whether it is due to grief, past trauma, anxiety, depression, or marital conflict, it is easy to feel stuck.
Miraculous change does not happen at one hour, once a week. I encourage my clients to take a more proactive approach. I encourage you and empower you to work through what we discuss in session, throughout the week, by reading suggested handouts and/or books and working towards personal goals set within these session.
Although each session is personalized, generally speaking, the first step in therapy is to become aware of the problem. Often, the problem is reinforced by the cycle of automatic, negative, self-talk and selective attention. Selective attention is the focus on negative or discouraging things that reinforce your negative thoughts or problems. Many times, you are unaware of the automatic thoughts and selective attention that keeps you “stuck” in a cycle that keeps you from moving forward.
Once awareness on how much time is spent on the problem, we can change the automatic self-talk and selective attention to what we want out of our lives. For example, we may start to think “if these issues did not exist, how would my life be different? or How did I make it for so long, maybe I am not as incapable as I thought?”
I will help you discover your strengths by pointing out how you have the ability to cope (as you have survived thus far). Together, we will focus on your desired outcomes and preferred future, and then set goals to help you achieve this outcome in order to move forward.
We can set realistic goals together to help challenge those initial thoughts and the behaviors that often result from these negative thoughts. Like, if you thought, “I can’t go to the store without people judging me, that is why I never go grocery shopping.” We are able to begin challenging that idea and bring awareness the selective attention you feel towards the one or two people who gave a mean look. Together we will then begin to set a goal; for example, stay focused and walk through the store for 5 minutes, and then reevaluate those feelings.
Challenging our beliefs and thoughts often results in long term change, as it also effects our self-concept, we begin to expand our faith and realize we are more capable than we initially thought.
I would love to work with you to promote this personalized change in your life.