Your Thoughtful Therapist

ART therapy is a blended field of therapeutic practice that combines art and psychology. It utilises the creative process, artistic techniques, and external artwork to support individuals to develop self awareness, explore emotions and acknowledge unresolved conflicts and trauma.  This psychological therapy has not been in use till the 1940s. After that the doctors observed and realised that the people suffering from psychological disorders are much more expressive through these artworks and drawings than verbally or written, which led many to explore the use of art as a healing strategy.After which this occupied a major place in the therapeutic field of psychology. The 3 main elements of art therapy are creating artwork, reflecting, and connecting to personal insights. There are few mentioned ART therapy techniques which help ones to overcome their problems: Collage, Colouring, Doodling and scribbling, Drawing, Finger painting, Painting, Photography, Sculpting, Working with clay A...

In general, anxiety can be defined as excessive and persistent worry about everyday situations. Anxiety can be normal in stressful situations such as public speaking or giving a test and it acts as an indicator of underlying diseases. The major symptoms of anxiety are fast heart rate, rapid breathing, sweating, and feeling tired. The Austrian neurologist and the founder of psychoanalysis, Sigmund Freud emphasized that anxiety is a felt, affective, unpleasant state accompanied by a physical sensation that warns the person against impending danger. The unpleasantness is often vague and hard to pinpoint, but the anxiety itself is always felt. Sigmund Freud was the first to state that anxiety is a type of personality trait that is an innate tendency of an infant to act in any stressful situation. This anxiety an infant gets from his/her biological parents and is not learned.   Anxiety according to Freud can be seen in 3 ways- Neurotic Anxiety- It is an apprehension about an unknown dan...

World Mental Health Day (10th October) is an international day for global mental health education, awareness and advocacy against social stigma. It was first celebrated in 1992 at the initiative of the World Federation for Mental Health. This day, each October, thousands of supporters come to celebrate this annual awareness program to bring attention to mental illness and its major effects on people's lives. World Mental Health Day was celebrated for the first time on October 10, 1992, at the initiative of Deputy Secretary General Richard Hunter. Up until 1994, the day had no specific theme other than general promoting mental health advocacy and educating the public. In 1994, for the first time with the suggestion of then Secretary General Eugene Brody, this day was celebrated with a theme. The theme was "Improving the Quality of Mental Health Services throughout the World".World Mental Health Day is supported by WHO through raising awareness on mental health issues usi...

Cognitive psychology is a fascinating field that explores how the mind processes and interprets information. Cognition is defined as the mental activity that goes on in the brain when a person is processing information- organizing it, understanding it, and communicating it to others, this process is called the mediational process. It's amazing to think about how our brains can perceive, analyze, and store vast amounts of data. Through the study of cognitive psychology, we can gain a better understanding of how we learn, remember, and think.  Dating back to the field of psychology, it can be seen that the field of psychology has been specifically focused on behavior-oriented explanations. It focuses on the idea that all behaviors of individuals are learned through interactions with the environment. Later with the new findings in the field of psychology called ‘cognitive Psychology’ by German-American Psychologist, ‘Ulric Richard Gustav Neisser’, conclusions were drawn that the funct...

It is not a destination but a continuous journey of growth and development... Becoming a thoughtful therapist is a transformative journey rooted in empathy and a profound desire to help others. It begins with inspiration and academic foundation, but it truly flourishes when you cultivate empathy and embrace personal growth and self-awareness. The art of active listening and reflective practice refine your skills, while ongoing self-reflection and supervision keep you attuned to your biases and triggers. This journey never truly ends; it's a lifelong commitment to understanding the complexities of the human experience, providing a haven for healing, and enriching both your clients' lives and your own with newfound insights and resilience. For many, the journey toward becoming a therapist begins with a spark of inspiration ignited by personal experiences, a desire to help others or a fascination with the complexities of the human mind. And there comes the education to make us qua...

  'Even within the profession of psychology, the clinician is considered a "late bloomer." ' (Kahn and Giffen)  ~ dedicated to all the aspiring clinical psychologists This perception stems from various factors that influence the trajectory of a clinician's professional development. While it is true that clinicians typically embark on their career path later compared to other professions, this delay is not a reflection of incompetence or lack of potential. Instead, it is a consequence of the unique demands and complexities involved in becoming a proficient clinician. One key reason why clinicians are considered late bloomers is the extensive educational journey they must undertake. Unlike some professions that require only a few years of formal education, the path to becoming a clinician necessitates significant investment of time and effort. A clinician typically begins their academic journey with an undergraduate degree in psychology, followed by a postgraduate p...

Hello everyone, Today I'm going to talk about a very small topic but trust me we all should know this and take care of. Going right into the topic, It is about the correlation has been seen between mental health and COVID-19. I understand, this is a very challenging time for all of us. We all are very uncertain about various aspects of life. And also scared, so, scared that, we are literally frightened of the whole pandemic situation. I understand, we continuously coming across of bad news and situation is getting worse. But I'm not here to talk about the misery or adding more. I'm writing this particular piece to aware you all and help you out in some way during this situation. My aim is to make you all understand the correlation of mental health and the COVID-19 situation. From past few days, I have come across cases where people are actually dying of breathlessness. But those patients were not affected by COVID-19. You must be thinking, How that can be possible? Here com...

  Hello readers, I hope you are doing well in this challenging time. If not that is also fine, we all are having our own challenges and difficulties in coping with this situation.  Crisis due to COVID-19 is hitting its peak and everyone is in distress, directly or indirectly.  In this difficult time, I request you all to not give up on our mental  and physical health  . Working on our wholistic well-being should be the goal now. If needed, please seek professional help for both physical and mental health .  We all are trying our bests to fight against this situation. Every small step taken by us can make a huge difference in the situation for us and also for others. In this post, I'll be sharing with you all, a wholistic way of keeping yourselves sane in this challenging situation. Some strategies or ideas which can help us grow our immunity and also improve our mental well-being. I, myself do these to keep my physical & mental health on check and hopef...

The Big Question..????? Can Counselors, Scholars with PhD in Psychology/Counselling Psychology, MPhil in Counselling Psychology (or other branches) work as mental health practitioners in India?  As per the Mental Health Care Act 2017 and RCI, two years full time supervised training in M. Phil in clinical psychology degree is the only essential qualifications to practice as clinical psychologists in the field of mental health. No other degree such as PhD in Psychology, or certificate, or masters in Clinical Psychology and psychology, Diploma in Guidance, Counselling, Psychotherapy, 3 months or 6 months internship in the field of clinical psychology, open university courses like M.Sc in Psychotherapy and Counseling, individuals underwent few days or few weeks professional training in CBT, REBT, NLP, SLD, Neuropsychology or Hypnosis in India or abroad or similar courses cannot make eligible anyone to practice as Clinical Psychologist in India. So, don’t be misguided by any kind of fak...

The National Commission for Allied and Healthcare Professions Bill, 2020 Recently, the National Commission for Allied and Healthcare Professions Bill, 2020 was passed unanimously by the Lok Sabha. The Bill seeks to regulate and standardize the education and practice of allied and healthcare professionals. The group of allied professionals is large and the Bill is trying to regulate this field by providing dignity to their roles. Key Points mentioned, Allied Health Professional: The Bill defines an ‘allied health professional’ as an associate, technician, or technologist trained to support the diagnosis and treatment of any illness, disease, injury, or impairment. Such a professional should have obtained a diploma or degree. The duration of the degree/diploma should be at least 2,000 hours (over a period of two to four years). Healthcare Professional: A ‘healthcare professional’ includes a scientist, therapist, or any other professional who studies, advises, researches, supervises, or ...

HELLO , Everyone In today's post I'll be talking about 'Communication Disorders'. In my previous posts we have read about what is Communication and the barriers in effective communication. These two parts are interdependent and we have seen the whole communication process as a whole in these two. If you haven't read up here are the links:  How Do We Communicate?  &  Modes of Comm. & Common barriers. Now we are going to know, what are Communication disorders.? These come under the clinical domain of the very topic. Communication disorders by it's name depicts the inability to communicate with others. And please note that, these are not just the barriers in communication. These are clinical pathological condition of a person (mainly children), who are not able to communicate with others. Children with Communication Disorders (formerly known as developmental speech and language disorders) have difficulty in producing speech sounds, using spoken language to ...

Hi, How have you been.? I hope all my readers are doing well.. Here I am, back with the continuing post on "Communication" . In this post, I'll be talking about the common modes we use everyday in our day to day basis communication and also about the barriers affecting our communication.. If you haven't read up the previous post regarding this topic then click on this link and go, read up ( communication: how do we communicate? ).. As we know and read up in the previous post, Communication  is a process. It has been defined as transferring of a thought or idea from one person or group of persons to another person or group of persons so that it can be understood and acted upon. Communication process is the system by which a message goes to the sender from the receiver in an organized way (the process has been described in the previous post). According to S.K. Kapur, “The Communication process is the method by which the  sender transfers information and under...