We all have a Mental Block

Our intellect, our rational mind, is an information block. It grasps information and holds on. That way it never gets to our heart – our real life center.

Our mind is power hungry and battles with heart and spirit for control. It gets puffed up with knowledge – information in words. There is pride in what we know.

We try to control our life from our mind. By doing so we interfere with the graceful person we could be if mind, heart and spirit were coordinated with one another.

As Jesus told us our heart is the center of action and source of our attitudes including sinful ones. Did Jesus give us philosophy and theology and ethics to heal our heart and control our behavior? No.

He spoke to us with pictures and parables more than lectures. He thus spoke the language of the heart – story. And his life and sacrificial death is another gift of a dramatic life story that touches our hearts.

Education is not effective in changing cultural patterns, family patterns or personality patterns. Why then do we act as if it does?  Why do we cling to the belief  that it does? This delusion is our mental block.

For the mind has little or know authority to change the heart. Education does not reprogram long term attitudes and associated behaviour. Yet we continue to act as though it does. And we keep getting the same result – no change or, at best, temporary change.

If you want to integrate a great insight into your life, teach someone else. That drops it into the heart. One of the core insights of AA is that you stay sober when you help someone else stay sober. The ’12 Step’ is essential to the program.

Try this. As soon as you learn a great idea, teach it to someone else. Be generous with your ideas and sow them wildly about. You will reap deeper insights and deeper integration of them into your life.

Riddle: How is it that by letting go of what we grasp we come to grasp it more firmly?

About George Hartwell. Is he too religious?

My wife was asked if my counselling/psychotherapy was too religious. She answered like this.

“George says thanks for your query.

He is officially a counsellor or therapist by label and belongs to the OACCPP ( Association of Counsellors Psychotherapists etc etc). So he does everything a psychotherapist does, has a Masters in Clinical psychology, but just recently applied to be officially called Psychotherapist.

He qualifies for the label given his experience and education. (30 years plus) It is just one of those things he never thought of getting the label for, given his work was never dependent on it.

He is a Christian, however he does both secular and Christian therapy if the client wants it. Normally, he sticks with common counselling practices no matter the religious background, unless someone requests ” prayer therapy” or has a unique request of a spiritual nature.

He personally, is open to more liberal practices and supports gay marriage, multi belief stances, and has many non Christian friends and associates.

He does not particularly “like” the church as it has been and prefers to attend a Christian church that is non- fundamentalist and open to LGBTQ communities. He thinks Jesus is fine, but the church ( as a whole, not a particular church in general) is a mess.

in other words. He holds some moderate conservative views, but would not consider him self either left or right. Most of his therapy is focused on root issues, resolving couple issues and sorting through patterns to find out how to solve life long issues. All in all, he only goes with a client’s goals, and lets the client determine the vibe and he works with those goals.

On a personal note, I find him to be a fantastic listener, a good abstract problem solver, well boundaried, playful and he prefers blunt people over proprietary and politeness.’

What are life strategies to reduce general anxiety?

Life strategies to reduce general anxiety

George Hartwell M.Sc. Christian Anxiety Therapist

1. Get enough sleep – How much? People say eight hours, but it’s probably more like 7–9. The point is, sleep enough. General anxiety can result from sleep deprivation. Your brain needs time to recover. Take 90 minutes to wind down without tv or other screens. Turn off bright white lights and use dim lighting avoiding blue light. Listen to music. Soak in a bath. Go for a walk. Take some melatonin or sleep-enhancing tea. Do not have cell phones or charging of devices near your bed. Black out all lights.
2. Calming activities – Once you get enough “hard rest” get some “soft rest” too. Your brain needs time to just calm down and chill out. Relax and listen to soaking praise music. Be still and repeat a calming Bible verse. Learn to tune out what you don’t need to spend attention on (newscasts and upsetting news or dramatic stories,) Do prayer walks. Enjoy a nature setting: a park, greenhouse, garden of place by the water.
3. Exercise, no, really – Using the body to work out stress is a COMPLETE necessity. Those who experience physical stress need to work out the buildup of stress related chemicals in the body and exercise is the way to do it. Walking, swimming, running, lifting weights pushes stress related chemicals out of the muscles and joints, and incites the body to clean itself out. Spend time doing this each day. Don’t do nothing, do some pushups or air squats at least. Increase the time spent in walking everyday until you have 30 minutes per day. Do not spend over an hour in sitting. Take little breaks.
4. Have a plan, organize your time – Studies show that having a plan in hand reduces feelings of anxiety. There’s expectation, and a comfort in knowing when to expect what.
5. Practice saying “no” and being okay – Don’t feel the need to do everything. Understand your core values and know when you say “no” to something it’s fine and you’re alright. Step away from being everyone’s helper, rescuer, go to person.

Christian Psychotherapy and counselling for Anxiety Issues.

by George Hartwell M.Sc. – a professional therapist with:

• Masters degree in community psychology
• over 40 years of clinical experience
• Conveniently located near west end Toronto and South East Mississauga
• flexible appointment times
• phone sessions for those at a distance.

What Anxiety feels like:

Anxiety is distress. It’s disquiet.

It feels like I am in danger and the threat is everywhere.

It feels like sleep is essential to my survival but I can’t. I can’t sleep. If only I could sleep.

Anxiety feels like whatever is holding me together – the string that runs through all of me – has been strung too tight.

How do I overcome my chronic anxiety disorder?

How do I overcome my chronic anxiety disorder?1. CORE BELIEFS: You may have a strong core-belief of “I AM NOT NORMAL”, “I AM NOT GOOD ENOUGH”.  You are stuck in your belief system since your childhood. By now your core beliefs are unconscious.

2. LIST: Keep track of the things going right in your life. What are you grateful for?  Sometimes when we are caught up in our “story”, we just forget everything else, like horse with blinders on we look at whats “right ahead” (in your case, whats going wrong!!!!)

3. Recreation: What activity gets you out of your head? Singing in the shower? Dancing? Painting? Going for a walk? Running? Drawing? Writing? Reading? How do you take care of yourself? Get a break from worry thoughts by making a list of alternative activities that allow you to break out of your train of thought.

4. THERAPY:You will need some extra help,in identifying core beliefs and getting rid of them.  Professional therapists are becoming more and more effective in dealing quickly and permanently with core beliefs that are at the root of anxiety issues.

Links

About George Hartwell marriage counsellor Mississauga, Oakville, Toronto on the

Life Transformation Group marriage and individual therapy Mississauga, Oakville, Toronto, Ontario

About George Hartwell Christian marriage counsellor Mississauga, Oakville, Toronto, Ontario on the web site:

of Agape Christian Counselling – HealMyLife.com – providing Christian counseling, therapy, counselling, marriage counseling in Mississauga, Oakville, Toronto, Ontario.

Life Transformation – How to use Prayer Therapy to Heal Your Life

Life Transformation is the use of tools in therapy and psychotherapy that bring significant and permanent change to your life. The science of this is now understood. The steps of the Life Transformation process are now well understood. The science can be found under Memory Reconsolidation.

Psychotherapy means in depth psychological therapy. Now that the science of Life Transformation is understood, psychotherapy that is effective can be better discerned. Some forms of psychotherapy fits within this framework fairly easily. Others do not.

Prayer Therapy with the intention of providing inner and emotional healing covers a wide variety of methods. Some of these approaches fit easily and well within the framework of the research on Memory Reconsolidation. Others do not.

The research that identifies in depth permanent change in emotional memory and personality patterns is new. It has come to the surface within the last 10 years in Psychological research and the last 20 years in psychotherapy research.  The practices in inner and emotional healing through prayer therapy that fit well with this research also emerged within the last 20 years. So all this is happening at the same time.

This series book encourages innovation in the practice of prayer therapy for inner and emotional by putting some road signs along the road to Life Transformation for others to follow. There may be more than one practice that fits the roadmap. Having guidelines, however, will help everyone to align more closely with best practices that are associated with lasting significant change in brief periods.

To be completely practical most chapters in each book will provide an example of a prayer intervention that allows reader to begin to put into practice the discussion of that chapter.

I foresee a series of books each focused on  an interesting topic areas in which knowledge of prayer and prayer therapy can be useful.

1. How to heal the Broken Heart.

2. Blocks to intimacy in marriage meaning the emotional bonding of a couple that creates a safe emotional space for each one.

3.  How to bring emotional healing to our inner child.

4.  How emotional healing through prayer therapy makes possible Gentle Deliverance from evil.

5.  In one book there will be a step by step overview of a prayer therapy session.  This includes an overview of the methods used in each step.

Each book participates in the overall goal of teaching those practices of inner healing prayer therapy that align well with the research on effective psychotherapy and Memory Reconsolidation.