Tag: Personal Growth

Mindful Imagining: Leveraging The Power of Your Inner World to Feel Different

March 12

By Sarah Beardslee, LCPC

Imagine – eating a favorite meal, hearing a favorite sound, smelling a favorite scent. You may notice your body connecting with such an image. Perhaps you smile as you imagine a funny story, feel warmth and comfort imagining a loved one, or your heart rate increases and muscles tighten when imagining something scary.

The imagination lets us explore our world in new ways. It allows us to create solutions, connect with things we cannot see. However, the imagination may also make us feel trapped within a world fueled by fears, insecurities, anger, or hopelessness. It can … Read more

Teaching and Modeling Resilience to Our Children in Tough Times

September 2

By Michelle Cunningham, LCP

We are going through a monumentally strange time in our lives right now. This is maybe the only thing that is utterly true at all times because everything else is shifting. A global pandemic has put it’s thumb on daily life and changed things we have taken for granted – face-to-face time with friends, family and acquaintances, work, school and now school sports. It’s all changing, stopping, or both, and it is hard. Potentially losing a year of team sports is going to be a challenge that we never planned to face.

While this is a … Read more

OCD Support Group Starts This Week

April 21

Location:  Online currently; future meetings will be held at Real Life Counseling Derby (1720 E. Osage, #200, Derby, Kansas).

Start Date:  April 22, 2020 from 7:00pm-8:30pm; Additional dates/times to follow.

Open to: Adults presenting with Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder, preferably currently in Exposure and Response Prevention (ERP) treatment.

Fee: Free

Contact: This peer support group will be facilitated by Shauna Meier, LSCSW.

If interested, please email Shauna or call (316)425-7774, ext. 3013.… Read more

6 Ways to Establish A Sense of Self-Worth (Apart from Relying on Others’ Opinions)

July 16

By Joel Ybarra, LCMFT

One of the most common questions I run into working with people is, “How do I establish a sense of self-worth not based on what other people think?” Most of us understand we shouldn’t be defined by others – what they say or think about us – but we don’t readily know how to establish a sense of value in a more legitimate way. After working for 20 years to help people improve their sense of self, I have gathered that there are actually multiple dimensions that can give us a sense of worth and value.

… Read more

“Because I Said So”: Instilling Confidence and Healthy Decision-Making in Our Children

June 12

By Seth Hock, LMFT

We have all been there, on both sides of the conversation – the ongoing negotiation between parents and children, when parents are asking children to do something they may not want to do. As parents, we can be exasperated from the arguments, power struggles, and the constant reminders to do something. The voice, oh so familiar, broadcasts the same tired message. It reverberates through our headspace like an ancient echo: “How many times do I have to ask or tell them to listen?”

Children, at times in innocent ignorance and at other times in stubborn defiance, … Read more

A Single Tree Podcast #11 – The Evolution/Development of The Self 2: Abiding Trust in Existence

January 7

Listen below to episode 11 of A Single Tree Podcast about being able to respond to what life hands us in a constructive way. Find all episodes of A Single Tree Podcast here and subscribe on Soundcloud or iTunes. Also, find the podcast on facebook here.

Description: In order to continue expanding our consciousness, we must have an abiding trust in existence itself. Amazingly, we can assimilate even the most difficult of circumstances into a resilient narrative. Life is there to shape us by transforming our “programming” so we can connect with the Largest Self or being-ness … Read more

A Single Tree Podcast #10 – The Evolution/Development of The Self: Assimilating Feedback from Our Environment

December 20

Listen below to episode 10 of A Single Tree Podcast about the development and evolution of the self. Find all episodes and subscribe on Soundcloud or iTunes. Also, find the podcast on facebook here.

Description: We form ideas of ourselves through interaction with our environment. The relationships we have with people around us and the feedback we get from our environment reflect back to us important information. We form impressions of ourselves which are discarded as we grow and develop. It’s important to know ourselves and be exactly who we are, and be willing to surrender these … Read more

A Single Tree Podcast #2: Small Self, Large Self

October 25

Brandon and Joel recorded Episode 2 of A Single Tree Podcast about the “small self” and how to connect with the “Large Self.” You can find all episodes of A Single Tree Podcast here and subscribe on Soundcloud or iTunes. You can also listen to the latest episode from October 24, 2017 below.

Description: More about the “small self” (or ego) and how we can take a proper stance toward it to shed layers and become our fullest selves, connecting with the “Large Self,” where we find connection and wholeness.

… Read more

A Single Tree Podcast #1: The Larger Context of Which We Are A Part

October 22

Brandon and Joel recorded their first podcast! It’s called A Single Tree Podcast and you can find all episodes here and subscribe on Soundcloud or iTunes. You can also listen to the first episode from October 17, 2017 about connecting with “the larger consciousness” below.

Description: We all search for context to help us find meaning in our circumstances. The largest context that exists is consciousness itself. We are all a part of it and it is that from which we came. If we go back and connect with this largest context which we can call “being-ness,” then we … Read more

Real Life Counseling Challenges Other Businesses to Maximize Health And Creativity, Not Just Profits

December 29

At Real Life Counseling, we are starting a campaign to challenge ourselves and others to build businesses that are healthy and creative, not just profitable. In a LinkedIn article “What If The Purpose of Business Is Creativity, Not Wealth Extraction,”[1] John Battelle questions the common understanding that businesses exist solely to deliver profits to shareholders. As we manage and work in business, we reach points where we must balance profit objectives with values that focus on the health of our organizations, the people within them and the community around us. Maximizing profits is not always opposed to creativity, but … Read more

Where You Have Not Been

September 13

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Brandon just returned not too long ago from being trained to do hypnosis and one of the main tenets of the training is that you cannot lead others where you have not been yourself. That is applicable to our work helping others in general. For that reason, we work hard as individuals and as an organization to be stretching ourselves consistently: growing as people and in our relationships with one another. If we as an organization cannot have healthy relationships with each other, how can we help others in their relationships? And, if we as people are not learning, growing … Read more

From The Road Less Traveled

August 29

“In any case, when we avoid the legitimate suffering that results from dealing with problems, we also avoid the growth that problems demand from us.”

M. Scott Peck, The Road Less Traveled (1978)

… Read more