White Cloud Consulting
Counselling
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Information for Dr Allen Nash's Clients                                    
 
This description will acquaint you with the Mindfulness-Based method:
 
The method is based on the idea that much of our everyday suffering is unnecessary and is produced by unconscious beliefs that are no longer relevant, true or necessary. The method is designed to bring such beliefs into consciousness. It is a method of assisted self-study and discovery. It can bring normally inaccessible mental processes into consciousness gently and efficiently. Once these mental processes (such as beliefs memories, habits and emotions) are made conscious,they can be examined and modified to provide a more realistic and satisfying way of being.
 
This work of assisted self-discovery requires of clients that they can enter into short periods (a minute or less) of mindfulness.  Because of this, clients must be able to learn to become calm and centered enough to observe their own reactions, as if they were observing the automatic behavior of another person.
 
What to Expect:
 
Your emotional history, the part of it that has created the unconscious beliefs and habits with which you meet the world, is operating right now. Your history is written in the way you do things every minute. It is expressed by your style and your defining characteristics.  So, you can expect that the therapist will be looking and listening for these and will bring them to your attention as part of setting up the little experiments in mindfulness that are the core of the work.

The therapist will also be very warm and kind and patient. The vulnerability that mindfulness entails, the openness to unconscious material that's needed, all requires a very safe environment,which needs a particularly caring, non-judgmental person. You can expect your therapist to be exactly that.

Because the method is based on this very direct route to unconscious material (evocative experiments in mindfulness), it is faster than most other methods. It works very directly with nonverbal expressions and does not spend a lot of time in conversation, analyzing and explaining. Something significant usually happens every session.
 
 
What You Need to be Ready: 
  • expect you can learn to stay with and report on your present experiences
  • a willingness to learn to get into a calm inward focused state and are relaxed enough to allow you to notice your reactions
  • you'll need the courage and be open and honest. That will be your greatest ally.
 
The Rewards:
 
There are many.  Relief from persistent painful emotions and behaviors is probably the greatest reward. You will also gain a much deeper understanding of yourself and with that, more freedom to choose what you'll be able to feel, greater pleasure in everyday living, and to engage in fuller, richer, and more rewarding relationships.  Assisted self-study can achieve this.