Whole Body Healing

Definition

Psychology is the study of human behavior from birth to death.  It strives to explain the inborn differences among people, how much people change in response to their environment, the role people play in their own development, the natural goodness and evil in humanity, and the relationship of child to adult behavior.

Indications for Psychological Counseling

• Anyone who is struggling with emotional pain
• Anyone needing emotional support
• Anyone who needs someone to listen
• Anyone wanting motivation to make a big change
• Anyone with depression
• Anyone with anxiety
• Anyone with too much stress
• Anyone with adrenal burn-out

Whether preformed by a naturopathic physician or psychologist, psychological counseling is a valuable enhancement to health and well-being.

Benefits of Psychological Counseling

• Decreases stress
• Decreases emotional aches and pains
• Increases relaxation
• Gives a sense of well-being

Brief History of Psychological Counseling

In the third century BC, Plato focused on innate differences in human aptitudes and asserted that these differences should be used in child rearing and education.  His pupil Aristotle believed that a child is born a blank slate, but agreed that each person had natural inclinations which should be the basis for education and vocational training.

During the middle-ages attention was focused on the moral nature of humanity.  It was believed that all people were born sinful and corrupt.  As a result, children were treated harshly to correct their depraved natures.

The modern-day French historian, Philippe Aries, concluded that in the Middle Ages the concept of childhood as we know it today did not exist.  Infancy spanned from birth to seven and then children were treated as little adults.

By the seventeenth century, humanity was redeemed and children were again thought to be born innocent and primitive.  It was thought that society corrupted children and that moral education could lead children to become trustworthy, disciplined, and rational adults.

In the late seventeenth and eighteenth century, Jacques Rousseau, a French philosopher, popularized the notion of childhood and promoted the idea of moral and intellectual education for children eight to fourteen in schools away from the evils and corruptions of adults.  During this time children became increasingly separated by age into grades.

As children became segregated from adults demands and adult work, they were able to play and explore the world in a new way.  A freedom arose that gave them the opportunity to develop social and technical skills.

The concept of adolescence did not develop until the nineteenth and twentieth centuries.  During this time, society begin to recognize and support adolescents in going to school and made it illegal to employ them.  This gave adolescents  from fourteen to eighteen the possibility for continued psychological growth.

Not too long ago, adults were considered to have completed their psychological development.  However, today we know that as people face new tasks and new challenges, and as these tasks are met, they change.  The forty-five year old with a responsible job and children in college is different than the twenty-five year old who is just becoming self-supportive and is anticipating the birth of a first child.

Today we look at the cycle of life and divide it into many stages: infant, toddler, preschool, childhood, adolescence, young adulthood, middle adulthood, late adulthood.  Each of these stages are considered separate and has its own developmental tasks.

Helping people adjust and meet the challenges of life at different stages is the job of the psychological counselor.