Review – of working with Ali

Just had to post this !!!

After speaking to Ali today I would like to book another appointment with her. I really like her as a person and I like that she is so unique in her way of communicating and counselling.

Thank you so much for arranging my first meeting and I look forward to the next!

J

SNIPER MODE – a trance like state

 

I watch my cat when he has spotted a mouse.  He will sit there completely focussed on the hole the poor critter has taken refuge in for hours.   SNIPER MODE

Do we ever do that? Well for sure.  I have a snake phobia so if I’m near long grass I go into SNIPER MODE.  Not for a tasty meal like my cat but for self-preservation.  I will be sort of listening to you, sort of enjoying my picnic, but not really because I am in SNIPER MODE and completely focussing all my senses on that long grass for a movement, a sound.  Its like I am in a trance, in that I am pretty well unaware of anything else going on around me.

Now I could just move away from the long grass and then I would be able to release my senses from guard duty to really listen to the conversation and taste my food and feel the sun on my back and notice the beauty around me.  But what if you can’t move away from the perceived threat?

Fight or flight response.  Fight or run.  Great if you can but what if the perceived threat isn’t physical? What if it’s a thought or a prediction about an upcoming event?

This is how we get so run down, when we go into SNIPER MODE on a perceived or possible threat …

– a big bill coming in at the end of the month we don’t know how we are going to pay

– a meeting that’s looming that we are really concerned about

– a fear that our partner may be looking elsewhere

– anything emotional really

And the problem is you can’t move away from those threats or perceived threats because they are in your head and so follow you!  And you go in to SNIPER MODE totally unable to really notice anything going on around you but the perceived threat, moving through your days but not being in them, not enjoying or noticing any of the great things happening around you.

You are in SNIPER MODE.

And it’s exhausting to be so alert to danger, to be able to do nothing about it. And it wears you down and then you feel poorly and tired which makes the perceived threat even more of a problem.

Would you know if you had slipped into SNIPER MODE?

Whatever your fear or perceived threat is you have a couple of choices:  accept that from now till the great event you can stay in SNIPER MODE. Let whatever the perceived threat is take away your senses.  So very exhausting and it changes nothing but your health and ability to deal with the perceived threat if it ever turns out to be real.

Or you can smell the flowers, being in the moment and notice the good things and beauty around you.

Neither makes time pass any quicker but how would you rather spend your time?

If this is you, get in contact and let me help you choose how you want to feel, how you want to spend you time.

Helping you to be to be all you can be – changing your emotional wellbeing

Whow!!! I really do have the best job in the world.

Below is a review from a mum who’se son was struggling at school, who didn’t want to go to school, who came out of school crying every day. His emotional wellbeing was being affected so negatively that the resulting behaviour would have resulted in him being ‘left behind’.

I looked for and found Ali because the medical and school system were letting my 8 year old child down. The Child Mental Health Service wouldn’t see him because he didn’t have specific behavioural problems and the schools inclusion worker was very nice but under the pump and 20mins a week wasn’t really effective. As parents we had tried everything we could think of.
He was being bullied, he struggled with playground politics, he wasn’t coping with the mean words being thrown at him, he spent alot of the school day crying and/or getting frustrated, which made the bullying worse, he was getting socially isolated, he was starting to refuse to go to school, his teacher was starting to lose patience and i was feeling like it was all spiraling. I felt like this needed to be resolved now and not wait “until he matures” or “until the bullies get bored”.
From the first day we met Ali my son took to her and the way she spoke and communicated with him. She was open with him and he understood what she did and engaged with her. After one session he was on a high. So happy! Like something had been released. Someone had finally told him HOW to cope with all these feelings he was having. He took his Ollie figure in his pocket to school so when the bad words came he could squeeze the figure and the armour would come up and protect his “heart” and over the next few days he started to work it out. One day saying “there were a few holes in my armour today mum cos some bad words got through but i will make it stronger tomorrow”. And he has built and built up his resilience. He said to me yesterday that a child had been saying mean things and that he had only needed to squeeze Ollie for 5 seconds and he felt ok and didnt cry and the boy left him alone. He was elated.

He hasn’t said he doesn’t want to go to school for ages and seems more confident and happier and the school have noticed a change too. He said he doesn’t want/need to be in social inclusion anymore cos he has Ali now. He doesn’t come out of school in tears looking like the weight of the world is on his shoulders. I am relieved we have found a person and a technique that is so simple but actually genius and it works. It just works! I would recommend anyone spend an hour with Ali and Ollie’s superpowers and guarantee they will come out feeling more resilient, supported and special because they now have superpowers too.

SJ – mum of a now happy 8 year old.

 

Emotional Wellbeing

What I do isn’t rocket science.  Its very simple but of so powerful as it gives the child, the parents, the family the tools to do it themselves whenever they need to.  If we can get to children early enough then what starts as low level anxiety, stress, ‘bob’ , lack of confidence etc it wont develop to the point where a child is excluded or needs to go to one of the overstretched mental health services.

I also don’t call it mental health.  I prefer emotional wellbeing.

 

All Behaviour Serves a Purpose

Behaviour

If we waste time trying to change a behaviour without recognising that the behaviour is as a result of an emotional reaction to something, we will be wasting a lot of time!

Beneath every behaviour is an emotion that created it.  Why? Well the behaviour is trying to voice the emotion or help it in some way.   An example would be:  ‘I feel sad, empty unloved’  The answer ..CAKE!  Okay that is a bit of a sweeping example but its what we do when an emotion is unhappy, not at ease with itself.  That’s why I love the word, DIS-EASE!

Getting to the Root

Traditional therapy spends a lot of time giving you strategies to change a behaviour. Sometimes that works but if you really want to deal with the issue stop pruning branches and go for the root!

Emotions

I can’t change a past event or make your current situation better in any material way.  I can’t find you a nicer husband, better job, well behaved kids, but I can help you deal with all of that by working with you to find the emotion behind all the things that are causing you DIS-EASE.

We create our realities, we choose how to think and feel, we are responsible for how we think and feel, and so if your struggling with something right now, you can spend a lot of time and money trying to change the behaviour the feeling of DIS-EASE has created.  Or you can go to the root, find the underpinning emotion that created the feeling and ask it ‘Why?’  Help it, and if it feels listened too and understood it will quieten down.

Its all about you!

You have have the answers inside you

In a School this week introducing how we can manage our emotions rather than be controlled by them to children from the age of 6 to 11, I came across a quote that really sums it all up.

“There is a soul bird who lives inside us all.
This special bird has the keys to our innermost emotions and feelings. It knows the secret places where we hide away our happiness, anger, joy, jealousy and sorrows.
Are you ready to listen to your soul bird?”
Michal Snunit.

Then today I received a beautiful letter from a client:

I don’t know if you realise just how much you help people like me.

You asked me for a hug and we then went on a journey that for me has given me back the freedom to do the things other people take in their stride – going up and down stairs, using escalators, crossing bridges, getting on and off trains.  Those and more were my phobias.

I honestly don’t know what you did that day, but you told me I would feel different for the next few days.  I left you and as I drove home I felt a weight lifted from me – I felt lighter and nothing ‘got to me’.

I did things my ‘problem’ had instilled in me without thinking.    I walked over bridges and calmly walked up and down unknown stairs to see the penguins with my precious granddaughter aged 3.

I know I can tell xxxx “I’ve got this, I’m ok” and I will be ok.

Thank you just doesn’t seem enough for what you have given back to me.  SMH

This lady found her inner soul bird, her emotions, her Super Power that helped her overcome her phobias and allowed her to spend time with her granddaughter doing those special things, experiencing that special time.  All I did was show her a path to that soul bird, her Super Power, her emotions.  She did the rest.

Growing Pains in Teenagers – School, Exams and the Stress

Growing Pains

I had a client describe her teenager as a ‘Growing Pain’   Bugger I giggled!

I don’t have kids and although sometimes its a huge regret in my life, sometimes I thank God for sparring me the growing pains or rather having to stand by helplessly why they go through them.

I am getting more and more teenagers in The Hut. Fortunately my normal therapist attire settles them – jeans!

They come because weight issues,self-esteem issues, bullying, but they also come because they get so very strung out over school work and especially exams.

One of the first youngsters I worked with was a lovely lad.  Polite, intelligent, straight A student – or should have been.

But the moment it got near exam time he went into melt down, not eating, not sleeping, becoming withdrawn – becoming a very troubling ‘Growing Pain’.  As we talked he explained that he enjoyed school and found the work easy.  He knew he knew all the answers in most exams, struggled a bit with maths but could not understand why he got in such a state on the day and did not trust the answers he wrote and had panic attacks in the middle of the exam.

I asked how he knew he knew the stuff and he explained that studying in his room, he just knew he knew. If only he could do his exams in his room and not in the exam hall that equated to failure, and panic.

Emotional Anchor

I gave him an Anchor.

No, not a pointy metal thing!! A Thought Anchor.

Before we started I asked him to give his exam fear a score.  Ten out of ten being terrified.  He got 12!!!!!

In a light trance I got him to tell me everything about his room, the decor, the lighting, the sounds and smells, and to notice how relaxed he felt there. When I could see him physically relax and smile at the thought, I lightly touched his wrist, creating a memory Anchor he could use any time.

I asked him to open his eyes and think about the exam room again. On a score of one to ten, ten being terrified, the thought was an down to 2.

Bless him.

I got him to touch his wrist and again the smile and his body relaxed.

He used the Anchor before and during the next exam and was able to place himself in his room rather than the hall.

And guess what??   He sailed through the exam and the next lot, even maths!

If you have a “Growing Pain” going through this, they really don’t have to and although it makes their world better, it will reduce the “pain” level in yours too!

Ali xxx