Michael Towers Counselling
460 Doyle Avenue Suite 106 V1Y 0C2 Kelowna, BC, Canada

Control has everything to do with identity and the process of becoming differentiated. The fruit of control is safety and the road to having control is through answering these two questions: who are you? And how do you want to be known? The qualifier though is you need to not use labels such as mom or brother or manager etc... only use adjectives :)

Progress can also look like crawling from the bed to the couch to look out the window in an effort to enjoy the sun. Some days can be harder then others so please be kind to yourself in your journey :)

Actually I believe and have been witness to those stories becoming someone else’s inspiration. You are someone else’s inspiration! Pretty cool thought :)

Your expectations on yourself not the expectations that others impose upon you from their own uninformed knowledge of how great you are and your potential for success :)

Feelings can talk... we just need to listen with care and offer them tentative language until our feelings resonate with the words we offer. Our feelings have stories to tell and experiences to share. Take the time to listen to what your feelings are telling you. Your mental health is important! :)

Monday morning Dopamine fix through a to-do list. As we enter into this final week before the Christmas week at least I am very aware of the COVID restrictions around gathering and am feeling loss because of it. Being isolated may work for some of us but not all of us so hopefully those of you who are struggling with isolation can find this to-do list helpful.

Art is a deeply personal expression of one’s inner being. If artists relied on external validation before they produced their work we would have no art to enjoy. Take back your paint brush and lean into your creative expression of self. The world will be a richer place because you did :)

This is talking about self-regulation not behavioural compliance. Please feel each and everyone of your feelings - give language to them and if you are sad or some other negative emotion then lean into it - feel it! But stop when those feelings invite you to become bitter inside because that shows up as negative outside. This last step of feeling processes can often get us stuck in that place of negativity and if you are stuck how about reaching out and having a therapeutic conversation so the best version of you can be seen and experienced by those around you :)

Our mornings may overwhelm us in these uncertain times. Our motivation draining from us at every moment. So many things out of our control except one: take a step. No matter how big that step is or how small that step is - take it. If that step is that you decided to make your bed today or shower today or make yourself a meal instead of fast food - take that step. Don’t stop pushing forward and it doesn’t matter how fast you’re going as long as you are moving forward :)

True success looks completely different than what we are commonly told through mass media. You are the author of your story and as my wife has said, a thousand messy starts... :)

Dreaming dreams and setting goals are not just for when we graduate high school. What dreams are you dreaming? What goals have you set? How can we help you achieve them? May your day be filled with dreams and new goals waiting for you to take that first step!

Winter is hard. COVID is hard. Make sure those on your team are for you and not against you.

Your growth is called becoming differentiated and those familiar systems you are connected with will resist your growth. They will push back, content to have you remain in those old roles and behaviours. Push against that because those systems will change and adapt and become settled again to who you have now become. If you need support and encouragement through this season of change reach out to a counsellor who is capable of walking that transformational journey with you :)

As the pandemic continues and increased social isolation persists...as winter begins and the days get shorter and greyer please remember that YOU matter and as a daily habit it is critical that YOU are at the top of your to-do list. If you need help or some encouragement on your journey please reach out to a counsellor. We are here to help and part of our daily to-do lists is to put ourselves first so we are ready willing and able to help you in your difficulties. Take care today :)

Reach out. I will respond to your text. I will respond to your email. I will respond to your phone call. There is help available. I am meeting clients in person but I am also available for video calls, phone sessions or email sessions. Whatever, wherever. And I am connected to a group of incredibly qualified professionals that feel the same way. There is help and we are here to help as you need it. http://cmhakelowna.com/canadians-suicide-covid19/

Next week is Mental Health Week in Canada and never has this been as important as now. Check out their website for tools and helps and please reach out for help if you need it. https://mentalhealthweek.ca/

March is music therapy awareness month (https://www.musictherapy.ca/mtawareness/) I first discovered the value of music therapy 12 years ago when I was taking my Master's degree. For parts of our training we needed to film ourselves 'doing therapy' with other fellow students and then we would show those films to the class for feedback and correction. One of my classmates taught piano and music was a key part of her life so I came up with an innovative idea to hold our therapy... session in one of the music rooms where a piano was present. I filmed us having a counselling session while this other student sat at the piano and played. The result was amazing! Then when I was completing my practicum hours I had a client who was also quite musical. The presenting problem was complex and I decided to have the client play their instruments while in session. Again the outcome was incredible! Whether it is having the client play and instrument or taking a few moments to listen to a client's favourite song I have enjoyed the therapeutic benefits of incorporating music therapy into my work. Music therapy can be a very powerful therapeutic tool and if you are so inclined I would encourage you to talk to a counsellor regarding music therapy. You may be pleasantly surprised by the outcome.

The last component of this formula is healing. As soon as hope is born, healing can begin. Healing is not the same as behavioural compliance. Healing is not replying, "I'm fine" when someone asks you how you are doing. Healing is not faking it when you go to work or church or some social function just so you can feel like you fit in. Healing is not the same as compliance. This is why healing can only happen at this last part of the formula. Healing is not called healing if i...t comes earlier in the process - it is called assimilation, it is called experiential authority, it is called retraumatization, it is called harm. Healing is a permanent state, it is a life-changing event and process that addresses the problem, names the problem, and then untangles itself from the problem. It leaves the client feeling empowered, equipped, and energized. Healing occurs at this last point in the formula because all of the previous foundational steps honoured the client and their various stories of loss. The process has showed the client how to care for their stories of loss - not how to 'get over it' or how to 'process it and forget it'. No, we cannot treat stories of loss like that because they don't go away and they are not forgotten about. Healing occurs once the client changes their relationship to the problem and changes how they are going to care for their story of loss. This is the formula. This is what happens in my counselling office with each of my clients.

Today is internationally recognized as Self-Harm Awareness Day. It is a day set aside to raise awareness around the stigma of self-harm in an effort to generate healthy mental health conversations. Although self-harming is predominately situated within the adolescent / teenage years, self-harming is a practice done by people of all ages. Self-harm can be viewed as a way of control and when we view it from this perspective we won't fall into the practice of pathologizing the ...person but instead can situate ourselves to begin to offer some help and ultimately some hope. I have included a link here to the Canadian Mental Health Association that has some good starting information on self-harm (https://cmha.bc.ca/documents/self-harm-2/). Today let's choose to take a few moments when we are having coffee with a friend or in general conversation to talk about this in order to better understand what might be going on for those people who do self-harm. See more

The next piece in this formula is hope. The way that I explain this formula up to this point is like this: To begin this process you need to be in control as much as you can and that begins here in this counselling room. You control this room. You control if you want the door open or closed, where you sit, and most importantly you control your stories. Once you feel like you have a measure of control you will begin to feel safe and once you feel safe you will choose to allow ...yourself to be vulnerable. In your vulnerability, hope is born - and that is where we are right now in this formula - hope. Hope is not something I can create for the client. I cannot present it like food and force my client to eat it. It is something organic that occurs within the client - it is born within themselves. They have begun to cultivate their own soil and they have planted their own seeds. I have helped water and I have provided some sunshine to nurture those seeds but it has been their own caring selves that have gotten them to this point and now they get to experience those first buds of hope springing forth from the muck, from that previously hardened, claylike base that didn't support life or freedom. It is an incredibly beautiful experience to be able to sit across from my client when they first catch glimpses of hope. I see it radiate in their eyes, their clenched fists begin to relax, their shoulders - weighted down with these burdensome problems now begin to relax. They see hope!

The third part of this formula is vulnerability. My application of this next step has been greatly influenced by Brené Brown's work and research in this field. I suggest this video (blob:https://embed.ted.com/575095a3-55e3-4ce2-8db7-8724b369c3af) as a place to start in understanding what I am referring to when I talk about vulnerability. Vulnerability is a choice and cannot be forced onto the client. When the client is ready they will allow themselves to be vulnerable and it... is in this moment that I am always hit with the incredible privilege it is to sit with this person. They have taken a step of faith, they have embraced courage, and they are trusting me with their stories. I am humbled at the thought of it and how profound these moments can be in the client's journey. Often, just the fact that the client has allowed themselves to be vulnerable is a powerful enough therapeutic moment to bring about positive change for the client. See more

The next step in the formula is for the client to come to a point where they feel safe. In the counselling world that most often occurs when a 'therapeutic alliance' has been established. I often take this a step further by providing opportunity for the client to lie to me. The premise is that early on in our conversations I would be seeking general information such as names of significant people in the client's lives (ie family members). During this time the invitation is th...ere for the client to provide me with a false name or even false details. My only reason in seeking this information is so I don't interrupt the client's stories as we begin the work with questions like, "Who is that person you just mentioned?" Instead I can refer to my earlier notes to find out who they are and not interrupt. The disclaimer that I tell the client is that although I don't care if you lie and give me different information the onus will then be on you to remember what you have told me and to keep that consistency throughout our conversations or else I may end up asking who this 'new person' is when you happen to mention them later in conversation. I have found that this additional practice in my approach continues to allow the client to remain in complete control of their stories and referring to my earlier post when the client is in control they can begin to feel safe. Since I am not positioning myself as the 'expert' in this conversation I have no need of 'accurate' information as I am only focused on the client's relationship to each of these characters in their story. It is also under this premise that I don't get caught up in the details if a client decides to change the details related to one or more of their stories. I recognize going into the conversation that someone can feel more than one way about a situation and in our own personal narratives how we position ourselves in the story is far more important than the story itself. See more

The simple formula to a successful outcome: start with controlling your environment. This might be something like positioning your chair or deciding where you sit in the counselling room with the counsellor so you feel like you can control the room. As an example you may want to make sure you are sitting in such a way that you can leave the room without anything or anyone blocking your path. Another tip I tell my clients to help them find a measure of control is that I don't ...need to know the details in order to help them find freedom from the problem. I am only interested in their relationship to the problem. As an example if a client is wanting to talk to me about how past trauma is creating relationship problems currently I don't focus on knowing the details about the past trauma but instead focus on understanding how their relationship to the trauma event has impacted their current relationship. I have been developing this approach to my work over these last 10 years and I call it Narrative Memory Therapy. I present the idea like this: We are both sitting at a table and in front of us is 1000 puzzle pieces. We are both working on putting the puzzle together but we don't have the puzzle box top so we have no idea what the picture is. Therefore I have learned to be comfortable with fragmentation, with non-linear or non-chronological explanations of the problem. This allows the client to remain in control of their story at all times, which is a critical first component in this simple formula to a successful outcome. See more

Hello everyone :) I have decided to open up private practice and my first step has been to join with the amazing team at Thirdspace Mind (www.thirdspacemind.ca). I will have office hours every Saturday starting in March. You will be able to book an appointment with me via ThirdSpace's website or my website www.michaeltowers.ca. I am available for in person sessions or phone/ facetime/ Skype. You can call or text me directly for a free consultation at 250-215-4155. I am looking forward to connecting with you.