Why single session counselling?

Different people need different things from counselling. Some people want proactive support that helps them by educating them about how their mind works and how they can change the way they’re thinking.  Cognitive Behavioural Therapy (CBT) might help here.  Some people like to have plenty of time to talk about things that may have happened recently or maybe from their history and many of the talking therapies will help here. Some people just want to talk something through to clear their minds and this is where single session counselling can be helpful.

If you have a problem and you’re looking for a solution, single session counselling maybe what you need.  Single session counselling can support you to focus on the problem and help you call upon resources you may already have to resolve it.  What the counsellor does is to ask questions that help you look at the problem in a number of ways and from different angles, which makes like the counsellor holding you to account to resolve the problem.

Planned single session therapy means that a questionnaire could be sent out to help you look at the problem from different angles, here are some examples: how important is it to you that this is resolved and what will change? When have you solved problems in the past and what helped you to resolve it?  Single session can be held as a drop-in service and can be highly successful in dealing with troublesome issues.  However, like planned single session counselling there are questions that are likely to be asked to help with understanding the nature of the problem and how important it is to you to resolve it.

Single session therapy is therefore very useful for that problem you feel you can’t talk to anyone about because ‘they’ won’t understand why you feel the way you do.  Single session counselling is not helpful however for traumatic experiences that need in-depth therapy with a specialist trauma psychotherapist, counsellor or psychologist.

Undertaking single session therapy doesn’t just mean that you can’t have another (or a series) session if that is what you decide is needed.  This is something that can be discussed during a session.

It is also possible to have ‘one at a time’ therapy.  Having had one single session, you can have another at a time convenient to you and your therapist.  Which can be repeated from time to time if that is what works for you.

My aim here is to help you to realise there is more than one way to get help and support when you need it.  Other types of therapy or walk and talk (out in nature), CBT which I mentioned earlier, creative therapy and some very specialised ways such as play therapy and Art therapy.  There is a wide range of therapeutic styles and modalities, and it is for you to decide what you think will work for you.

NB: If you want to know more about single session therapy, as a practitioner, take a look at Windy Dryden’s “The Single-Session Counselling Primer”

April 2021 Blog:

About three years ago a study was published that suggested there was a more accurate way of listening to someone if you wanted to understand them more fully.

This study, carried out by Yale University School of Management*, suggests that if you close your eyes you will be better able to discern your companion’s true emotion and feeling.  To quote Dr Michael Klaus “Our research suggests that relying on a combination of vocal and facial cues, or solely facial cues, may not be the best strategy for accurately recognising emotions or intentions of others.”

In the study Kraus (2017) describes a series of five experiments involving more than 1800 participants in the United States.  Individuals were asked either to interact with another person or observe the interactions taking place.  Participants were then placed in different categories and could either look but not hear, hear but not look or look and listen.  A final group listened to a computerised transcription of an interaction, meaning there were no voice inflections or other clues.

The experiments’ findings were that those who only listened, without observing, were more able to identify emotions, with one exception – those who listened to the computerised excerpts did badly, being unable to identify emotion as there was no vocal inflections.

This explains how it is that we know what is going on at the other end of the phone line!  Telephone counselling allows the counsellor to focus on what they hear, picking up on emotions even though they are unable to see a person’s face or read their body language.  Klaus goes on to say “ ….. What we find here is that perhaps people are paying too much attention to the face – the voice might have much of the content necessary to perceive others’ internal state accurately …”

If you think in terms of listening to bird song, or a piece of music that relaxes us, most of us tend to close our eyes – the better to concentrate on the sound.

Of course, it is not that simple in a counselling room or on the internet with a camera focusing on our faces and (usually) our upper body.  If any of us were to close our eyes while listening to another, the visual cue to the person talking might be – you’re not listening to me!  So, if you’re tempted to close your eyes in the presence of a friend, customer, colleague, or client when listening to them – make sure they understand why!

_{Ref:   *Article: “Voice-Only Communication Enhances Empathic Accuracy” Michal Kraus, PhD, Yale University School of Management. American Psychologist, Published online 10 Oct 2017}

Breathe:

• Sit on a chair, place both feet flat on the floor, and breathe slowly and steadily into your belly so it expands.
• Breathe in for a count of two – breathe out for a count of four.
• Keep your focus on the breath – on the way in and on the way out.
• Breathe this way for at least five minutes or until your breath becomes more calm and regular.

This is an example post, originally published as part of Blogging University. Enroll in one of our ten programs, and start your blog right.

You’re going to publish a post today. Don’t worry about how your blog looks. Don’t worry if you haven’t given it a name yet, or you’re feeling overwhelmed. Just click the “New Post” button, and tell us why you’re here.

Why do this?

• Because it gives new readers context. What are you about? Why should they read your blog?
• Because it will help you focus your own ideas about your blog and what you’d like to do with it.

The post can be short or long, a personal intro to your life or a bloggy mission statement, a manifesto for the future or a simple outline of your the types of things you hope to publish.

To help you get started, here are a few questions:

• Why are you blogging publicly, rather than keeping a personal journal?
• What topics do you think you’ll write about?
• Who would you love to connect with via your blog?
• If you blog successfully throughout the next year, what would you hope to have accomplished?

You’re not locked into any of this; one of the wonderful things about blogs is how they constantly evolve as we learn, grow, and interact with one another — but it’s good to know where and why you started, and articulating your goals may just give you a few other post ideas.

Can’t think how to get started? Just write the first thing that pops into your head. Anne Lamott, author of a book on writing we love, says that you need to give yourself permission to write a “crappy first draft”. Anne makes a great point — just start writing, and worry about editing it later.

When you’re ready to publish, give your post three to five tags that describe your blog’s focus — writing, photography, fiction, parenting, food, cars, movies, sports, whatever. These tags will help others who care about your topics find you in the Reader. Make sure one of the tags is “zerotohero,” so other new bloggers can find you, too.

This is an example post, originally published as part of Blogging University. Enroll in one of our ten programs, and start your blog right.

You’re going to publish a post today. Don’t worry about how your blog looks. Don’t worry if you haven’t given it a name yet, or you’re feeling overwhelmed. Just click the “New Post” button, and tell us why you’re here.

Why do this?

• Because it gives new readers context. What are you about? Why should they read your blog?
• Because it will help you focus your own ideas about your blog and what you’d like to do with it.

The post can be short or long, a personal intro to your life or a bloggy mission statement, a manifesto for the future or a simple outline of your the types of things you hope to publish.

To help you get started, here are a few questions:

• Why are you blogging publicly, rather than keeping a personal journal?
• What topics do you think you’ll write about?
• Who would you love to connect with via your blog?
• If you blog successfully throughout the next year, what would you hope to have accomplished?

You’re not locked into any of this; one of the wonderful things about blogs is how they constantly evolve as we learn, grow, and interact with one another — but it’s good to know where and why you started, and articulating your goals may just give you a few other post ideas.

Can’t think how to get started? Just write the first thing that pops into your head. Anne Lamott, author of a book on writing we love, says that you need to give yourself permission to write a “crappy first draft”. Anne makes a great point — just start writing, and worry about editing it later.

When you’re ready to publish, give your post three to five tags that describe your blog’s focus — writing, photography, fiction, parenting, food, cars, movies, sports, whatever. These tags will help others who care about your topics find you in the Reader. Make sure one of the tags is “zerotohero,” so other new bloggers can find you, too.