Friday 14 December 2018

How to build a successful couple relationship, by a long-term couples therapist


*Comfort and passion in sex-love relationships*:

I have heard it said that happy relationships consists of a good balance of ‘comfort’ and ‘passion’.  Of course, we then need to look at what produces ‘comfort’, and I think the answer is that given by Erich Fromm, in defining love as ‘care, respect and responsibility (plus an interest in who your partner is, and how they feel, right now!)

What about the passion side?  Some people think that is straightforward.  Unfortunately, too many men still think that the definition of passion in romantic relationships is this: intercourse; penetration; ‘shafting’.

However, in my book on how to build a successful relationship, I include this alert by Daniel O’Beeve:



Appendix G: The importance of the clitoris

G1 The myth of the vaginal orgasm

In this appendix, I will write about Daniel O’Beeve’s first love affair:

His girlfriend, Belinda, informed him up front how bored she became with sex, when she had been involved with a new man for a few weeks!  He assumed (for a completely unknown reason), that this would not apply to him.

Six weeks later she had betrayed him with another man. 

He left, found a copy of a book entitled The Myth of the Vaginal Orgasm on the railway platform, as he left town, and studied that book on the train.

What did he learn from that reading?

1. That the male theory of human sexual relations, which he had picked up from his culture by osmosis, was false.  It was not enough to insert one’s penis into a woman’s vagina, and to thrust it in and out, in order to produce mutual pleasure.  (It produced undoubted pleasure for the man, and most men failed to ask the woman: ‘How is this for you?’)

2. Sexual intercourse is the most enjoyable part of sexual relations for the man – but for the man only!  It does not produce an orgasmic experience for the woman - (or not reliably, in some cases; and not at all in perhaps most)! 

For example, in an article about her new book, Germaine Greer (2018) quotes the “statistics of sexologists” as showing that “46% of women fake orgasm every time they have sex”.  And they do this to bring the experience of intercourse to an end.

3. For most women, on most occasions, only direct stimulation of the clitoris[i], by digital (finger) or lingual (tongue) massage, will bring her to orgasm.  (And any man can ask his partner to teach him how to do that!) And just in case some readers insist that my data are not up to date, and that things must have improved in recent years, I offer you this extract from the Metro Newspaper of Thursday November 22nd 2018:

“...A study conducted by Durex in the Netherlands last your (2017) showed that almost 75% of women do not orgasm during sex, whereas only 28% of men don’t climax... And it’s getting no better: this month a study in The Journal of Sexual Medicine revealed that of 1,700 US newlyweds, 43 per cent of husbands had no idea how often their wives orgasm. So, in straight sex, there does seem to be an Orgasm Gap.”  (Page 39)[ii].

Part of the problem may be... For more, please go here: https://abc-counselling.org/happy-marriage-or-couple-relationships/






Saturday 8 December 2018

Daniel O'Beeve's Amazing Life - A psycho-therapeutic journey


Jim Byrne is a doctor of counselling who has developed a novel approach to narrative therapy, which includes an understanding of the power of social stories about ‘who we are’, and ‘what is possible for us’!

Nata-Lifestyle-coach8Introduction to this new book about

Daniel O’Beeve’s Amazing Journey

Page of information constructed by Renata Taylor-Byrne,

December 2018

~~~
One feature of Jim’s approach is that he uses autobiographical writing to explore psychological and spiritual distortions in his clients and his readers.

For a number of years, he has been refining a story about the life of Daniel O’Beeve, which is intended to teach people just how much we can transcend our difficult social origins, if we are determined enough.  As he would express it: “We can heal our souls and minds and hearts, given the belief in the possibility of a forward moving journey to a better life!”

He has found it very difficult to package Daniel’s story in a way that would preserve its value, while at the same time making it both accessible and appealing to potential readers.

His target audience is anybody who is interested in psychology, philosophy, mythology or spirituality, in the context of being born into a difficult, distorting, dysfunctional family of origin.  Anybody who is interested in the possibility of self-growth in the context of an extremely challenging early childhood environment.

When he first discussed the packaging of the story with Daniel, Daniel wanted it to have a zany title, like this:

Knit Your Own Psychotherapist, by Daniel O’Beeve.

Jim asked Daniel for more on that (bizarre) idea, and Daniel expanded it like this:

“I would suggest this as the flysheet/cover text:

Knit Your Own Psychotherapist – With bits of old wool.    

A semi-autobiographical story by a French-Irish psychologist

~~~

“EntrĂ©e:
Image of Daniel for front cover“I was born in an Irish Catholic ‘mad house’ at the end of the Second World War.  My mother knitted – furiously, and unendingly – woollen garments, for the family and for sale – while standing on one foot, smoking a Woodbine, which dangled from her pursed and nicotine stained lips, while she sang patriotic Irish laments.  She knitted my itchy underpants; my socks which would not stay up, because they were too loose; my nightshirts; jumpers with shawl collars that sweated and itched all through the hot summers in school. She even threatened to knit me a white suit for my First Holy Communion (while all my school peers would be fitted out with little gray, tailored suits of worsted fabric). But the worst crime of all, and the one that caused the most psychological damage to my child-mind was this: She knitted me a woollen helmet from leftover scraps of many colours, and insisted that I must wear it to school every day, despite the fact that it attracted every bully, within a five mile radius, to beat me”.
~~~

Jim wasn’t keen on Daniel's suggested approach.  He countered with this:

“Why don’t we call it something like:

The Construction of a Psychotherapist from Fragments of Broken Lives:

An Autobiographical narrative.

“Doesn’t that sound like it conveys the serious psychological content of your story?”

~~~

Daniel rejected Jim’s response, and countered with an even wilder idea than the previous one.  And so the conversation went back and forth, via email exchanges, for months and months and months.

~~~

After many attempts to come up with a message which accurately reflects the nature of Daniel’s journey, they agreed upon this:

Daniel O’Beeve’s Amazing Journey:

From traumatic origins to transcendent love

The memoir of Daniel O’Beeve, a strong-willed seeker: 1945-1985

Transcribed by Jim Byrne
~~~


~~~

Couples therapy for abusive behaviour in relationships...


Blog Post

8th December 2018

Dr Jim’s Blog: Couple relationships and the problem of abuse...

~~~

In this blog post, I want to present the core of a case study from my recent book on How to Build a Successful Relationship, as follows:


Debby D came to see me, in my office, on a cold, wet November morning. She looked undernourished, pale and sad.  She told me that her partner, Tom, had refused to come with her.  Indeed, he objected so much to the idea of couple’s therapy, and verbally abused her to such a degree, that she had promised not to proceed.  But she had come to see me anyway, because she was desperate.  She and Tom had been together for ten years, and there had been trouble from the start.  He treated her horribly, criticizing her approach to housekeeping, and her makeup.  He frightened her so much that she had started biting her nails.  Then she developed an obsessive-compulsive urge to scrub her hands until they bled. 



I explored her history of relationships, working backwards from Tom, via two other serious relationships; and back to her relationship with her mother and father; and her parents’ relationship with each other.  Every single one of them had been abusive!

Debby wanted me to show her how to make Tom be more reasonable.  It took a few sessions for me to get to the point of using the ‘Best Friend Question’ with her:

“Debby”, I said.  “Suppose your best friend had exactly the same problem.  She came from a disturbed family background; she had three difficult relationships, in which her partner was verbally abusive with her; what would you advise your best friend to do?”

“Kick him out!” said Debby, without a moment’s pause.

I then asked her: “If that seems to be the right solution for your best friend, is it also perhaps the solution for you and Tom?”

At this suggestion ...

For more, please take a look at my latest blog post, here: https://abc-counselling.org/2018/12/08/couple-relationships-and-abusive-behaviour/

Wednesday 5 December 2018

The psychology and philosophy of love and relationships


What is love?

According to one popular view, to create love, you have to exert yourself in pursuit of the happiness of another person.  We show our love through appropriate actions.  And other actions tend to destroy love.

When we have worked successfully to create a loving relationship, we know intimately that love is sweeter than honey; warmer than the warmest blanket; and more sustaining than the most enjoyable food.  For more, please go to this web page: https://abc-counselling.org/happy-marriage-or-couple-relationships/

The need for love

Love is actually an essential requirement for a fulfilling life.  It is not an optional extra.  Love is food for the soul, from the soul! Without it, we wither and die inside.  A loveless life is a curse; a strain; a barren journey through a valueless vacuum.

Love warms the coldest night, and brightens the dullest day.  It warms the heart, and drives the blues away.  Love makes us glad to be alive, and to be connected to the one we love. For more, please go to this web page: https://abc-counselling.org/happy-marriage-or-couple-relationships/


Learning how to love

But if you come from a family background in which love was in short supply, how do you then learn to love?  How can you succeed in becoming a loving partner in a loving relationship? The answer is to read this book, by Dr Jim Byrne, based on his experience of:

- Being a couple’s therapist for more than twenty years;

- Completing his own marriage guidance in 1984, and co-creating a thirty-four-year relationship of great happiness, love and joy with his wife, Renata; And:

- Studying love and relationship and communication skills for about thirty-five years.


Monday 3 December 2018

The divorce rate in the developed world is in the region of 50%. Relationships are failing at a spectacular rate, causing an enormous amount of emotional pain and social aftershock. 

Christmas is coming, and this is a typical time of family conflict, because expectations are high, costs are high, and money is tight because of the state of the economy.

The glue that holds relationships together is going to be tested to an extreme degree.

Are you happy in your relationship, or are you struggling to feel that you are sufficiently loved and liked and admired; and that you are able to offer enough love and care and respect to your partner?  Does your mutual love keep you both going through the tough times?

If you need help with your love relationship, then I can help.  I have twenty years’ experience of helping couples to overcome all kinds of obstacles and difficulties, and to learn to love each other more actively and more successfully, and more happily!  And now I have written my wisdom and learning down in a book on how to build and repair a Successful Relationship.



This book is an introductory guide to the following subject:

How to have a happy and successful couple relationship (which could be a marriage, pair bond, civil partnership, or sex-love relationship).

It’s designed to be helpful for:

- Committed, long-term couples; or young people starting out on the journey of building a loving relationship;

And for:

- Counsellors and therapists (who want to learn from the author’s experience of providing couples therapy for twenty years);

And for:

- Self-help enthusiasts, and students of human relations.

It deals with a broad range of knowledge and skills, spread across three volumes, and is based on the author’s thirty-four years of study of couple relationships; and his twenty years’ experience of helping couples to improve, revive, restore (or dissolve) their relationships with their long-term, committed, sex-love partners.

This first volume is an essential foundation for what comes later.

For more information, please go to https://abc-counselling.org/happy-marriage-or-couple-relationships/


Sunday 25 November 2018

2.
“Remember, you are only an actor in a play, which the manager directs”. Epictetus
~~~
“I wish I had never married, ‘cos the humour is off me now!” Popular song.
~~~

Moira Curran heard the door close, even though it was done quietly.  She knew she should get up at once, to get the younger children ready for school, but instead she reached out and switched off her alarm, which was due to go off in about fifteen minutes.
She was very tired.  It was the tiredness of depression and grief, as well as the effect of endless domestic drudgery; and late evening knitting, to earn some money from neighbours who had no time to knit for themselves.  She closed her eyes for a quick, forty winks.
Moira heard the door close, even though it was done quietly. She knew there was something wrong.  Surely she’d been here already this morning? Surely she’d heard the door close once already. And the second time was slightly louder than normal.
She sat up in her big, pink cotton nightdress, and leaned her head and shoulders against the metal bars of the head of her little, single bed.  Reaching out, she picked up her clock, and checked the time.  It was 7.20.  She’d slept for thirty-five minutes after the Old Man had gone out.
She felt confused. Why would the door close twice?  In the past, it would have been Dermot going out to work.  But he was no longer here.
There were five beds in this room, four of which were occupied.  The one in the corner, by the wardrobe, used to be Dermot’s bed, up to three months ago.  She looked across at the tidy bed cover, and the tears welled up in her eyes, as they had done every day since he’d left for England.  And now, about twelve weeks later, she’d only had one letter from him, and that was of little comfort, since she detected no warmth in his dutiful words; and no sense that he missed her or his home.
He was a cold fish, was Dermot; even though he was her big boy; her brightest son; the brains of the family; the one who would become a doctor.
She cupped her hands over her eyes and sobbed gently, until she heard Aileen, her eight year old daughter, stirring in the adjacent, single bed.  She immediately suppressed her tears and sobs, so as not to wake her daughter; swung herself out of bed; and began to get dressed. ...More... https://abc-counselling.org/a-psychological-thriller-about-a-disturbed-family/

Friday 16 November 2018

Chapter 1: What hell is this?


1.

“Fatherhood would be a wonderful state if only we each had a father who knew how to father us!” (J.L. Prendergast)

~~~

“A bitter heart devours its owner”. (Herero adage).

~~~

24th September 1964

Waking and sleeping are like parallel universes.  The function of the former is to learn about life; and the function of the latter is to collect up the broken pieces of another futile day.

Those were strange thoughts for a man who had only attended technical school, in a poor rural village, and who lived in a bookless home.

He stepped out from among the trees on to the shamrock blanket that grew profusely in the fields to the south and west, and abutted the sprawling sea of grey, corporation houses that was Wattling Town, on the outskirts of Dublin City. The shamrock was just as alive and active in the cold, pre-dawn breeze, despite being almost invisible.  But it was still the same shamrock that had inspired generations of Irishmen to strive for freedom in a world of permanent serfdom, and perpetual slavery to false ideas and false gods.

He felt the poor shamrock crushing under the weight of his big, black riding boots; the ones he used to wear many years ago, when he was a proud, young farmer, many miles from here.  He could sense the black blood flowing out of the crushed shamrock leaves, as he stepped forward.  And then he noticed a change in texture, and realized that his right foot was now completely bare, and buried up to the ankle in a warm, sticky cow pat.

Michael Curran awoke to the sound of the mechanical alarm clock ringing violently, like the bell of a local fire engine. His head was pounding.  Picking up the clock, and switching the alarm bell off, he noticed the time – 5.30 am.  The damn thing had gone off half an hour early.  But he was glad to be awake, since waking up pulled him out of the nightmare he was submerged in, up to a moment ago.

He swung his fifty-five-year-old legs out of bed, and looked up at the crucifix on the wall opposite the side of his lonely bed, above the holy water font by the light switch.  He scratched his greying head of wavy, formerly-black hair, and yawned. Over to his left he could see his son Christopher’s blankets rising and falling rhythmically, as he snored through his drunken stupor.  The little drunken bastard. ...
https://abc-counselling.org/a-psychological-thriller-about-a-disturbed-family/

~~~

Tuesday 30 October 2018


We live in very difficult times.  Stress levels in the Anglo-American world are the worst for many decades, resulting in an epidemic of emotional distress – manifesting as depression, anxiety, panic and anger outbursts.  Mental health is in crisis.  Physical health is in crisis. (See *The China Study*, by Campbell and Campbell, 2006). The so-called high-tech health systems of the Anglo-American world are failing to maintain the health of our nations.
Sitting on the periphery of this mess is the legion of counsellors and psychotherapists, who have to decide where to stand on these developments.  But there are really only two places to stand.  One involves covering your eyes with a blinder, and soldiering on pointlessly. And the other involves waking up and doing something about this mess.

https://abc-counselling.org/2018/07/24/lifestyle-counselling-as-extreme-self-care/


Monday 29 October 2018

Here is my ‘quick tutorial’ on how to apply E-CENT counselling in practice, drawn from my impressions of thousands of counselling sessions.  If I have to try to summarise ‘the process’, here is my best approximation to what the counsellor is trying to do:

# Build a relationship with the client, while trying to find out what they want and 
need.

# Get an outline of the client’s story – the ‘confession stage’ (in the Jungian tradition) – about the client’s presenting problem.

# Help them to explore their story, and to refine it, so it becomes more accurate – more complete; or more digested; more known. For example, help them to check if their story has been subjected to any deletions, distortions or over-generalizations. Help them to explore their story of origins and their story of relationships (to begin with).

# Help them to see that their stories (including their emotions about events) could be edited (‘re-framed’)[1] so that they are less disturbing, less painful, and more tolerable than they originally seemed[2].

# Teach the client that the quality of the story that they live inside of is strongly and unavoidably affected by their diet[3], physical exercise regime[4], relaxation and sleep processes, relationship support (adequate or inadequate), physical and socioeconomic environment, and social connections (good and/or bad)[5], etc.; as well as their inner-dialogue (or self-talk; mainly at non-conscious levels of mind).

# Teach the client:

(a) To dedicate themselves to reality at all cost![6] (Even though it is hard for a human to know what is ‘real’, because we automatically interpret every event/object on the basis of our prior, cumulative, interpretive, cultural experience.)

(b) To accept the things they cannot change, ...more... 

https://abc-counselling.org/



Sunday 28 October 2018

Murder is murder!  But some murders have the disturbing effect of banging up unfinished business from the past.  This is the problem facing Inspector Glasheen...

Inspector Glasheen stumbles upon a brutal murder which brings up his own childhood demons.


In Watling Town, on the outskirts of Dublin City, in 1964, he has to investigate the death, in bed, of a sixteen year old youth.  It looks to others like an open and shut case of ‘filicide’ – or the killing of a child by his own father.
But Glasheen’s unusual background causes him to see and feel this case differently.  He is, after all only half-Irish.  The other half is American Indian, and although his father brought him back to Ireland when he was just five years old, he has retained a lot of the ways of the Indian: the uncanny capacity for tracking and tracing; for sensing and feeling; for seeing the whole picture. The story begins like this:
24th September 1964
Michael Curran awoke to the sound of the mechanical alarm clock ringing violently, like the bell of a local fire engine. His head was pounding.  Picking up the clock...

Monday 15 October 2018

Although Dr Albert Ellis and Dr Tim Beck argued that our emotional distress is caused by our own thoughts and beliefs, in E-CENT counselling we argue that emotional disturbances are multi-causal phenomena.  Some of the causal factors determining our emotional state include diet, exercise, gut bacteria, self-talk (or self-story), environmental re-stimulation of feelings from the past, relaxation, meditation, current relationships, historic relationships, and general environmental stressors, etc.  Here is a brief insight into the gut-brain-emotion axis:

“Anyone who has ever felt nauseous or lost their appetite because of grief, fear or shock, knows that stress has an impact on the gut.  It has been more than a decade since animal studies began making the correlation between stress and changes in gut microbes.  The connection between stress, depression and anxiety is well established, and dozens of studies are now looking at how these conditions affect bugs in the gut.  The big questions – such as which comes first, the microbe shift or the depression – have yet to be answered. Because it’s a two-way street, though, it looks as if correcting the gut microbiome (or gut bacteria population, variety and balance JWB) could be a new way to treat depression”.  (Footnote: Dinan, T.G. and Cryan, J.F. 2013, Sept; 25(9): Pages 713-719: Melancholic microbes: a link between gut microbiota and depression?  Available online).
uotation from: Celeste McGovern (2017) Bugs in the system. What Doctors Don’t Tell You, Jan 2017, Pages 28-36).

Comment by Renata Taylor Byrne and Jim Byrne: Our way of understanding this new research is this: Food is probably going to prove to be one of the best medicines for emotional distress (all other things being equal – including general stress level, current relationships, historic relationships, regular physical exercise, sleep pattern, and so on.  Holistic. Holistic. Holistic!)  And supplementation with friendly gut bacteria, combined with eating the right kinds of foods will prove to be important.  Big Pharma’s drugs for emotional distress have proved to be a social disaster!

For more, please click this link: https://abc-counselling.org/diet-exercise-mental-health/

~~~



Saturday 6 October 2018


I have just begun to write a new psychological thriller.  This is how it begins:


Chapter 1: What hell is this?

1.
“A bitter heart devours its owner”.
Herero adage.

Michael Curran awoke to the sound of the mechanical alarm clock ringing violently, like the bell of a local fire engine. His head was pounding.  Picking up the clock, and switching the alarm bell off, he noticed the time – 5.30 am.  It had gone off half an hour early.  But he was glad to be awake, since waking up pulled him out of the nightmare he was submerged in, up to a moment ago. 

He swung his legs out of bed, and looked up at the crucifix on the wall opposite the side of his lonely bed, above the holy water fountain by the light switch.  Over to his left he could see his son Christopher’s blankets rising and falling rhythmically, as he snored through his drunken stupor.  The little drunken bastard.  Under the chair, to the side of Christopher’s bed, Michael could see the quarter bottle of whiskey which Christopher would slug down as soon as he awoke.  Sixteen years old, and already an alcoholic for more than two years.  And getting his booze money by driving a coal truck, below the legal age for driving.

Michael, who never drank alcohol, stood up on the cold lino, and began to scratch his chest and back, under the long-sleeved vest he always wore in bed.  He was sick of his life.  Sleeping alone in his cold bed, in the box room, for the past eight years, had been a great strain on his mental state.  He was depressed and angry – bitter - and he constantly felt an ache in his heart.  He was sure he would have a heart attack one of these days. ‘My heart is scalded with the lot of them’, was his constant mantra.

He put on his work clothes, and laced up his boots.  He knelt by the side of his bed and began to say his morning prayers.  He could not understand why God was tormenting him so.  He wife having sex with other men; his youngest ‘daughter’ not really his; extreme poverty; and this horrible wretch of a son - a degenerate alcoholic at sixteen years of age.  And Dermot, his oldest son, who was just eighteen years old, and the only son who really respected him, had left for England three months earlier, in the middle of June.  He prayed fervently for redemption; for release from his suffering.  He had always tried to be a good man; but he’d lost his farm, then his first job and tied cottage, then his wife, and his life revolved around working as a poorly-paid gardener for toffs in Dublin.

He went down the stairs with a heavy heart, as silently as he could, to avoid waking the house.  In the kitchen, he buttered two slices of homemade brown bread, put some jam on, and made a pot of tea.  In the front room, he sat at the table and read the unread parts of yesterday’s Evening Herald.

At 6.45 am he put on his overcoat and cap, put his bicycle clips on his trouser ends, and wheeled his big, black Raleigh bicycle up the hall, out the front door; closing the door quietly behind him.  Although there was still a whole week to go to the end of September, it was cold and damp that morning, and the light was gloomier than it had been just last week. 

Out on the road, he mounted his bicycle and pedalled furiously up the road, to raise his temperature, and then settled down to a steady pace, which would get him to his workplace in about thirty minutes.  He was in the blackest mood he had ever experienced.  He could not imagine carrying on with this farce of a life.  Perhaps this day the Lord would liberate him. Oh God. Why hast thou forsaken me?

~~~


Tuesday 2 October 2018

How to Write a New Life for Yourself: Narrative therapy and the writing solution

by Dr Jim Byrne

Daily journal writing can raise your personal awareness in a “nearly magical way”, as well as reducing the hectic pace of life and making it “more balanced and manageable”.

Writing Theapy book coverIn my book on expressive writing, I have included more than twenty exercises for dealing with a broad range of problems and goals.  The first two deal with daily planning and reflection.  The third deals with a start of the day system of ‘stream of consciousness’ writing.
I began using a daily journal somewhere in the mid-1990’s, and I’ve found it to be a wonderful help in digesting my day-to-day stresses and frustrations; generating solutions to my practical and emotional problems; and coming up with creative ideas for blogs, article, books, and business innovations.
However, I have noticed a recent resistance in myself to the writing of ‘stream of consciousness’ in my journal – which means, writing whatever comes into my head. Sometimes I do it.  And sometime I resist doing it.  I seem to prefer doing some of the more structured writing activities from my book; such as exercises designed to achieve a particular goal; or to manage my emotions; to plan my time; or to produce a particular piece of work-based writing.
On the other hand, Julia Cameron (in her book, ‘The Artist’s Way’) advocates stream of consciousness writing on a daily basis – every morning.  And this is mainly a form of open-ended, self-reflective writing, as opposed to specific goal-directed writing – (although goal setting and review can come out of it).
About six weeks ago, I was reading something by Dr Jim Loehr – in Timothy Ferriss’ book, ‘Tribe of Mentors’ (which Renata was reading at that time) – and I tripped over something which reminded me of the importance and value of self-reflective writing as such:
“The daily ritual of self-reflected writing has produced priceless personal insights in my life”, writes Loehr.  “For me, daily writing heightens my personal awareness in a nearly magical way.  I see, feel and experience things so much more vividly as a consequence of the writing.  The hectic pace of life becomes more balanced and manageable when I intentionally set aside time for self-reflection.  I am able to be more in the present in everything I do, and, for whatever reason, more accepting of my flaws”.
~~~
Writing Theapy book coverI found this statement to be very motivating, and so I have been doing stream of consciousness writing every morning since that day; and it has paid huge dividends.  I have produced some wonderfully creative ideas; resolved some significant problems; and I discovered that my life was being strained by two psychological drivers, or insistent injunctions: “Hurry Up”, and “Be Perfect”.  Because of becoming aware of those drivers, I decided to work against them; to defuse them; and to rewire myself for a significantly less stressful life.  I now write an affirmation every morning that says I do not have to hurry up, and I do not have to be perfect, and this has had a hugely calming effect upon my life.
I also use some of my own exercises, from my book, How to Write a New Life for Yourself; and I and getting a lot of value from this daily journal-writing activity.
So, if you want to develop a cumulative collection of personal insights; creative ideas; personal growth gains; and greater self-acceptance; the thing to do is to make sure you write at least a couple of pages of ‘stream of consciousness’, or personal reflections, every morning, before the commencement of your working day.
Three pages would be even better; and this is a great way to process stressful life events; and to produce creative ideas; and to solve your practical and emotional problems.
This stream of consciousness process is just one of the more than 20 writing processes described in my book, How to Write a New Life for Yourself.  There is a writing process for most of your likely personal and professional development needs included in the main text.
For more on this subject, please click the following link: https://abc-counselling.org/how-to-write-a-new-life-for-yourself/
~~~

Monday 24 September 2018

Lifestyle Counselling and Coaching for the Whole Person:

Or how to integrate nutritional insights, exercise and sleep coaching into talk therapy

Draft-cover-3By Dr Jim Byrne, with Renata Taylor-Byrne
Updated on 24th September 2018A low-cost Kindle eBookversion of this book is now available (in addition to the paperback).
You can find both options on the same page at any of the major Amazon  outlets.
This is the book that many counsellors, psychologists and psychotherapists have lauded and applauded in numerous comments on LinkedIn and Facebook, over the past few months.  But why are they so interested and excited by this new book?
Lifestyle counselling is the futureBecause this book explains how to integrate diet and nutrition, inner dialogue, physical exercise, re-framing of experience, and sleep science into *Lifestyle Counselling* practice. And lifestyle counselling practice is the most likely future direction of all systems of counselling, coaching and psychotherapy.  
Lifestyle counselling broadens talk therapy by including consideration of the nutritional state of the client; their approach to sleep hygiene; and their level of physical activity.
We explore the scientific research which demonstrates definite links between those and other lifestyle factors and emotional problems and mental illness. We see this as the core of most healing practices of the future, combined with talk therapy, and emotional self-management.
For some years to come, this form of practice will be a novel service offering for clients who have realised that:

Sunday 2 September 2018

Dr Jim’s Counselling Blog:

Lifestyle counselling resources are now being made available in low-cost eBook format via Kindle:

https://abc-counselling.org/2018/09/02/lifestyle-counselling-resources-available-in-ebook-format/


Tuesday 12 June 2018


Renata’s new blog post is up and running.  This is how it begins: “In this short blog I want to share with you some fabulous quotations which I’ve come across in the course of my research.  My hope is that these little ideas will spark some new thinking of your own, and make a contribution to your growing success and happiness”. 
It’s available here: https://abc-counselling.org/2018/06/11/coaching-for-success-and-happiness/ 

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Friday 23 March 2018

News about #books and #blogs on #lifestyle #counselling: https://abc-counselling.org/2018/03/23/6109/ via @abc4cent


Saturday 17 March 2018


The book we have been waiting for is here! Available today: The new book that revolutionizes counselling and psychotherapy: *Lifestyle Counselling and Coaching for the Whole Person: Or how to integrate nutritional insights, physical exercise and sleep coaching into talk therapy*.  Get your paperback copy from Amazon, by clicking one of the links on the following web page: https://abc-counselling.org/counselling-the-whole-person/



Tuesday 13 March 2018

Updated today - 15th March - with an extract from Chapter 9: How to incorporate lifestyle and health coaching into talk therapy:  #Lifestyle #Counselling and #Coaching for the whole person; #diet#exercise#sleephttps://abc-counselling.org/counselling-the-whole-person/ via @abc4cent



Tuesday 27 February 2018

Hello,
If you bought our book – “How to Control Your Anger, Anxiety and Depression, Using nutrition and physical activity” – then we want you to know that there is now an updated Index which you can download, to make the book even easier to use.  Please click this link to get it: https://abc-counselling.org/revised-index-for-diet-and-exercise-book/
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On the other hand, if you have not yet bought the book, we would like you to know it has been updated and ready to buy here: https://abc-counselling.org/diet-exercise-mental-health/
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Thanking you for your interest in our books.
Sincerely,

Renata and Jim
Renata Taylor-Byrne and Jim Byrne
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Sunday 25 February 2018

Update: 25th February 2018: Our paperback book – about how to control your anger, anxiety and depression, using nutrition and physical exercise – is selling very well.  It is available at various Amazon outlets. (See the links below), and we have just updated it to make the index more usable.  Before it was published, more than 250 counsellors, therapists and others indicated a high level of interest in this book, with many requesting to be informed when the book became available.  This is a clear measure of how badly needed this resource is, by professionals who know their clients are bodies as well as minds; and by individuals who know they need to do something radically different – like taking control of, and responsibility for, their lifestyle – in order to ensure their own emotional wellbeing.

The book provides some clear guidelines regarding those foods which need to be excluded from your diet, in order to be healthy and emotionally well.  It also contains lots of stimulating ideas to help you to produce your own ‘personalised diet’ and exercise plan. And we have expanded Part 6 to provide a comprehensive guide to how to change any habit, so that readers can actually make the kinds of changes to diet and exercise approaches that appeal to them.

More information can be found by clicking this link: https://abc-counselling.org/diet-exercise-mental-health/




Wednesday 31 January 2018

Sleep is even more important than diet and/or exercise for mental health and emotional wellbeing:

I have just completed the index entries for the Sleep chapter in the new book on Lifestyle Counselling and Coaching.  I have posted the entire entry on this webpage: https://abc-counselling.org/counselling-the-whole-person/


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Wednesday 24 January 2018

New #Counselling #Quote on humans as story tellers with bodies that need attention! #narrative #therapy #diet #exercise: https://abc-counselling.org/ via @abc4cent


Sunday 21 January 2018

Sunday 14 January 2018

Saturday 6 January 2018

#Attachment #theory moves out of the world of #psychology, and into the world of #fiction and #autobiography ... https://abc-counselling.org/jim-byrnes-autobiographical-novel/