Online e-therapy through Skype or similar web-based services has gained significant popularity over the last few years, mostly because of its convenience and cost-effectiveness. When combined with Mindfulness Therapy, a form of psychotherapy that focuses directly on healing core emotions, without spending years on biographical analysis, the results can be very dramatic.
When I ask people what they most want from a therapist, most will answer that they just need a few pointer on how to work with their emotions, their anxiety or depression, stress or other form of suffering. They want to learn how to stop being overwhelmed by their emotions, of becoming the victim of emotional reactivity over and over again. People want to break free from their negative habitual reactivity, and learn new ways of processing their feelings that is positive and leads to healing, balance and happiness.
We all need help with difficult emotions, but many of us are afraid of therapists! We don’t like the idea of showing our vulnerability to a complete stranger and we may feel embarrassed telling them all about our personal history. Yet at the same time, part of us recognizes that we have become stuck and remaining stuck is just not an option anymore. Perhaps our anxiety or inner turmoil is causing us to be depressed and negative all the time leaving us feeling listless and fatigued. We see how this affects our personal relationships and family life, how we are just less “there” for our partner or our children. Life should be a passionate dance in which we interact positively with all the challenges that face us. Instead, we retreat, contract and withdraw into our shell. No one at home; Do not disturb; Leave me alone. This is the state that so many of us find ourselves in, condemned to live life as slaves to our reactive habits. We live as victims of our emotions, thoughts, beliefs and memories, enslaved by the contents of our mind that arise out of habit and years of denial, and this is what Mindfulness Therapy tries to put right. Interestingly, communication through a videocam is definitely more comfortable for many people, and conducting a session in the familiar surroundings of ones own home (or office) makes the client feel much more empowered in the therapy process.
Mindfulness Therapy is all about regaining a sense of our real identity as something so much more than all the petty contents that make up the story of who we think we are. At some level, we know that there is more to us than the material content of shadowy forms; we sense an inner spirit that is bigger than all our worries, disappointments, frustrations and anxieties. Mindfulness Therapy puts us directly in touch with this spiritual dimension of our being, and as we make contact with this larger dimension, it breathes healing warmth onto the frozen and frigid regions of the contracted mind and transformation and healing begin. It is an extraordinary feature of the human mind that being completely present with our suffering is in itself directly healing. Mindfulness heals. Learning how to be fully present with our suffering, or the suffering of others, is the focus of Online Mindfulness Therapy.
When we focus mindfulness on painful emotions, we create a space around them that is the essence of compassion and kindness and non-reactivity. Nor surprisingly, contracted emotions respond to this inner freedom by unclenching and releasing their grip on you. In this inner space of full engaged-presence, which is what mindfulness is, painful emotions are finally given permission and freedom in which to change and heal. This is the remarkable insight pointed out by the Buddha over 2,500 years ago, and which is now regaining popularity with therapists and counsellors everywhere. The big mind, called the psyche, is more than capable of healing the suffering created by the little mind, the ego, if…and this is the big IF…it is given the freedom in which to change. No freedom, no change. Mindfulness is the conscious awareness that generates this inner freedom and facilitates healing at the core. I encourage all of you who genuinely want to make a change for the better to learn mindfulness skills, including mindfulness meditation and apply this remarkable form of conscious awareness to heal the wounds of the heart.
Peter Strong, PhD is an author, teacher, Professional Mindfulness Psychotherapist and Online Therapist, based in Boulder, Colorado, who specializes in the study of mindfulness and its application in Online Psychotherapy for healing the root causes of anxiety (Online Therapy for Anxiety), depression (Online Therapy for Depression) and traumatic stress (Online Stress Management).
Besides face-to-face therapy sessions, Dr Strong offers Online CBT Counseling Therapy via Skype. Visit http://www.counselingtherapyonline.com or visit the home site for The Boulder Center for Mindfulness Therapy at http://www.mindfulnessmeditationtherapy.com. Email inquiries are most welcome. Request a Skype session today and begin a course of Mindfulness Meditation Therapy.
You can purchase a copy of Dr Strong’s book ‘The Path of Mindfulness Meditation’ at Amazon.com, Amazon.ca and Amazon.co.uk and Barnes&Noble.com. Also available on Kindle.
