Blog

Yoga can enter ‘talk therapy’ in many ways – from one client’s committed practice to another’s curiosity to ‘try it out’, and from transformative experiences to triggering ones. Counselling Psychologist and former yoga teacher Cleandra Waldron embarks on a five-part series about the interconnections between therapy and yoga, including the therapist’s own experience or assumptions – beginning with how she found her professional ‘yoga lens’ through personal trauma

Ruth Lanius on critical breakthroughs in trauma research, helping dissociated clients to be present with the environment and their bodies – and why we should always begin trauma therapy by honouring our client’s neurobiological adaptive responses.

Advances in neuroscience mean most general therapists understand the importance of working with the body, especially at the intersection of addiction and trauma. But how many of us lack confidence when inviting clients to safely connect with their embodied experience? Ahead of a PESI UK training in Autumn 2023, Jan Winhall introduces her Felt Sense Polyvagal Model – a foundational framework based on ‘Six Fs’ that integrates insights from Gendlin and Porges, and uses playful imagery to help clients track their own autonomic nervous systems.

Worrying has its benefits. But clients with high anxiety tend to experience more of the painful costs. International neuroscience and anxiety specialist Catherine Pittman shares her approach for helping clients to shift away from worries, using a little psychoeducation about the role of the amygdala and a simple two-word diagram.

Love is fundamental to human lives, cropping up repeatedly in client narratives and consulting room dynamics. But how much do we understand about it? Dr Divine Charura, editor of Love and Therapy, continues his five-part series on the role of love in life and psychotherapy with a look at attachment research, mirror neurons and the contributions of Polyvgal Theory.