Welcome to the AIPC Online Article Library. The library includes over 300 articles focusing on counselling, life effectiveness skills and mental health. We invite you to explore our range of articles by clicking the category links above, or using the drop-down menu on your right. To learn more about AIPC, visit www.aipc.net.au

Latest Articles

Caring for Others: Avoiding Common Traps

AIPC November 5, 2014 Counselling Theory & Practice, Ethical Issues, Social Support

In the first article in this series we highlighted needs and motivations behind providing emotional and psychological support to others, touching on the “shadow” side of helping: trying to meet personal needs through the helping relationship. Both professional and non-professional helpers can unwittingly do this, even when they are meticulous, highly ethical helpers, so it is crucial to gain an understanding of how this happens. The principal concepts we will be working with in this article are narcissism, transference and countertransference, enmeshment, rescuing, co-dependency, and burnout. »

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Caring for others: Why do we do it?

AIPC November 5, 2014 Counselling Theory & Practice, Social Support

When a friend is going through a hard time, we often think about how we can lend a hand and provide emotional support. But are we always aware of the reasons why we want to help? Is it because we feel obliged? Or perhaps because we just want to help – to be there for someone who has been around for us when we needed? We’d like to say, “It doesn’t matter what unresolved issues are hiding in your mind. As long as you mean well, you’ll be a smash hit!” We’d like to say that, but unfortunately it isn’t always true. “Where you’re coming from” makes all the difference in where you get to when lending emotional and psychological support to someone. This isn’t merely a theory. It is a universal observation about human behaviour. As human beings, we all have needs, and how we come into relations... »

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Social Anxiety Disorder: The Core Patterns and Symptoms

AIPC November 5, 2014 Anxiety / Depression, Mental Health Issues

Said to be the most common of the anxiety disorders, impacting people from all walks of life, SAD is estimated to affect tens of millions of people worldwide. Of course, nearly everyone experiences occasional anxiety in certain social settings or at some social events. Were we never to own moments of awkwardness, embarrassment, or a sense of being inhibited in public, we might have a disorder of a different type! The question for diagnosing SAD is: how extreme must the fear and stress in social situations be and how severely do such situations need to impact on a person’s life before the person is considered to suffer from SAD? »

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Counselling and the Brain: Five Major Processes

AIPC October 6, 2014 Counselling Theory & Practice, Neuropsychology

The research in neuroscience is highly supportive of counselling’s emphasis on deep listening, empathic understanding, strength building, and wellness (Ivey, Ivey, Zalaquett, & Quirk, 2011). Counselling is shown to change the organisation of the brain: a learning process as the brain responds to stimuli and creates neural pathways to accommodate new information (Ivey, 2009). “Information” includes experiences, actions, thoughts, and cues: both those emanating from within ourselves and those from others and most especially including those stimuli arising within the therapeutic relationship. As John Ratey (2008, in Sullivan, 2012) said, “Experiences, thoughts, actions and emotions actually change the structure of our brains” (emphasis added). »

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Case Studies

A Case Using Brief Psychodynamic Therapy

AIPC November 27, 2014

Wendy is a 54 year old woman who has two adult children and has been married for twenty-nine years. Her husband, Steve, has recently and unexpectedly informed her that he no longer loves her and that he wants a divorce. Wendy was shocked to hear this...

A Case of Lost Direction

AIPC November 25, 2014

Jenny has come to counselling due to strong feelings of dissatisfaction with her life. She is 48 years old, un...

Case Study: Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder

AIPC June 7, 2013

Marian, a psychologist who specialised in anxiety disorders, closed the file and put it into the filing cabine...

Communication

The Fine Art of Compassion

AIPC May 15, 2019

Imagine this scenario: you are keen to get a particular job and an opportunity for it comes up. You prepare meticulously for the interview, but somehow, it doesn’t go well. The interviewers don’t seem to warm to you, and you know in your heart that y...

Building Shame Resilience in Clients

AIPC June 1, 2018

Jungian analysts have called it the “swampland of the soul”. Other psychotherapy writers have observed how it ...

Strategies for Helping Families to Enhance Resilience

AIPC July 19, 2017

If you are supporting a family in transition, you may perceive huge differences between them and the character...

Counselling Theory & Practice

Men and Emotions: From Repression to Expression

AIPC August 19, 2019

In our previous article (read it here), we asked why men do not seem to express emotion as easily as women do. Was there some pathology, or should we just put the differences down to male-female tendencies? We identified Dr Ron Levant’s notion of “no...

Men, Emotions and Alexithymia

AIPC July 30, 2019

She sends him little “I love you” texts during the day, and wonders why he doesn’t even whisper the three magi...

The Fine Art of Compassion

AIPC May 15, 2019

Imagine this scenario: you are keen to get a particular job and an opportunity for it comes up. You prepare me...

Life Coping Skills

The Fine Art of Compassion

AIPC May 15, 2019

Imagine this scenario: you are keen to get a particular job and an opportunity for it comes up. You prepare meticulously for the interview, but somehow, it doesn’t go well. The interviewers don’t seem to warm to you, and you know in your heart that y...

The Benefits of Intentional Daydreaming

AIPC January 23, 2019

Your fitness tracker reminds you to walk away from your computer every hour to get needed movement – and then ...

Procrastination: What Your Client Needs to Know

AIPC October 24, 2018

95% of us procrastinate (Steel, 2010) – accruing negative consequences – despite having recognised for 500 yea...