What is Holistic Counselling
Holistic Counselling takes the Soul, rather than the Mind, as its starting point of balance. It has an expanded view of life, recognising that the world is a complex mystery and it takes into account belief systems, universal and personal energy systems, intuitive psychic realities, karmic interplay, subconscious and super-conscious states of awareness, metaphysical experiences, spiritual presence and higher-self cosmic connections.
With the Soul being the starting point individuals come from the heart, whilst not forgetting one’s head, and from this heart space one cares for the sacred interdependence of all life. Compassion for self and compassion for others is a core concept for one’s personal and collective growth.
In Holistic Counselling the emphasis is on wholeness, dealing with the whole person, and assisting an in inner balance and integration of all the dimensions of Self. It is experiential and focuses on the client’s individual experiences and reality, and recognises that each person is unique and respects that the client’s reality is different from their own.
Trust and empathy belong to the intimate counselling relationship that remains private and confidential. The client will seek counselling for objectivity and advise. The counsellor will also listen attentively and ask questions to encourage clients in expressing their thoughts and feelings. After discovering reasons for certain reactions or conflicts, the counsellor may offer a variety of choices or help the clients evaluate certain behaviours and eventually enable clients to make their own choices and decisions to action.
The counsellor is thus active and creative, responding to the immediate issues brought by the client. The assumption is that human beings are innately motivated towards achieving their highest potential of awareness and fulfilment; the counsellor’s role is to support this and trust the client’s process and create a holding and sacred space for the personal unfoldment of their clients. Ultimately, the idea of counselling is to help the client to overcome or work through a present conflict caused by a past event.
The spiritual journey can be blissful and awakening, but also it can be arduous, frightening and lonely. Anyone can have a spiritual experience, or peak experience, but holistic self-realisation is a different matter. Spiritual development best occurs at the point when the Ego identity is strong enough to take a little disorientation. One’s understanding and meaning of one’s lives depend on the presence (and emotional intelligence) of the Ego. If the Ego is not strong and does not hold the person in a healthy reality; the spiritual opening then results in fragmentation and crises. This altered State of Consciousness can be catastrophic to the Ego if the individual contacts the lower level of consciousness rather than the higher level of consciousness. A healthy Ego arises from the healing and integration of past traumas and of Self-Realisation / Self-Awareness; understanding that every challenging event has the potential for the spiritual growth of the individual.
It is important to have an awareness of a spiritual identity; - we are all more than our personalities and our problems and they do not define who we are. People are not their behaviours!
Strengthening an awareness of our spiritual self it essential for our well-being and can help us in times of challenge, trauma and illness; as we develop trust, hope and faith that we are being guided to becoming something greater!
Faith in Self That we have within us the wisdom to make the right choices.
Faith in Potential That every situation has a potential for growth.
Faith in the Journey That our lives have meaning.
Faith in Spirit That we are truly Spiritual Beings.
In a nut-shell, one of the main goals of holistic counselling is to help people reach a state of awareness, or self-realisation. They act as motivators, and mirrors, which can help people finally realise that they are unique and amazing beings in and of themselves. Holistic counselling helps many individuals realise their own strengths and abilities, and focuses on empowering the individual to reach their full potential for a happy and fulfilling life.
However, holistic counselling also helps people realise just how interconnected they are with others and the rest of the world and can help individuals with most matters related to spirituality and faith, unlike many other mental health counsellors that are bound by the limitations of science.