Towards Hope

Welcome to this blog! It’s been an awfully long time since I’ve done any long-form writing, but what better way to do it than at the start of my own adventure into counselling and mental health.

I’ve had a keen interest in working with people since I was a teenager, but after completing my degree in psychology I knew I wanted to pursue work focused on being in the room with someone to understand mental health better, rather than focusing on research. I will always be interested in keeping up with research, but throughout my training in counselling I learnt how much I value human connection and just being alongside someone while they come to an understanding of their journey.

I think just about every person who goes into counselling as a career has their own story to tell of how they struggled and found comfort in healing, and my story is no different. The professionals I worked with have forever shaped me and pushed me to pursue better work, supportive friendships, and opportunities that I wouldn’t have looked at otherwise. I feel immensely privileged to have experienced these therapeutic relationships, especially in a world where mental health support is becoming increasingly difficult to access.

I’d love to use this blog to spread the word about counselling options and how people can feel empowered to make the right choices for them, but also to discuss the current situation around mental health in the UK and connections to social change. This is also a place I’d love to share about my own practice and journey in my career, so please do feel free to check out information about my own practice here.

What will I post about?

This blog will be a mish-mash of information on counselling, both for other counsellors and potential clients alike. I find there’s a lot of mystery and hard-to-digest information on the counselling world out there, and it seems to me that making that information easier to take in and opening the door for discussion could make it a lot easier for people to find support that works for them. You shouldn’t need a degree in psychology to understand what counselling can offer you!

As this is a blog I’ve created, I’m also interested in writing about my own development as a counsellor and sharing experiences here. I’m always open to sharing and hearing other people’s stories alongside my own, so please do feel free to comment and start a discussion.

I’m hoping to post semi-regularly, but will probably be more rocky towards the beginning! Alongside building my work as a counsellor I also work in the NHS in primary care, so I’m juggling work in a few areas. But hopefully this blog can eventually become a great space for sharing information and keeping up-to-date with research, information, and sharing knowledge in my little section of the internet.

For the sake of being person-centred and using congruency, I’m super nervous about starting this blog! But regardless of my reach or how often I post, I’d love to have this be a way of continuing my love of counselling, psychology, and just being with other people. Here’s to the start of a new journey, and many more cheesy posts like this one!