My Approach
An Integrative Approach, Tailored for your Needs
Our process together begins by understanding your needs. We can then choose the most relevant wellbeing approaches to suite your recovery. By gently bringing together a number of deeply interrelated healing methodologies, we can achieve a “Multiplier Effect”. For example: learning muscle relaxation techniques supports optimal breathing, and optimal breathing supports better oxygen delivery to the brain which supports mindfulness. The approaches I offer are listed below….
Mindfulness
Mindfulness is foundational to, and interwoven within all of the work that we will do together.
Learning to slow down and cultivate a friendly and curious awareness of our own thoughts and emotions is key to reconnecting with wellbeing.
By learning to tune into the senses of sight, sounds and touch, we can drop out of the busy scattered mind into a more peaceful, and less anxious level of consciousness.
Buteyko Breathing
For many clients, making changes to the way they breathe can be profoundly healing.
With Buteyko breathwork, you will learn a selection of interrelated breathing exercises designed to calm your nervous system and increase levels of healing Carbon Dioxide and Nitric oxide. By learning to breathe light, slow and low through your nose, and using short breath holds you will benefit from improved blood circulation and oxygen delivery to the body and brain.
Deep Relaxation
By learning to fully relax the body, clients can connect with deep experiences of calm and relaxation. This helps to reduce muscle tension, repair the nervous system (via the Vagus nerve) and support restful nourishing sleep.
We will explore these practices together in-session, and then audio recordings are provided for you to listen to in between sessions.
I offer a wide range of relaxation techniques including Passive and Progressive Muscle Relaxation, Coherent Resonance Breathing, Mindful Bodyscans, Autogenic Relaxation, and iRest Yoga Nidra.
Self Compassion
Self compassion can be a powerful ally in soothing our own suffering. By learning to offer yourself kindness in the midst of the most difficult moments, you can find ease, and make the unbearable bearable.
On a practical level, learning to offer yourself soothing touch, by placing your hands over your heart, or on your belly, releases Oxytocin, the “Hug Hormone”. And this helps to calm the nervous system and create feelings of safety.
Self compassion also helps to soften the inner critic and melt toxic shame. By learning to be kinder and gentler to yourself you can discover a deeper level of healing for your mind and body.
iRest Yoga Nidra
iRest Yoga Nidra is a deep relaxation, a self-inquiry and a meditation. Through the process of iRest Yoga Nidra, the senses and thinking mind are calmed and you experience the part of you that is unchanging, ever present and always at peace.
By engaging these practices over time, you nourish routines that support peace of mind, and enable your body and mind to easily fall into deep, restful sleep.
The practice of iRest Yoga Nidra also helps you ease into deep states of relaxation that support falling asleep and obtaining restful sleep.
Meditation
Meditation is an opportunity to re-connect with yourself on a deeper level. Here you can come into contact with the thoughts, emotions and beliefs that drive your words and actions. And this is the place where change begins…
Meditation is also a formal training ground where you can teach yourself to be more present, more accepting of yourself and more compassionate towards yourself and others.
I offer training in a wide range of meditation practices: the various practices from the Mindfulness Based Stress Reduction curriculum, breathing meditations, self compassion meditations, visualisations to create inner resources, deep body relaxation meditations, Zen meditations, and iRest Yoga Nidra.