Life Counseling Duluth

12/12/2024

The Holidays can take their toll on mental health. Remember to practice self care this season!

10/23/2024

Anxiety can affect people throughout their entire lives. In this article, we introduce how you can use your "wise mind" to manage anxiety from a Christian-based perspective. Whether you've dealt with anxiety for years or are just beginning to understand its impact, healing is possible.

Read full article here:
https://christianfamilysolutions.org/realsolutions/anxiety-your-whole-life/

"Just like every other emotion you experience, the important thing is what you do with your anxiety. Emotions are important, but they aren’t everything. They are not your voice of reason, they are not your guide, and they don’t make your decisions. You make your decisions. You decide how you want to navigate your life."

10/09/2024

09/26/2024

🙌🏼 Your mental health symptoms don't define you 🙌🏼

09/19/2024

What techniques have you found helpful in recognizing and stopping anxious thoughts before they ruin your day?

09/12/2024

“We demolish arguments and every pretension that sets itself up against the knowledge of God, and we take captive every thought to make it obedient to Christ.” 2 Corinthians 10:5



“Take every thought captive” is something we hear a lot in the church, and yet countless people still struggle with pervasive negative, fearful, and unproductive thoughts that lead them in circles of anxiety. So how, exactly, does a person gain mastery over thoughts?



My favorite part of this verse is that Paul isn’t telling us to make our thoughts obedient to ourselves, but to Christ. He is the one who can ultimately help us pull our thoughts into submission. Here are some tips I’ve found to help with this:



--Learn to recognize untrue thoughts immediately. Don’t let them run around in your head unchecked. Know they are only thoughts. They do not belong to you and they do not define you.

--Once you see an untrue thought is there, turn away from it. Sometimes I literally turn my head “away” from a thought or tell it to “stop.”

--Replace the thought with something else. What do you know to be true that contradicts the thought? If you aren’t sure, find a scripture or song you can lean on and repeat in your mind instead of the thought.

--Be patient. Habitual thoughts may take a while to fade away, but with time and consistency they will go.

09/04/2024

Christian Counseling Frequently Asked Questions

WHAT IS A CHRISTIAN COUNSELOR?

Christian counselors can come from several backgrounds. Some are not licensed to practice therapy, but have biblical counseling degrees or are trained in inner healing prayer ministry. You can often find these types of counselors at churches or ministry centers, and they don’t bill your insurance. Shout out to the Sozo ministry at the Duluth House of Refuge!


Other Christian counselors (like me) have licenses that allow them to practice therapy and bill insurance for it. When you work with a counselor like this, you receive science-based interventions (like cognitive behavioral therapy, motivational interviewing, or EMDR) from a counselor who also has a Biblical/Christian worldview.



DO I HAVE TO BE A CHRISTIAN TO SEE YOU?

Nope.


WILL YOU PUSH YOUR FAITH DOWN MY THROAT?

Not at all! I am here to help you work on goals that you identify and clarify your own values, not impose my values or goals on you.



IS THIS A SAFE PLACE TO PROCESS SPIRITUAL TRAUMA?

I wish it didn’t exist, but spiritual trauma is alive and well. Many people find themselves in a spiritually abusive situation, and pain inflicted by those in spiritual authority can have far reaching and highly destructive effects. If this is you, I can be a resource to help you navigate the betrayal and sort out where the trauma has left your personal faith.

08/28/2024

"Do not conform to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God's will is--His good, pleasing, and perfect will." Romans 12:2

This verse guides my therapy practice. We are challenged to continually renew our minds. That means recognizing and catching any lies we are believing and replacing those lies with a truth that brings transformation.

Sometimes the lies we believe are deep within us and need to be taken out by the roots. This can be a painful, purging process. But the freedom that comes from actually believing true things is worth every tear. Cheers to transformational mind renewal!

08/28/2024

Welcome to Life Counseling Duluth, where you will find posts that encourage both mental and spiritual health.