My Approach to Counselling, Who I Support, and the Modes of Therapy I Draw On
“After 25 years working in Finance, I realised something - it wasn’t actually the numbers or the corporate life that lit me up inside. Instead, it was the people, the relationships with these people, and the sense of community that came with the work. Now, as a Counsellor, and Meditation and Yoga teacher, I bring together my passion for people with my experience and professional training, to support others to heal stress, anxiety, and burnout, so they can live their most fulfilling lives .” Nicky Angelone - Flourish Mindfully
My work is driven by the belief that everyone deserves to live a fulfilling and happy life, and that by understanding how to safely and authentically express our emotional needs, we can reduce our experiences of overwhelm, stress, anxiety and burnout.
Where it all began - finding my passion
In March, 2015, I went to a breakfast event at my daughter’s school. There was a guest speaker in attendance - a beautiful woman, who worked as an actress and model, and had struggled with Anorexia since her teen years.
What stood out to me while listening to her story was the disconnection with feelings and emotions, and lack of safety in being who she was. I could hear, in her sharing, how she had struggled to recognise and express her feelings. I had a moment of realisation from my own life experience and witnessing others that while this woman’s challenges had manifested as Anorexia, it could also just as readily manifested as something else, such as addiction or bullying behaviours. I remember noticing how this physical and mental illness was strongly related to a response to not feeling real and present emotions.
This was the moment where my passion for supporting people to navigate their emotional and physical wellbeing sparked. I had a new found fire in my belly to find a way to help people to not suffer so deeply and cruelly.
After the breakfast, I jumped on the train, headed into the CBD to my corporate role and telling my colleague: “I’ve just experienced a moment of passion I have never had in my whole career (23 years at that time). I need to do something about this. I’m going to change careers.”
In line with how I was operating at that point in my life, I set a 90 day plan to explore, decide and plan, how I was going to make this change happen.
Initially, I explored the idea of becoming a Psychologist, however quickly realised that pathway, for me, would mean 10+ years of studying and a six figure student debt.
So, I next explored Counselling and Coaching options. I realised that it would take a bit longer than 90 days to find the right course that aligned with my humanistic values, and was credible and provided the practical experience alongside the theories.
That brought me to considering if there was anything I could leverage in my life already. The answer was right there - Yoga.
I had started my Yoga journey 10 years prior, in 2005, and I’d been attending weekly yoga classes since, which had changed my life. I realised training to be a Yoga teacher was a good first step into my career change.
Alongside this, I completed a wellness coaching course, however at that stage I didn’t have confidence I’d get clients as a Coach. In my work as a CPA (Certified Practicing Accountant), credibility was a high priority for me - that I felt that it was essential to working with someone - and I wasn’t sure if coaching provided that level of credibility for me.
Leaving my corporate career and navigating the shifting sense of security
Prior to leaving my role as a CPA, I had been with one organisation for 18 years, and another for 7 years. Job security was very important to me and branching out on my own was a big deal.
Starting with Yoga teaching while working part time in my corporate role gave me time to focus on selectively finding a Counselling course that would be hands-on and Humanistic. I also wanted to do deep work with clients so including Psychotherapy theories and practice was another box that needed to be ticked. The course I ended up going through, at Cairnmillar Institute in Melbourne, was amazing. It was incredibly hands-on with triad practices and group work in all units. It was humanistic, person-centred, with plenty of opportunity to practise the skills being taught.
Who I support
My clients are adults (18 years and over) who come to me for personalised one-to-one support, through counselling or meditation. I also work with corporate teams wanting to learn more about mindfulness and healthy habits.
Some of the core areas that I provide therapeutic support around include:
Emotional awareness and regulation
Through my own lived experience of feeling like a floating head, detached from my body and having difficulty regulating my emotions, I’m passionate about working with people who are feeling disconnected from their feelings and are struggling to articulate their emotions.
Learning how to safely and authentically express our emotional needs is crucial to reducing our experiences of overwhelm, stress, anxiety and burnout. Yet, expressing our needs and feelings is something that not everyone has experience with. Perhaps you were not permitted to have emotions, or to express them. Perhaps you don’t even recognise or have a language for identifying your emotions?
My role is then to support you to reach a point of familiarity with your inner world, from which you feel equipped to identify your emotions and needs, experience them, and express them in a safe and appropriate way.
Career transitions
I love to work with people who are noticing that they’re no longer happy where they are, and want to transition to another industry, or to start their own business. This means I often work with high achieving women who are running their own businesses.
With 25 years of experience in a corporate career, I know the struggles, stress, and anxiety of these environments, and I’ve experienced the burnout that can occur in these spaces.
As someone who potentially didn’t ‘fit the corporate mould’, I remember the days when I felt the ‘lack of fit’ meant there was something wrong with me. Feeling like this only led me to try harder to fit in. Not only was this exhausting, but I was also waking up feeling flat everyday, because I was lacking that passion and purpose from my work.
Now, I support others who feel like they’re not living their purpose - together we unpack what they love most about their work, to identify possible career transitions that allow for more purposeful and meaningful work in the future.
As someone who made the change from corporate life to running my own business, I’ve navigated this change and understand first hand the isolation and other challenges that can be part of the business owner journey.
This time of change and transition can in itself be a bit discombobulating, as often our whole identity and worth becomes so tied up within that corporate career pathway. It takes time and support to find your new normal.
My role is to walk with clients through this time of change, providing tools and techniques to support the body and mind, and the behaviour changes alongside this.
Loss
Combining my own lived experiences of loss with therapeutic approaches to grief, I support individuals who are navigating the loss of a parent or grandparent.
Personally, at the end of my first year of university, I experienced my mother’s diagnosis of terminal bowel cancer, and the challenges of caring for her through her illness and then processing my grief around losing her.
While each person’s experience is unique to them, I believe there is a benefit to having lived experience, combined of course with training, to be able to sit with a person in their pain and provide authentic support.
Parental challenges
I also work with parents around the challenges and learning curves of parenthood.
At age 4, my daughter was diagnosed with Type 1 Diabetes, and I have lived those nights of being on high alert, and fearing what could happen. I’m familiar with, and can appreciate just how much self care and support is needed within our roles as carers and caregivers to others in our lives.
People pleasing, perfectionism, burnout and boundaries
Many of my clients identify as high achieving women, and often speak about their struggles with people pleasing, perfectionism and burnout.
A common theme underlying these experiences can be a history of difficulty in expressing needs and setting boundaries. When we don’t feel that we can set boundaries around our time and energy, it often leads to resentment, stress, and sometimes burnout.
However, we’re not always shown how to set boundaries or express our needs, and sometimes the systems we’re working in or the homes we live in don’t allow us to do so. That’s where professional support can be so beneficial in, providing a safe and supportive space in which to learn about your own needs and boundaries and practise expressing them.
How I work and the modes of therapy I use
As a Counsellor, I’m trained in a diverse range of therapeutic approaches, including Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT), Mindfulness, Tapping, Cognitive Behavioural Therapy, Focusing Oriented Therapy, and Interpersonal Therapy, as well as Meditation, Yoga Sequences and Yoga Breathing.
I always draw from a person-centred and humanistic approach and believe that the client knows themself the best - and given the right conditions, they can experience self actualised growth. My role is to support you in this.
Each and every person is unique and brings a unique history of experiences, so I tailor my approach to meet each individual’s needs and goals.
Because the body stores memories of our experiences, I like to work with the body as well as the mind, to process and heal the whole being. What I mean by this is that there are some experiences we can’t think ourselves out of. They need to be healed within the body - through processing how we felt when the initial situation arose.
Some of the modes of therapy I commonly draw on include:
Mindfulness
Mindfulness is a powerful practice that helps us connect to the present moment, without judgement, and with a quality of curiosity.
It involves intentionally directing our attention to the present moment, to observe our thoughts, emotions and physical sensations.
With regular practice, mindfulness has been shown to:
Improve focus
Support emotional regulation
Support our capacity for cohesive relationships
Release stress
Improve energy.
Learn more about the 5 Benefits of Mindfulness.
Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT)
Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT), is a therapeutic modality that evolved from Cognitive Behaviour Therapy (CBT) and incorporates mindfulness practices. It is well-known and accepted within the field of Psychology and has been found to be effective for a range of mental health challenges.
In ACT, we work to make room for everything - all thoughts, feelings and sensations, without trying to control or get rid of them.
This includes a technique called Defusion, where we work to step back from an experience, in order to become less merged with it. This noticing can help to bring new perspective to our internal experience - and to make decisions from our core values, rather than from the reaction to the experience.
ACT emphasises taking actions that are aligned with our core values and that promote wellbeing. By focusing on affirmative values-based action, we can move closer towards our goals for a fulfilling life. This focus on values can provide a sense of compassion and purpose.
Learn more about ACT in a nutshell.
Tapping
Tapping is a technique that involves using the body in a mindful way, to be with difficult thoughts, feelings and experiences.
During a session, I would typically ask you something like: “What are you thinking?” or “What are you feeling?”, and write down the words you say. Then I will ask you to use the tapping technique while we say these words in a call and response. For example, if one of your descriptive words was “anxious”, I’ll say “anxious” and you’d repeat “anxious”. Or, if the experience has changed, you could also respond with “felt anxious”.
After this, we have a check in, as other things may start to arise. Through the process of Tapping, other emotions, needs and thoughts that are below the surface can be revealed and processed.
Tapping helps with:
Staying present and mindful in the moment
Gentle exposure - rather than avoiding difficult things, it provides a way to gently tune into them
There is also an activating effect of Meridian points through physically tapping these points on your body.
For a little taste of tapping with me you can tap with me here. I also recommend having a look at Nick Ortner’s Tapping Solution and Brad Yates on Youtube. Nick Ortner’s tapping solution app is one some of my clients find helpful too.
Focusing Oriented Therapy
This therapeutic approach involves tuning into the body’s intelligence to access and get to know the felt sense of their experience and follow this as a way to process and heal emotional wounds.
This approach supports getting out of the thinking mind, and connects with the information your body has to share with you.
This can be challenging sometimes, where perhaps sitting with body sensations has previously been unsafe, or where it’s a new experience. It can also be a very different way of being with yourself, in turning your attention inwards.
However, with time, we can access and unlock these unconscious insights in the body and learn so much more about ourselves through doing so.
This approach includes exploration of how an issue feels within the body, including trying to bring it to life by giving it a colour, shape, texture or phrase (for example, “it’s like a squishy playdough ball”, or “a buzzy feeling in my chest”). Then, we check if it has an emotional tone and if so, what is it that makes it angry or sad or fearful?
Then, importantly, we explore:
What does it need or not need?
What does it want or not want?
The responses to these questions are then acknowledged, meaning this part of you can be seen, heard and sensed. In feeling acknowledged, a sad part may make way for a critical part to be seen, heard and acknowledged. In this way, you’re supported to attend to past difficult experiences and emotions, and access healing through the process.
Yoga sequences and yoga breathing
I sometimes draw on my experience as a Yoga teacher to incorporate yoga movement, meditation and breathing techniques that support the mind and body to manage stress and anxiety.
Yoga has been found to be supportive for a range of mental health concerns, including anxiety, depression and PTSD, as it can promote relaxation by activating the parasympathetic nervous system. This can also lower heart rate and blood pressure, and support focus, attention and memory. Yoga also promotes physical health through improved flexibility, balance and strength.
By combining yoga-based techniques together with the above modes of therapy, I offer holistic support to promote psychological, emotional and physical wellbeing.
My Yoga teaching and practise, along with my life experiences allow me to hold space in sessions in a way that builds rapport and safety for those I work with.
I hold non-judgemental positive regard for each person who works with me, and I make room for big feelings and defence mechanisms.
Nothing is too big to bring to a session.
Work with me
If my work resonates with you, I offer a complimentary 10 minute chat where you can ask any questions, clarity how I can help you through working together, and get a sense of whether we are a good fit for your growth and healing.
Book https://www.flourishmindfully.com.au/10-minute-chat or drop me an email.
As a qualified and registered Counsellor & Psychotherapist, Mindfulness Meditation Teacher and Yoga Teacher, with much lived experience I am equipped both personally and professionally to support you manage these life challenges.