Scientifically Researched-Based Proven Techniques

Therapeutic Approaches

are the lens through which a counsellor addresses their clients' problems

A therapeutic approach is the theory by which a therapist frames how they view human relationships and the issues that occur for people throughout their lives. One way to think of a therapeutic approach is that it is the lens that a therapist looks through when they are considering and addressing their client’s problem. Nasim has experience in applying the following therapeutic modalities in her practice:

EMDR Therapy

Emotion Regulation
and Sand Play

Parts Work

Sensorimotor
Psychotherapy

Exploring and Processing
Through Art

Mindfulness

EMDR Therapy

In 1987 Francie Shapiro (founder) began to study the way mind can heal itself naturally through bilateral stimulation, such as rapid eye movements. During 20 years of research, EMDR (Eye Movement and Desensitisation and Reprocessing Therapy) was found to be a scientifically proven therapy in treating:

Parts Work

Parts Work has been developed and inspired based upon the Internal Family Systems psychotherapy, which is a powerfully transformative, evidence-based model of psychotherapy. In doing the Parts Work, we acknowledge that the mind is naturally multiple, and our inner parts contain valuable qualities and perhaps hold burdens or vulnerabilities of the past. In the Buddhist tradition these states are called mental formations, or habitual patterns, in Sensorimotor Psychotherapy these are called our Procedural Learnings, Piaget and the Cognitive Behaviourists refer to them as Schemas. Psychosynthesis refers to them as subpersonalities and psychodynamic psychologists refer to them as ego states. Nasim, like many other IFS informed therapists, calls them Parts.

In sessions with Nasim, all parts are welcome. The parts that you may have perceived as negative in your life, have a driving force to try and protect you.

Effects

This approach will help you increase an awareness and understanding of the nature of your core self. This work will help you identify the source to your disturbing thoughts, and to establish an accepting relationship with your life experiences.

Self Awareness

Through applying this modality, you will be supported to identify and understand your different parts and receive help in building a more positive relationship with the most damaged and neglected parts of you.

Freedom

This work leads to achieving neural integration and overall harmony and acceptance of the self, which inevitably leads to easing down your visceral responses to trauma or daily stressors.

Sensorimotor Psychotherapy

“The Body Keeps the Score” (Dr Bessel van der Kolk) and it “speaks clearly to those who know how to listen” (Pat Ogdan).

When You feel Emotions

With every moment, our brains and bodies take in a load of sensory stimulation from the environment. Memory is stored at an explicit and implicit level, through three different channels of images, thoughts, emotions (body sensations).

With every emotion felt, there is a muscle that moves. If the same emotion persists, overtime, the muscles movements associated to that emotion become more dominant. This results in physiological changes over time such as different postures or different type of walking.

Early Experiences

Unless you turn the unconscious into conscious, it is going to run your life and you are going to call it “Faith”. Early experiences are remembered as a series of unconscious expectations that the body carries. Our bodies will reflect and sustain efforts to meet the expectations of our attachment figures throughout life, and it carries out the same patterned preferences later in life. Traumatized clients typically have a compromised social engagement system and cannot accurately neurocept safety even in non-threatening environments (Sahar, Shalves & Porges).

Due to this, clients whom their safety and protection have been compromised as young children through inadequate attachments, lack the ability to regulate arousal and respond effectively to their environment. Their bodies carry messages of fear and cognitive distortions through life.

Result

These messages result in the client experiencing intense, raw emotions of fear, shame, anger or even frozen, numb, tense or constantly ready to fight or flight. Such clients experience these bodily sensations as panic attacks, anxiety or numbness that depression brings. With the use of Sensorimotor Psychotherapy, we help you build a relationship with your body through mindful activities, and help you focus your attention to your internal processes.

In Sensorimotor Psychotherapy, strategies such as Somatic Resourcing (meditation, breathing and grounding) or Somatic Sequencing (learning to sit with body sensations for longer periods) are taught, in order to increase your window of tolerance for your physiological experiences.

More on that note

The more you are able to learn about the wisdom of the body and pay attention to those adaptive movements and preferences, the more you will be equipped to draw upon its intelligence to resolve the issues of the past and process raw emotions that the body has stored for so long.

The more we recognise the wisdom of our bodies and explore its capabilities, the more we can experience the body as a living, ever changing source of intelligence, information and energy that provides ongoing support for our physical and mental functioning (Pat Ogdan).

Emotion Regulation & Sand Play

At this stage, Sand Play is not offered until further notice.

Sand Play is often used to enable you to process and express implicit emotions that are otherwise hard to access through the use of language. When using sand trays, you can construct your own microcosm, using miniature toys and sand. The scene created after your session acts as a reflection of your life or an expression of how you may be feeling on the day. This allows you the opportunity to resolve relational conflict, process implicit memories, remove obstacles, gain acceptance of the “Parts” that may show up in the session and access “Self” energy through processing and sensory regulation. Sandplay stimulates vertical integration and regulates emotions such as:

Sandplay uses symbolic language to activate implicit memories and helps you express and process memories that are not otherwise expressed through language. Sandplay is known to reduce anxiety, eliminate depression and helps the person feel more connected to their body.

Using Arts

Nasim incorporates Art in her work with clients on a regular basis and finds it an integrative tool that helps the client with regulation, processing and stability. Art materials and directives such as creations and paint are used to activate sensory responses and generate imagery that is directly connected to emotions.

This process helps one to re-experience emotions in a way that allows them to organize their feelings and form a narrative around an overwhelming experience.

Through this work, you can express and process strong emotions, which inevitably increases your Window of Tolerance, allowing you to stay connected with emotions for longer, without being overwhelmed.

Mindfulness

There is no “is”, until an observer makes an observation (Bonnie Badenoch).

Mindfulness is a bottom-up approach that has been scientifically proven to be an effective element in the process of brain neuroplasticity. Mindfulness increases your tolerance for pain and negative emotions through paying attention to the present moment, and through pure acceptance, without judgement, of what may arise in that moment.

Mindful techniques taught in sessions increase your ability to perceive emotions without feeling the need to react to them and increase your window of tolerance for unpleasant sensations and emotions.

At an interpersonal level, paying kind attention, on purpose, without judgement, to whatever arises in the mind from moment to moment, allows us to access our Self energy, which is vital in recovery from trauma and achieving effective change.

In couple therapy, mindfulness changes the non-conscious implicit expectations about relationships.

Counselling Services

comprehensive counselling and therapy to enhance your psychological well-being in the following areas:

Scientifically Researched-Based Proven Techniques

Therapeutic Approaches

EMDR Therapy

Emotion Regulation
and Sand Play

Parts Work

Sensorimotor
Psychotherapy

Exploring and Processing
Through Art

Mindfulness

EMDR Therapy

Parts Work

Effects

Effects

Self Awareness

Freedom

Sensorimotor Psychotherapy

When You feel Emotions

Early Experiences

Result

More on that note

Emotion Regulation & Sand Play

Using Arts

Mindfulness

Counselling Services

PTSD & Trauma

Phobias

Depression

Anxiety

Accepting the Self

Grief & Loss

Self Esteem &
Self Confidence

Interpersonal
Support

Domestic Violence

Drug & Alcohol
Counselling

Cognitive
Distortions

and more...

Mind Matters Health

Therapeutic Approaches

Counselling Services

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