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The purpose of Art Therapy is essentially one of healing. The artwork in each session is a confidential record showing patterns of feelings, thoughts, beliefs and behaviours. The therapist and client work together to understand the meaning of the art produced. The therapist provides a safe, non-threatening space and invites the client(s) to explore their issues.

Art therapy can be successfully applied to clients with physical, mental or emotional problems, and can be used with children, young people, adults and the elderly. Art therapy is not a recreational activity or an art lesson, and clients don’t need to have any previous experience or expertise in art.

Cognitive Behaviour Therapy or CBT is based on the concept that the way you think affects the way you feel. Different people can interpret the same life event very differently. When life events are interpreted in a negative way, this often leads to unhelpful emotional and behavioural consequences. CBT is a proven therapy for treating depression and anxiety.

CBT works on the principle that negative, unhelpful beliefs need to be identified and then tested to determine whether they are accurate, realistic and helpful. In most cases, the thoughts deemed irrational are the ones that lead to distress and increased difficulty coping in situations. CBT helps you to unlearn problematic ways of thinking.

Focusing Therapy occurs exactly at the connection between your body and mind. It consists of specific steps for getting know how you are in a particular life situation. This is done by becoming aware of how your body responds to these events; developing your “inner knowing” or body sense. Your body sense may be unclear and vague at first, but if you pay attention it will open up into words or images and you feel a shift occur in your body.

So, in the process of Focusing, you experience a physical change in the way that the issue is being felt within the body resulting in a different outlook and new solutions arising.

Focusing helps to change where your life may be stuck. The felt shift that occurs during Focusing is good for your body. Focusing has been found to decrease depression and anxiety, and improve your relationship and awareness to your body.

Interactive Drawing Therapy (IDT) is a client-centred, directed method that follows the natural path of the psyche as it seeks to resolve issues, release potential, and move on. IDT can be used in either individual or group settings and is a practical therapy suited to both short-term crisis work and long-term work to understand behaviours driven by subconscious beliefs.

IDT allows the words, images and behaviours of the client to reveal where they are in their therapeutic process, the nature of the underlying issues, and how best to intervene. By externalising onto the page, the clients change their perceptions about themselves, their experiences, and their world of possibilities.

Interactive Drawing Therapy (IDT) uses right-brain drawing and writing techniques to complement and extend the more common left-brain talking and cognitive processes. It systematically alternates between both functions to put things into a different perspective with insight and conviction.

In Narrative therapy, your beliefs, skills, principles, and knowledge helps you regain your life from being overwhelmed by a problem. The therapist helps you examine and evaluate your relationship to that problem by acting as an “investigative reporter”; that is, the therapist poses questions that help you separate yourself from (externalise) the problem and then thoroughly investigate its influence and intentions.

Coupled with this problem investigation, you will also discover alternatives to the problem’s influences. These often lead to an alternative story about your life.

Sandplay Therapy is a form of psychotherapy for adults and children, which heals through connection with the deep psyche. It is a hands-on, expressive counselling and psychotherapy modality that has been in use for over 75 years.

By creating scenes in a tray of sand, using realistic miniatures that you choose from the therapist’s collection, you set up a world corresponding to your inner state.

Through this creative play, unconscious processes are made visible in a three-dimensional visual form. The use of sand and miniatures offers a symbolic way of expressing feelings and viewing your life. Sandplay provides a fun, non-threatening approach to the unconscious, and a safe space in which to explore feelings and life situations that may feel overwhelming.

A number of studies have demonstrated a positive relationship between exercise and mental health. Even just going for a walk in the park or at the beach may help lift your mood and help you feel less stressed.

The remarkable thing about Walk and Talk Therapy is that you reap the benefits of gentle physical exercise, while at the same time receiving the benefits from therapy. This combination may help to reduce anxiety, improve your mood, decrease stress and/or increase feelings of well-being.

The emphasis in Walk and Talk Therapy is on the psychotherapy, with the walk being a secondary benefit.