'Old yew, new yew, renew you'

The yew, one of our native trees, has long been a symbol of re-birth. As a species, yew displays extraordinary qualities of longevity and regeneration. The drooping branches of old yew trees can take root on touching the ground and then form new trunks. The most ancient yew in the UK is about 5,000 years old and is thought to be one of the oldest trees in Europe.

Legends and myths abound concerning yew trees, and their symbolism is ancient. The oldest trees are often to be found in churchyards where they have been planted from historic times. The Druids held them as sacred in pre-Christian times, and they came to symbolise death and resurrection in Celtic culture, most likely because of their ability to regenerate.

About Yew Counselling

My counselling room is on the site of an old yew tree that stood proud and splendid at the bottom of the garden. We were very sad to see it go but a talented wood-turning friend turned its beautiful wood into an inukshuk in its memory. Inukshuks and balancing stones have come to represent mindfulness and calming equilibrium.

I see my counselling practice as a space for renewal, reminiscent of the yew’s powers of regeneration. These are all aspects of my practice: to facilitate clients in regaining their equilibrium when life throws them off balance, enabling a sense of new purpose and hopefulness. Old you, new you, renew you.

Why Person-centred Counselling?

Person-centred counselling or psychotherapy was developed in the 1950s by Carl Rogers, one of the founders of humanistic psychology. It emerged due to his vast experience of working with distressed individuals, his careful and methodical attention to what he learned from this, and his enormous intellectual gifts. He devised not only a new psychological approach to therapy, education and relationships, but also a theory of personality. He has been ranked as the most influential psychotherapist in history.

The person-centred approach (PCA) is the only modality where therapy is not something done to the client by the expert therapist, but rather involves the client actualizing their own potential for recovery. Thus the PCA champions the individual, recognising their power and ability to access inner resources to facilitate change and growth. By immersing themselves into the world of the client, one human being in relationship with another, the therapist’s immersion becomes the activator for potentially profound transformation in the client.

A safe space for growth

The therapeutic relationship is the therapy, and for it to be successful, Rogers outlined a set of conditions that must apply to the unique relationship between therapist and client. He termed these the Six Necessary and Sufficient Conditions:

the client and the therapist are in psychological contact
the client is vulnerable or anxious, in a state of so-called incongruence
the therapist is congruent or integrated in the relationship- they are being genuine and not putting on any facades for the client, they are being entirely themselves
the therapist experiences unconditional positive regard (UPR) for the client
the therapist experiences an empathic understanding of the client’s internal frame of reference and communicates this to the client
the communication of the therapist’s UPR and empathic understanding is achieved.

Over the many decades since these conditions have been applied in therapeutic relationships, the approach has been found to be experientially sound.

My own philosophy about what is important in life is also humanistic. I have seen the power of compassion in therapeutic relationships. Humans need other humans to show them they are cared for, and that security is the rich soil that allows growth to occur.