Jabez, here are the exercises that my counsellor used as best I can recall them. I did them with her, and then sat down after dinner with S13 and went through them. He didn't want to do them, but I made a point of also doing them and once he saw that I opened up he did as well.
Firstly look at how you are right now under 4 categories:
Feelings
Thoughts
Physiological
4th one?? I recalled it earlier, but have lost it. Will let you know when it comes back. Possibly Beliefs. Sorry can't find my notes on this one, and haven't done it for a while.
Write these down.
Then think "if you were the best person you could be, how would you be in regard to these 4 factors"
Also write these down. Now you can see that you do have the power to change how you are feeling, thinking, how your body is. So when you start thinking negatively for example, think "How would my better person handle this?"
This really does work. The first time I did these, I could feel myself sitting up more. Apparently the tone in my voice changed. And I instantly felt more confident about the situation.
Simple breathing techniques:
Breathe in for count of 4 Hold for 4 Exhale for 8
Do this standing up and you instantly feel a lot calmly. I also do a variation of this I learnt with Yoga where you do one nostril at a time.
A visualisation exercise to empower you. Think of a time when life was good. You were confident, in control and things were going well. Work out a secret body signal that you will use. I rub the skin between my thumb and index finger. Recall how you felt at this time while rubbing this point. Now in future, when you are going into a stressful situation, rubbing this point recalls those positive feelings, and you approach the situation with a confident mindset. I find this one of great benefit.
Also the visualisation techniques where you visualise thoughts, memories you want to get rid of. Many different variations of this one. I find one where you blow the thoughts into a huge balloon, and let it float up, and then let it go to help.
I hope this makes sense. I don't see my counsellor any longer as feel a lot stronger, but these did help.
