Human Givens Therapy
Overcome challenges & Emotional difficulties - learn how to thrive
ONLINE AND IN PERSON
The Human Givens approach to therapy and coaching is effective, brief (with an average of 4 – 6 sessions), practical and with personal improvements shown to continue after therapy has ended. I have worked with the Human Givens therapy approach with tremendous success for many years – and in just a few sessions, we can achieve lasting effects.
By incorporating the most up-to-date insights into how the mind, body and emotions interact, Human Givens therapy empowers you right from the first session. Emotions that control unhelpful patterns of thought and/or behavior are released in an efficient way, without needlessly digging into the past. The resulting energy will enable you to access your own resources naturally, so that you can get your needs met and participate more fully with life.
The approach has been disseminated and taught in the UK since 2000 and is rapidly becoming recognised as a profoundly important improvement in our understanding of the way we function as individuals, families, organisations and society as a whole.
Book a session
If you feel that you could be helped by sessions of therapy, please contact me to discuss how we could work together. I would be delighted to answer any questions or concerns you might have.
Further to my practice in Woodchurch (Ashford), Kent – I also occasionally work with people online. Skype coaching or therapy has become a very popular way of working as it suits certain types of of situations (but not all) very well.
“My successes are snowballing as I am overcoming my anxiety. I am even playing music again for the first time in ten years.”
What are 'human givens'?
The approach itself is a comprehensive new model of the way we function: understanding how the mind makes sense of information and experiences. It is based on established scientific principles with results that have been measured and published in top peer reviewed journals.
The ‘human givens’ encompass both parts of a natural process. They are the physical and emotional needs that evolution has programmed into us and the resources that humans have developed over time to meet those needs. Our innate needs drive us to seek fulfillment through the way that we interact with the environment using those resources nature 'gave' us.
In short, as human beings, we all have core needs that need to be met and, thanks to nature, we all already have the resources nesting in us to fulfill them.
The theory
The underlying theory of the therapy is that if our emotional needs are met in balance, it is not possible to suffer from mental illness. Unmet needs result in symptoms of depression, anxiety, panic attacks, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD), phobias or inappropriate behaviour resulting from anger which in turn feeds into the downward spiral of mental distress. Successful therapy (re)activates people’s own natural resources. It teaches the skills we require to get our needs met in a healthy and balanced way, leading to an upward and outward spiral of growth.
What are our innate human needs?
These are security (stable work and home); connection to others through friendship and joint objectives; belonging to a wider community such as a community or company; status and self-esteem (that comes through learning and the competent application of skills); a sense of autonomy; attention – how to give and receive it - and a need for meaning.
What resources do I have?
Curiosity; long-term memory and learning; imagination (which allows us to focus our attention away from our emotions in order to problem solve more objectively); the ability to understand and extract deeper meaning of situations, using metaphor (intuition through pattern matching); the capacity for empathy; an observing self (to stand back from our emotions); a dreaming brain (which we now know maintains healthy emotional templates); and a rational mind that can be a check on our emotions.
Individuals are only able to reach their potential when needs are matched up in the environment in a balanced way.
Our innate potential is compromised if our resources are neither recognised nor effectively utilised. When they are, the results can be life-changing.
Effective companies will be those which, knowingly or not, work within this needs/resources framework.
