How To Restore The 4 Enriching Ingredients Of HOPE

HOPE = Happiness Optimism Passion Equanimity

Life on planet earth is meant to be a rich playing field & bountiful source of human emotional growth & learning, that’s why we have enormous emotional capacity. But how do we find our way through the maze of emotional deadends & blocks without getting exhausted or emotionally wrung out?

As a counselling psychologist in practice for the last 20 years in the UK & NZ, I have heard the most amazing rationales & compelling stories to explain emotional unhappiness & disturbance.

When life becomes all too much, we struggle to make sense of the huge array of emotions within us & in others around us…

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Counselling, Happiness, Wellbeing

Download your Wellbeing

  Some excellent research  into 22 European nations accounts of wellbeing is on the NEF (New Economics Foundation, UK) website.  NEF is a UK charity promoting global interdependence, thriving communities, wellbeing & future economy for policy-makers, governments & organisations.   NEF used 2  components in their comprehensive research of wellbeing personal & social wellbeing.  Denmark was top scorer for personal & social wellbeing.   I wonder how NZ would shape up in comparison.   more on Sub-components of Personal Well-being…

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Happiness, Positive Psychology, Wellbeing, , , , ,

If you are feeling blue.. my Top Pickup Tips

Image taken from finkorswim.com

Some times I feel down & I don’t know why, my heart just kind of feels heavy & I know I have lost my smile. Even facebook seems to be all boring & samey.  I usually go through the process of elimination – is it food eaten, hormones, lack of beauty sleep, the weather?   Am I just having a blue day & how can I shift it into a bright sunshiny yellow-gold day?

If you are feeling down & blue, what to do  …

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Happiness, Inspiration, Therapy trends, Wellbeing, , , , ,

How to Live in the Moment?

 January 2012

How much do we long for the ability to sustain a wonderful sense of feeling good? The short-lived highs of a new technological gadget or a fashion scoop hardly touches the pleasure centre spot. We search for greater meaning. So really appreciating the simple things in life, feeling a good aspect in every person we encounter, is an art which needs practice.

 Living in the moment..

Psychologists & counselors are moving strongly into mindfulness based therapies as a way to help people become much more present emotionally & mentally. http://www.actmindfully.com.au

If we can live each day as if it has great meaning, like its our last, would we hold a different point of view on the road rage or the argument with the spouse? What really matters to us?…

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Happiness, Inspiration, Therapy trends, Wellbeing

Bridging the gap between Wellbeing and Distress

For my beachside holiday reading over Christmas & New Year I enjoyed perusing Dr Russ Harris’ new book The Reality Slap – How to find fulfillment when life hurts (see www.actmindfully.com.au) which looks at how events in life such as crisis & disasters shock us, causing a huge slap in our reality awareness, especially events like death, divorce, bankruptcy, redundancy, disability, serious illness or injury.   The recent earthquake & aftershocks in Christchurch is a prime example, following on from the previous shakes. These life events can affect us to such a degree that the gap between what is happening/happened & what we desire or need in order to feel OK looks like a huge gulf.  Even Christmas & New Year experiences of family dramas or feeling alone can trigger so much distress in us, that we find it hard to engage with everyday life. In these troubled times, Russ’s book helps us to develop self-compassion. He uses ACT (acceptance & commitment therapy) – ACT mindfulness  to deal with these major losses.   I was then reflecting on how exactly do we manage this reality slap.
How can we bridge the gap between feeling normally OK with inner WELLBEING & dealing with the distress of having our world turned upside down?
The 2 worlds can seem to be universes apart.

Here are 7 ways to bridge the gap…

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1 CommentHappiness, Inspiration, Therapy trends, Wellbeing, Workplace Wellbeing