In this video I talk about 6 things you need to know about loving someone with Depression - and some meaningful and effective things you can do to help and support them. If you enjoyed this, please do share it. And if you do, let me know so I can thank you!
Failure is not about whether or not you fall in the hole, it’s about whether or not you climb out of it. The last month, business wise, has been weird. Good weird or bad weird. I’m not sure yet, but hopefully by the end of this article it will be more clear. As I was saying, it’s been a month. A total entrepreneurial roller coaster of a month. Some really great things have happened that I wasn’t expecting and I am really excited and grateful for those. But just the other day I was doing my [...]
In case you missed it on Periscope*, Julia Kristina Counselling is holding a contest for a 55 minute Counselling or Life Coaching Session via Skype! Here are all the ways to get your name in the draw: Go to Julia’s Good for Me personal development blog here and pick your favourite article (or 2 or 3 or 4 or 5). You get 1 entry for: Each article you Tweet - and make sure you tag @juliacounsellor in the tweet in order for it to count. Liking Julia Kristina Counselling’s Facebook Page found HERE. You get 2 [...]
And I’ll tell you why. In a minute. First. Have you ever stood in front of the mirror and told yourself something about being amazing, wonderful, powerful, and strong? And after the quick dopamine rush that any good pep talk can offer, did you feel like a changed person? I mean really, deeply changed? Did that warm and tingly feeling of confidence and self-love last more than a hot second or two? Most likely not. But you don’t have to feel bad, you didn’t do anything wrong. It’s just that you told yourself a [...]
Anxiety is a normal emotion. We all feel it at times, and that’s not a bad thing. Anxiety CAN serve us well if and when it comes about to warn us of impending danger, but actual danger, not the relatively inconsequential things we usually get ourselves all worked up about. Anxiety is a big issue in our culture, bigger than ever. But I’m not going to go in to philosophizing as to why it’s become such a problem. We’ll save that for another day. Regardless of the reason for our anxious feelings, one thing is clear, it’s [...]
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h6SF5wQ5H2k A recent collaboration I did with a Mental Health Peer support YouTuber, LikeKristen. This girl is so incredible and inspirational, and such a joy to work with. In the video I answer some of her viewer FAQ's about how to talk to one's therapist about self harm. We hope you find it useful!
Ponder this: When do you think you’re more likely to get a bigger hit of happiness? When you do something for someone who is easy to be generous with? Or when you have to work hard to make yourself be generous with someone who isn’t making it easy? Now hold that thought. Here’s a story: A short while ago a colleague of mine asked me for a favour. Not a huge favour, but they did ask if I would mind sharing a document with them I had created so they could copy it and use it for their [...]
All of us have dreams. But have you ever wondered why some of us pursue them and some don’t? Why do some people get out there and just go for what they want while the rest sit idly by on the sidelines wishing and hoping. Don’t get me wrong, there may be legitimately good reasons why some don’t pursue their dreams, but I have a feeling, no, in fact I know, many people don’t pursue their dreams for not very good reasons. And actually getting out there and pursuing ones dreams is not a matter [...]
"There is more to life than simply increasing our speed" There are way more sources than ever before pushing and vying for our immediate attention, AND doing a really good job of luring us in whether we like it or not. They promised technology was going to make life exponentially easier because it was going to allow us to do things much faster thus adding simplicity and convenience to almost every area of our lives. But the exact opposite has become our reality – now that we can do more in less time, we don’t magically have heaps [...]
Do you think people are more confident because they are super successful? Or are people more successful because they tend to be quite confident? Most of us believe the former, when in fact, the latter is actually true. And although some were born exuding confidence right from the start, most of us have had to work on becoming more confident. So not to worry, you don’t have to have always had confidence in order to become a confident person. There are some pretty straight forward things you can start doing right away to bring out the Yay and [...]
Anger is quite a powerful little 5 letter word that means very different things to different people. For some, especially women, it is an emotion that is rejected or avoided at all cost and understood as evil, bad, or unacceptable. For others it is all too present and readily available to use to hurt, damage, or destroy – sometimes irreparably so. But anger is just an emotion. And like any emotion, it’s not really right or wrong, but what we do with it can either be used for either good or evil. For good, anger can help [...]
The other day on CBC Radio One they were talking about teen depression and how it’s on the rise in North America. Some stats say that approximately 20% of all teens will experience a major depressive episode before they reach their adult years. I find this information quite off-putting and disturbing and it's made me reflect on the why of it all. Why, in a nation where the majority of us have way more than anyone could ever want, let alone, need? Where we have freedom, food, and fresh water? Where we have education, elected government, and employment? Where [...]
Here I talk about what Cognitive Behavioral Therapy is and why, contrary to popular belief, it is NOT the Power of Positive Thinking. Have a Mental Health or Personal Wellness Topic you'd like me to cover in a video? Feel free to leave your suggestions or questions in the comments section below
I’m not a big fan of living in the past, regretting the past or punishing myself incessantly for things I may have done or not done in the past. But there are certain things that would have been nice to know (or to have really understood) back in high school. I think if I had, I probably could have saved myself from a lot of self-doubt, hurt, and frustration. But the good news is we can know these things now. And be grateful we are learning and applying them today instead of 10 years from today. It also [...]
It donned on me part way through the day that because this past Wednesday was Canada day, the work week seemed to just slop by before I realized I had yet to write my weekly Good for Me article. Now of course no one is forcing me to write one post each and every week – and I’m sure those of you who are waiting with baited breath for the moment I push the publish button are few and far between, but I made an unspoken commitment to myself to post one original article per [...]
I’m going to come right out and say it: I’m weird about sleep. And have been as long as I can remember. I think this is partly because as a child, I’ve been told, for some reason I had difficulties falling asleep and this must have carried on more-or-less in to adulthood. Now I’m not sure if this issues is a case of the chicken or the egg. I don’t know if I have problems falling asleep because I’m worried about whether or not I’m going to get enough sleep, or if it just takes [...]
Do you ever have times when everything can be going great and then one little bad thing will happen it’s ALL you can think about? It’s as if all that was going well up until that point gets completely wiped out because of this one tiny flaw. But what about the flip side? Does the same ring true? When everything is going terrible and one little good thing happens, do we allow this one small positive occurrence to take over and sweeten the unpleasant situation? Do we let it come in and trump all of [...]
Here’s a question for you: Who do you envy? Now ask yourself: Why do you envy them? And although this is quite an uncomfortable question to ask, it’s actually quite an important one because it can really help you know yourself better. Envy toward something someone else has tells us about something we wish we had. And when we know what that thing is, we can ask ourselves if there’s a way we can have it too. Envy can show us something that’s missing from our lives, or make clear to us some kind of [...]
There’s an old teaching tale that goes something like this: Two villagers were talking one day about how each of them wanted to become wealthy. Both agreed that in order to consider themselves wealthy they would need to somehow acquire a relatively large pile of coins. One of the villagers decided he would not change anything about his life, but rather spend his days sitting at home by the fire hoping a pile of coins would suddenly appear on his doorstep, and occasionally complain about why he wasn't getting what he wanted. The other villager decided [...]
It can be really hard to feel good when it seems like everything (or even just a few key things) in your life are not going well. And we all have struggles, and we all go through hard times. That’s normal and there’s nothing wrong with that. But there are also times when we make things a lot harder for ourselves than we need to. Very rarely is life perfect. And on the flip side, very rarely is life absolutely awful (even if there are moments when it feels like it is). And if you [...]
I recently read an article by one of my favourite writers – Jeff Haden and it really got me thinking (I love it when good writing does that!) Now, I wholeheartedly recommend reading this article for yourself, because, in true Jeff Haden fashion it’s interesting, inspiring, informative, and a really enjoyable read. But if you’re a little more pressed for time, I’ll give you the quick rundown. The article talks about the one question every (professionally) successful person asks him or herself. He basically explains that we’ve all failed, been looked over for promotions, haven’t [...]
We all want to feel good and be emotionally healthy – no surprise there! And often times feeling satisfied with who we are is simply the result of how we choose to act and react in any of the situations we face on a daily basis. In the years I’ve been in practice as a mental health therapist I’ve worked with many men and woman in their healing, growth, and personal development process, and what I’ve found is there are a few key things many of them learn to do through our work together that really [...]
Whenever I get the chance (which is pretty rare with 2 small children) I head over to my neighbourhood Yoga Studio for my favourite Kundalini yoga class. It’s the one exercise class I never have to talk myself in to going to and this is why: It’s basically a full-on dance party in the dark. Picture it: 100 + men and women in stretchy pants dancing completely sober on their yoga mats. And the best part of it all is because it’s a late evening class and all the lights are turned out you can [...]
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4SIl7SAfo-Y In this video I share an easy to understand explanation of what CBT is, how it works, and why it's effective in treating Anxiety, Depression, Low Self-Esteem and Chronic Stress.
1. Make Yourself a Priority. No, it’s not ALL about you, but No it’s not NEVER about you. Your needs matter and other people’s needs matter. But remember when I said your needs matter? It’s up to you to value yourself, take care of yourself and, set your own healthy boundaries for yourself – it’s not anyone else’s responsibility. And if you don’t consider yourself in any of the equations, you’ll likely find yourself feeling exhausted, run down, bitter and frustrated – and that’s no good. I'll use one of my favourite metaphors to illustrate this [...]
The truth is, we all behave in ways that are less than becoming from time to time and sometimes we’re aware of our unflattering behaviours and sometimes we’re not. No one’s perfect and that’s okay. But there is a line between having the oddmoment, and being a down right unappealing person to be around. And if you want others to really enjoy your company and like being around you as much as possible here are 6 behaviours you may not want to exceed your quota on too often. Constantly Criticising Others Picking people apart, judging [...]
“We have two ears and one mouth. This is so we can listen twice as much as we speak.” –Aboriginal Wisdom Ahh communication. When we hear the word communication, the first word that usually comes to mind is ‘talking’. But that’s only the half of it. The other half is listening and that part often gets forgotten. And believe it or not, being a good listener is often more crucial to being an excellent communicator than talking. Most people can talk relatively well, but very few actually listen well. If you really want to stand [...]
In this video I walk you through a short deep breathing exercise you can do anytime and any place. It's really simple to do and literally only takes about a minute. It's amazing how just taking a moment to intentionally breath effectively can help us feel immediately more calm, relaxed, and grounded. Enjoy!
I’m not really a quotes type of person – meaning I typically don’t go seeking them out. But I do a lot of reading on psychology, mental health, wellness, and personal development and every once and awhile, something someone has written will just seem to jump out and smack me across the face. I usually take this as a sign that I really must be meant to hear what’s being said so I try to make a habit of writing these little doozies down. Here is my list of both the most recent and most [...]
It hasn’t actually been proven yet why some people thrive in the face of adversity while others really seem to struggle. It could be genetics, experiences you had during your more formative years, the amount of social support you had while growing up, or just plain coincidence. I think it’s safe to say, however, that most of us have felt depressed at one time or another, and some have experienced depression in a way that is quite a bit more serious and lasts a lot longer than the average person. No matter who you are or where you [...]