Hi There,
Welcome along- I'm Emma and I'm the counsellor behind Your Space Counselling, Swansea.
So, who is Emma?
Well, before I answer that it might be useful to start with how I came to arrive in the world of counselling. As a teacher of 10 years and then a parenting and baby class owner and teacher for 4 years I thought I had life pretty sorted.
Then Covid hit! Like so many, life took a turn in ways I couldn't have possibly anticipated, prompting the bigger life questions like, 'Who am I?' 'How did I get to this point in my life?' and 'Where do I want to be?'- changes were needed!
I wrapped up the baby/toddler group after Covid restrictions lifted (much to my dismay as I do love singing, dancing and helping people find the journey that suits them- in this case parents). I started working in the third sector (charity) with a peer mentoring project for people with mental ill health. This was so much more suited to my way of being; sitting without judgement, encompassing a person-centred approach, just being with someone and supporting, simply listening and understanding, using my natural empathy and seeing and appreciating people for who they are. My passion was sparked! I started searching for the change I was looking for....
The questions I was seeking answers to were big, they were overwhelming and in actual fact, scarier than I was admitting to myself. And so, what did I do? As most of us do, I pushed them down and away (convincing myself that they’d magically solve themselves) and got on with life. But no, they kept coming back in the most annoying and awkward of times. I needed something more this time- I looked into starting my own journey with therapy to address these questions, what I found was a journey of a different sort.
After much searching of overwhelming amounts of information, nothing really stuck for me and I began to think that maybe this is all life was and that what I was feeling was normal. Normal to feel like I didn't know the woman staring back at me in the mirror, normal that I felt I didn't belong in the story anymore, normal to feel like I was heading towards the abyss with no direction, clarity or desire. Then, quite out of the blue, i stumbled upon something... A centre in Swansea, The Way Forward Centre, offering not counselling in the main but counselling training. Was this what I was looking for? A way forward? It felt too intriguing not to consider. I am a do-er, I just wanted to be able to ‘do’ something. Was this it?
Turns out it was…and so started the best, most terrifying, most eye opening, life changing journey of my life so far… continued in part 2!