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Burnout is defined as ‘exhaustion of physical or emotional strength or motivation, usually as a result of prolonged stress or frustration’. From daily demands of work and family life, one can feel pulled in different directions that may result in prolonged stress or irritability. Counseling techniques can help face concerns that affects your life. Through solution focused, strength based, narrative therapy, person centered care and mindfulness, sessions can help look at the work-related stress and help provide ways to explore ideas on how to deal with the stress or related circumstances. While providing ways to help with the stress/burnout, you can learn about what will calm your body, mind and emotions.

Life has become such that often our day to day can feel overwhelming with challenging life circumstances. Worries and fear around your health, performance at school/work, and relationships can result in on-going negative thoughts that eventually affect our daily life and wellbeing. Anxiety can also feel like you're ‘stuck’ and you continue to think and explore ways for the situation to go away. The inability to stop thinking about everything that worries you even if there is no direct solution to them can cause sleepless nights, panic or mental fatigue. Other symptoms of anxiety can be the feeling of irritability, overwhelming feelings of worry, nervousness, fear, restlessness, headaches, muscle tension. Examples of evidence-based counseling techniques that can be used for anxiety are; motivational counselling, strength based, and cognitive behavior therapy.

Research shows that If you’re feeling low, sad or hopelessness, longer than two weeks, even when positive moments and experiences don’t make an impact, you could be experiencing signs of depression. Depression can be hard to come out of, because our thoughts focus on the sadness leaving you to lose interest or enjoyment in your everyday activities and hobbies. Sense of pessimism, anger, lack of energy or feeling slowed down can all be signs of depression. If you feel you don’t have the energy or going over events that create blame, anger or no control then opening up about it and working through the thoughts and feelings can be therapeutic. Evidence based techniques used for depression can be motivation therapy, strength based, solution focused, person centered care and cultural sensitivity,

Being diagnosed with a chronic disease/pain can be difficult to deal with and even more challenging having to explain it to someone who may not relate or acknowledge the feeling around the disease. Some signs to seek counseling while dealing with a chronic disease are symptoms of depression, a traumatic accident that resulted in a high level of past stress, current stress, anxiety, a mindset surrounding the belief that nothing will go right and the emotional pain around the disease/pain. Counselling can help you acknowledge your thoughts, fear and uncertainty of your medical diagnosis, as well as how it impacts your day to day and independence. Through solution focused, strength based and motivational counselling, counselling can help you work through the chronic disease or the pain that may inhibiting a ‘normal’ life.

Let’s face it, being a teen is a challenging time with all the changes we encompass physically, mentally and from ‘building’ an identity. For this reason, working with teens can have its own challenges where we figure out that becoming quality active listeners and mentors can help build authentic relationships with teens. Having your teen talk to someone who is neutral and can provide a safe space with a non-judgmental rapport can allow for listening, open ended questions to allow your teen open up and in return closed ended questions to help them process their thoughts and feelings without feeling pressured, confused and expectations.

When it comes to men and their mental health, it is still encompassed with a lot of stigma due to the ‘old school’ perspective on how men ‘should’ play a role in society. Fear and shame around the preconceived beliefs of their roles and responsibilities has proven to create pressure and impact mental health. In addition, research continues to show that men often will ignore/brush off or keep difficult emotions inside them, versus opening up and talking it out to process the feelings they are experiencing. Depression, anxiety, addictions, work stress/overworked, relationship conflicts are just few issues men also experience but due to cultural and societal expectations about being a man, would prevent them from accessing support (The Alberta Men’s Survey, 2017). Using goal-oriented approach, narrative therapy and shifting a perspective that is person centered care can be helpful and really bring in a better quality of life for men who are seeking resolution and purpose.

When we become caregivers to a loved one who is an elder, responsibilities with your day to day activities can increase to additional duties such as; in-home care, transportation to appointments, grocery pick up, medication arrangements, escorting to medical appointments/navigating through the health care system and/or continuous emotional support and check-ins. All this while the caregiver continues to work, raise their own family whilst being mindful of their own well being. However, with the immense responsibilities unfortunately can become difficult, challenging and stressful. Research shows that caregivers can experience their own signs of depression, physical health problems from anxiety, stress and the emotional overwhelming feeling with the thought of death and dying of their loved one. Counseling that entails supportive/active listening and emotional focused therapy can provide a caregiver the space to open up to bring clarity with releasing their emotions with someone neutral and compassionate amongst the challenges being faced by the caregiver.

As the saying goes, ‘you can choose your friends but not your family’ and we all know that at times families can be difficult to navigate through due to each member of the family bringing in their own thoughts, ideas and role. The purpose for family counseling is to mend any communication issues in a safe and controlled space that would be creating family complications that would be related to individual emotional wellbeing. Research shows that with family counselling, comes with a better understanding of each member’s role creating specific patterns and dynamics. Family sessions can also bring better communication, discuss problem solving techniques, reduce tension and generate trust and support back into the family dynamic.

We can all admit that relationships are hard - marriage, friendships, parental, work colleagues. Stress, expectations, day to day activities, can create conflicts that can be difficult to work through, resolve and be hard on our mental health. If you find you are trying to sort out a disagreement, withdrawing from interactions, trouble making decisions[1] , or having a difficult time expressing feelings to the person, counselling time can be helpful to release the hard time you are having to a neutral person. Narrative therapy can provide a sense of validation that someone is hearing your story and can help find ways to clear the mind, look at the conflict from a different perspective and brainstorm solutions in the relationship that is in ‘trouble’.

Change is one of the hardest things in life to accept, especially when experiencing a difficult time to cope and adjust. Through change, stress and feelings of overwhelmingness can come and the ability to perceive the benefits of the change can be difficult to see. Through narrative therapy as well as emotion focused therapy you can learn to see how difficult changes eventually can also show growth in one’s life as well as, learning on how to deal with change resulting in resilience and confidence in one’s self. By opening up about the emotions hinged on the changes, therapy sessions can also help you be better prepared for any future transitions that may occur.

Unfortunately, loss is something most people will experience at some point in their lives. When we are trying to cope with a loss, we may experience different emotions and feelings from sadness to anger. Some people may even experience withdrawal from day to day activities- there is no particular way to grieve, everyone is different. If you find you are either emotional and dive into your feelings over the loss or look for distraction to get away from the event that will not change, therapy can provide an outlet to discuss and be open about what you are feeling and thinking. Emotion focused therapy allows you to open up in the best way you know how with no rules or restrictions. With the emotions come with looking at certain changes such as adapting to a new role, accepting changes in routine, or figuring out a new way of living.