JACQUELINE GREEN COUNSELLING

ABOUT ME

You might be someone who understands yourself to a degree. You are maybe familiar with "the work." Perhaps you’ve been to therapy before, you’ve read the books, and you have some intellectual understanding of why you feel the way you do. Yet, despite that insight, the anxiety, the tension, or the burnout still feel "stuck" in your system.

I offer something different: a way to bridge the gap between your mind and your body.

Insight alone is often not enough; we can understand our patterns perfectly and still feel triggered by them.

My work is designed for those who are ready to move beyond intellectualising their pain and include the body in the conversation to create real, lasting change.

My Story: Why I Work This Way

I am Jacqueline Green, a Counsellor, Supervisor and Group Facilitator with over a decade of experience. My journey into this specialised "Dual Approach" didn't come from a textbook; it came from sitting with hundreds of people in the NHS, schools, charities and private practice, and noticing a consistent missing link.

I saw people who were self-aware but remained exhausted. I saw people who could "talk through" their trauma but whose nervous systems were still living in a state of high alert.

I realised that traditional talking therapy often stops at the neck - we live in a world which prioritises living in our 'heads'. To truly heal, we have to address the body - the place where our history, our stress, and our survival instincts actually live. This realisation led me to deepen my practice with specialist training in Somatics, nervous system regulation, and trauma-informed care.

The Dual Approach: Mind & Body

My practice is built on two inseparable pillars:

Talking Therapy: We work together to name, understand, and make meaning of your story. We look at the patterns you’ve developed and the narrative you carry about yourself.
Somatic Work: We include your body’s intelligence. We track sensations and reactions to access what the body is still holding. By working with your nervous system, we move from just "talking about" the problem to actually shifting how it feels in your system.

A Wider Perspective: It’s Not Just You

I believe that your symptoms - whether physical tension, anxiety, depression, illness, chronic overwhelm, or emotional exhaustion - are often intelligent responses to the world around you, not personal failures. One of the most vital parts of my work is gently naming the wider context of your life.

You may be working extra long hours because slowing down feels unsafe, a mother caught in the invisible friction between work and home, a man holding his breath because asking for help feels like weakness, someone trapped in a career that pays the bills but drains their spirit, or a caregiver silently carrying the mental load of everyone else’s needs while abandoning their own.

Whatever your circumstance, these feelings do not mean you are broken. We do not exist in a vacuum...we are living, breathing human beings operating inside relentless systems that demand we over-function just to keep up. When we stop treating your exhaustion as a personal flaw and start seeing it as a nervous system trying to survive an unnatural pace, the shame begins to lift.

So, I am not here to help you ‘cope better’ with a world that is harming you, nor am I here to help you 'tolerate more'. My goal is to help your body recognise these external pressures so we can lift the weight you've been carrying. When we name the systems at play - generational trauma, discrimination, childhood conditioning, inequality, or social expectations - we disperse the personal blame, making space for real rest, self-compassion, and genuine healing.

This allows you to let go of the belief that you are the 'problem', let go of the shame and move into a place of compassion and empowerment. You can stop "tolerating" and start building the capacity to honour your own truth.

Professional Integrity

While my approach is grounded in warmth and a light heart, it is built on a foundation of rigorous professional standards.

15 Years of Clinical Experience: A background spanning the NHS, secondary education, the third sector and private practice.
Registered Member of the BACP (MBACP): I work strictly within the Ethical Framework for the Counselling Professions.
Specialist Somatic Training: Post-qualifying expertise in nervous system trauma release and regulation.
Clinical Supervisor: I provide supervision for other practitioners looking to integrate a somatic and systemic lens into their work.

Contact me

jacquelinegreencounselling@gmail.com

Word 7 in this series giving language to the hard-to-explain physical realities of healing: Pendulation.

When people come to therapy, they often believe the goal is to feel completely calm, happy, or unbothered all the time. But a regulated nervous system isn’t a frozen state of peace - it’s a flexible one.

In my practice, pendulation is one of the somatic interventions I use with clients holding trauma or distress.
Instead of diving headfirst into overwhelming trauma memories or trying to force immediate relaxation (which often backfires), we pendulate.
In real time, we touch briefly on a difficult sensation or memory in the body, sometimes we don’t even need to hash out the story because the body reacts instantly! And then we deliberately swing the attention back to a grounding exercise - a resource, a physical anchor, or a sense of safety in the room. Maybe it’s a metaphorical visual we’ve created together, something we’ve agreed upon before that helps, something in the room like the touch of your blanket, or the look of a plant or art to focus on, or maybe it’s guided breathing by me…. And we stay here until our bodies understand it’s safe again.

We do this over and over again.

Back and forth into the activation and then back to grounding. Over and over….

We pendulate between the trauma and safety because our body needs real-time, physical practice to remember that it can visit uncomfortable states without staying trapped in them.

Talking therapy helps you process the memory and map out why it happened. Somatic pendulation physically teaches your tissues that safety is accessible right now, even when difficult emotions arise. I offer this blended approach in my therapy - I call it the dual approach.

So you aren’t broken because you swing back into anxiety, grief, or tension all the time. That isn’t a failure…. it’s your nervous system doing its job….

The work is simply learning how to guide the pendulum back toward safety when it swings too far ❤️‍🩹

Have you ever noticed your body naturally wanting to pull away or distract itself when a feeling gets too intense? That’s your system asking for pendulation.

What do you think???

Here’s to friendship chats on Friday nights, and Therapy on Monday mornings 😅🥲

Word six in this series….

Have you ever had a day where you feel completely overwhelmed and think, “I can’t keep feeling like this”… and then, a few days later, you’re absolutely fine?
That’s a little bit of what emotional permanence can look like.

When we’re anxious, depressed, rejected, lonely, angry or overwhelmed, the feeling can become so present that our brain struggles to access the memory of feeling okay.

It can sound like:

“Something is really wrong.”
“I’m always going to feel like this.”
“It’s just the way I am now”
“I don’t think I can cope.”

And sometimes we make decisions from that place because the feeling feels like the whole truth.
But feelings have a habit of changing….

The version of you who is having a really shit Tuesday can genuinely struggle to remember the version of you who was absolutely fine on Sunday 🙃

This is one reason I talk so much about slowing things down and getting curious about what is happening in your body, rather than immediately believing every thought that arrives alongside it.

You don’t have to convince yourself that you feel differently at that moment. Sometimes it’s enough to gently remind yourself:

“This is how I feel right now. It isn’t necessarily how I will feel forever.”

If you’re in this state, just know, it’s not the whole story ❤️

Why do we put so much pressure on ourselves? 😩

We often reach for “regulation” only when we’re already overwhelmed, treating it like a magic light switch or a permanent state of zen where you never get stressed. But let’s demystify what it actually is for a sec.

Regulation isn’t about feeling calm 100% of the time….that’s impossible!
It’s simply your nervous system’s natural ability to move through stress and return to safety.
You flow in and out of it all day long and that’s normal.
So being dysregulated sometimes doesn’t mean you’re failing; it just means you’re human. Isn’t is a beautiful chaos being a human 😆

So what is regulation for me? Well, nervous systems learn through repetition, especially in ordinary moments like these ones….. here you can see me going for a walk, going for a swim, sitting in silence in between things, lying down at night to watch the stars, taking a pause, stretching, breathing, and simply just doing absolutely nothing.

These simple and ordinary practices are how I send a clear, repeated message to my body: “I’m okay. I have time. I can slow down. Nothing needs fixing right now.”

When life gets overwhelming, those everyday moments give your nervous system a familiar groove of safety to draw on. So you can come back to a sense of balance again.

Just remember, regulation doesn’t require constant therapy, deep inner work, or rigid self-improvement routines. Doing less, noticing more, and living your ordinary life is part of the process, too. You don’t have to make every moment profound…..

you just have to let yourself actually be in it 🤍

Ps I hope my mug doesn’t offend you, but if it does, I hope you can find your balance again soon 🫠😉

Basic plain brown notebooks for client notes instead of computerised notes…. yes and I’m very happy to have made this transition.
Original cute little clocks….. yes, that’s all I need.
Plants that I struggle to keep alive….. yes 😬
Books - professional reading and personal passions, because actually, they’re the same thing….. yes.
Empty cute vases and candlesticks….. yes for now.
Pops of colour, so whatever day it is, I can usually find something that matches my mood….. yes.
Cosmic vibes - because do you ever really take the sun, moon and stars out of an 80s girl? So yes 😁
☀️🌙✨
A noticeboard with absolutely nothing on it yet because all my important stuff is in an important box somewhere…… yes (hopefully not for long) for now.
Fairy lights and candles….. not yet. But this situation will be rectified TODAY!

If you’ve been here for a while, you might remember the days of my wonderfully built garden room office.
How cute was that? 🥹
I still miss it.
But life has moved on, and I’m finding myself really enjoying this new little space.

It’s taken me about a year to get from a completely blank room to this. And it’s still not finished. Far from it, actually. But maybe spaces like this are never really finished. For me, this room has become more than somewhere I work.

It’s where I come to read.
To stretch.
To join an online class.
To work and sit with people in their own spaces.
To think.
To be quiet.
And sometimes, just to have a little bit of peace of my own.

But this isn’t the only place I work from.
Sometimes my office is the beach and big open spaces. Sometimes it’s a walk through the woods.
Half my time I’m outside doing Walk&Talk sessions and this feels very me too!!!! 😌

But I think there’s something really lovely about having a landing pad. Somewhere that feels like you.
And this is the space for me….. it helps me feel a little more myself.

So now I’m curious…
Do you have a little corner of your home that feels like yours?
Or perhaps somewhere outside that has become your place to go when you need somewhere that feels safe, familiar or just a little bit more you? 🤍

I think I had a version of summer in my head before it even started.

One where I’d have more time. More space. More of those slow, unhurried days where I could just potter about and not feel like I was already thinking about what was next.

And actually, it hasn’t really been like that.

When one role pauses, another begins. My diary changed, but life didn’t stop. There was still work, studying, supervision, family, friendships, plans, things to organise, things to do.

And I’ve noticed myself doing that thing where I compare what actually happened with what I thought would happen. And then feeling grief of what it could have been.
As if the imagined version was somehow the better version.

I think we do this quite a lot. We can become so focused on the life we think we should be having that we lose sight of the one that’s actually happening.

And sometimes I wonder if that’s where we miss something important.

Not because everything needs to be appreciated or turned into a lesson. It doesn’t. Not at all. But because there is something about accepting our actual lives that feels very different from constantly measuring them against an imagined one.

This summer didn’t give me everything I thought I wanted from it. But it gave me a lot. And I am so grateful.

And maybe I don’t need to make it more than that 🤷🏼‍♀️

As September approaches and the pace starts to shift again, I’m trying to remember that I don’t need to leave this summer feeling like I did it perfectly. I also don’t need to create a fresh start and make Autumn the new project.

I just want to have noticed that I was here.
That I was living it.
And maybe that’s enough.

Does this resonate? 😏

Oh btw…. School holidays in Scotland are over. If you’re in England/ Wales and think I’m a little confused 😏😝

The fifth word in this series of giving words to experiences that can sometimes feel hard to explain…

Liminal.

Have you ever found yourself in that strange in-between space? Where you know something has shifted, but you’re not quite sure what’s next yet.

Maybe…

🍂 Someone you love has died, and you’re trying to find your way in a world that looks the same but feels completely different.

🍂 A job that once felt right doesn’t feel the same anymore, but you don’t know what the next step is.

🍂 A friendship or connection has changed, and you’re grieving what it used to be while trying to understand what it is now.

🍂 Your priorities have shifted as you’ve got older, and the things you once chased don’t feel as important anymore.

There’s actually a word for this: liminal.

It describes that space between what was and what is yet to come. The boundary or the in-between threshold of transition.

I think these spaces can feel really uncomfortable.
Because we’re often much more comfortable when we know where we stand. When we have a plan. When things feel clear and defined.

But life doesn’t always work like that.
Sometimes there’s a period of adjusting, grieving, questioning, letting go, and slowly finding our feet again.

And we can be so quick to judge ourselves when we’re in this place.
Thinking we’re stuck.
That we should have moved on.
That we should know what we’re doing by now.
But what if this isn’t a problem to fix?
What if it’s actually a process of change?

I see this a lot in therapy….that the messy middle can feel like something has gone wrong, when actually it can be the place where something new is beginning to form. The old ways of being might not fit anymore… but the new ways haven’t had time to settle yet.
And that can feel uncertain.
Vulnerable.
A little uncomfortable.

But maybe this space deserves a little more compassion. Maybe we don’t have to rush through every transition or force ourselves to have all the answers.

Maybe we can trust that something is shifting, even when we can’t quite see what it is yet.

If you’re in a liminal space right now… you’re not necessarily lost.

You might just be in the middle of becoming 🤍

Word 3 in the series giving language to experiences that are often hard to explain: Somatisation.

In my practice, I bridge two worlds: talking therapy and somatic integration. Because talking gives you insight, understanding and empathy which can bring along with it….. relief, clarity, acceptance.

BUT the body holds the baseline.

You can intellectually understand why you feel stressed or traumatised…. you can talk about it for years, but if your nervous system still feels unsafe, your mind will continue sending emergency signals straight into your physical tissues.

This is where somatisation lives.
It’s not “all in your head.”
It is the physical translation of unexpressed, unintegrated emotion.
Real life rarely gives you a sign saying “you’re suppressing grief.” Instead, it looks like:

👤 That sudden, inexplicable IBS flare-up the week you have to set a hard boundary at work.

👤 Tension headaches that start the second you get home from a family gathering where you clenched your jaw and had to play peacekeeper.

👤 Chronic low back pain or pelvic tightness after months of carrying everyone else’s emotional weight.

👤 Unexplained fatigue where your blood tests come back completely clear, but your body simply refuses to go any further.

ANDDDD….it presents differently depending on how we’ve been socialised:
Generally speaking, women… statistically and clinically tend to hold somatisation internally, leading to higher rates of gut dysfunction, chronic fatigue, pelvic tension, and autoimmune responses. Society teaches women to swallow anger and internalise stress to keep the peace.
Men tend to hold it in high-tone muscular rigidity, cardiovascular strain, and sudden physical collapses. Society teaches men to suppress vulnerability and bypass emotion until the body literally forces a complete stop through burnout or severe injury.

Talking therapy helps you name the story.
Somatic therapy helps your body safely release the physical grip of it. We need both.

When we stop fighting the symptom and start listening to the message behind it, the body no longer has to scream to be heard.

Send this to someone who might appreciate understanding this 😌❤️

Word 3 in the ‘Giving words to experiences that are hard to explain’ series.
Fight or flight gets all the attention in the trauma conversation, but today I want to shine a light on a survival response that lives quietly in the body: fawning.

It’s one of the hardest trauma responses to recognise. Largely because our culture actively rewards it.

Somatically, fawning is a physiological reflex.
It’s that knee-jerk urge to soften your stance, appease, and over-explain the moment you feel a shift in the room’s energy. It’s going back on an opinion when you sense judgement. It’s agreeing when your gut says no. It’s smiling through visceral discomfort. It’s micro-managing everyone else’s emotional temperature just so your own nervous system can relax.

When you grow up learning that peace is your responsibility to maintain, self-abandonment becomes a physical habit.

I’m sharing this because after nearly two decades in clinical practice, I see so many people mistake this response for kindness, selflessness, or “being easygoing.” It’s not that! It isn’t a personality trait.
It’s survival. It’s your nervous system defaulting to a strategy that once kept you safe when being authentic or setting a boundary felt dangerous.

When we give words to these hard-to-explain bodily experiences, we take away their shame and the personal responsibility we hold - and that’s where real somatic integration begins.

Does this resonate with how your body copes with tension?

Almost 20 years in this field, thousands of hours in clinical training, and a lifetime of conscious experience have taught me one fundamental truth:
healing isn’t about forcing your body to fit a trend.
It’s about learning to listen to what it’s been trying to tell you all along, underneath all the noise and conditions.

These are some of my truths about your nervous system, trauma, and what emotional integration actually takes.

Which one hit closest to home for you today???

In therapy, I often see how much extra weight we can all carry simply by fighting things we cannot change.

We do it in deeply human ways:
• putting off a GP appointment because the reality feels uncomfortable • pushing through a packed week when exhausted • staying in a toxic environment • ignoring a crossed boundary • continuing unhealthy habits • or creating a fantasy to escape a bereavement.

Sometimes, living in denial feels safer than facing the truth. If the truth means a life must change, our minds protect us.

We create an internal cognitive dissonance… holding onto the friction because the alternative feels too disruptive.

That survival mechanism can go on for years.
It’s not a failure; it’s just your nervous system deciding the truth is currently too heavy. Aren’t our bodies just so incredible that it knows what to do to survive this conflict within?

But fighting reality turns pain into chronic suffering. Our bodies stay on high alert: the constant low-level dread, the tight shoulders, the mental looping.

I must be clear…. Radical acceptance doesn’t mean condoning, approving, or liking the situation.
It simply means stopping the exhausting fight against the reality of it.

This is where a gentle, trusting therapeutic relationship can come in. We rarely move out of survival mode alone. Held safely by another person, you find the ground to move into acceptance. It feels scary, sure, but it is also brave and deeply hopeful.

When we give our minds the map of reality as it is, our bodies can drop beneath the story.
That is when the dots connect.

As a somatic therapist, I help you pace this transition. We track where resistance lives in your body, safely meet the fear or grief denial was protecting you from, and help your physiology realise it’s safe to drop the reins.

When this happens, the jaw softens, the breath comes back, and it feels possible to ask:

“Now that this is reality... what is my next right step?”
🤍

Some people practise radical acceptance as a way of life, finding it incredibly helpful. Some people touch base with it only when needed, and some people find it too much completely.
I wonder what your position is?

The daily battle between me and my amateur lighting setup 🙄😑

Tips anyone? 😅

So the first post on my ‘Giving words to experiences that are hard to explain’ series…

When we are overwhelmed, our instinct is often to try and think our way out of it.
We analyse, we plan, we worry, and we look for logical solutions. All in the same of feeling in control and safe again.
But heres the thing. That doesn’t work.
Your nervous system doesn’t speak in logic. It speaks in physical sensation.

This is why simply intellectualising why you are stressed doesn’t actually calm your heart rate or loosen your shoulders.
To do that, we need to drop down beneath the story and find a resource.

The beauty of resourcing is that it is found in the smallest, most ordinary moments:

• The weight or texture of a stone from the beach tucked into your pocket.
• The warmth of a mug of coffee held between both palms.
• Stepping outside and letting the sun hit your cheek for thirty seconds.
• The steady, rhythmic breath of a sleeping pet nearby.
• The sound of waves in the distance.
• Really noticing the colours of the sky at sunset.
• The comfort of a hot water bottle on your lap.
• The sensation of clean pyjamas after a long hard day.
• Looking at your favourite photo and immersing yourself in how it feels.

These aren’t just distractions. They are literal, biological cues telling your nervous system:
“You are here. You are supported. You can soften, even just a fraction.”
Remember what I always say… you have to give physical evidence to your body that it can relax and feel safe. It’s not enough to just think it.

Having the words to understand this is a beautiful first step - it gives us the map. But actually pausing to find a physical resource today is how we connect the dots and let the body express what it is holding.

So what is one tiny, physical resource you can lean into right now? Exactly where you are…. 😌

I haven’t posted on here in weeks.
I’ve just been incredibly busy.
Work is busy, life is busy, and because I’m a psychotherapist and not an influencer, social media is naturally the first thing to drop when time and energy are tight.
And that is exactly as it should be 😌

Our nervous systems are constantly making choices about where to direct our capacity.
Sometimes, the most somatic aware thing we can do is stop trying to spin every single plate and just focus on the ones right in front of us.

Now that I have a little breathing room to step back into this space, I want to share something new with you.
It also feels like a good time to be clear about why I’m actually on Instagram.

I’m not here to teach therapy or post dry checklists. You won’t find posts here on “5 signs of anxiety” or quick-fix hacks. Instead, my hope for this space is simply to help you understand yourself.

Often in therapy with me, we spend time trying to untangle feelings that feel heavy, blurry, or confusing. But as a somatic therapist, I know these experiences aren’t just in our heads. They live in our bodies… in a tight jaw, a shallow breath, or that heavy, running-on-empty fatigue.
Our minds are very good at intellectualising why we feel overwhelmed, yet our bodies can remain stuck on high alert.

Because of this, simply understanding the theory in your head isn’t enough. Having the words to name what you are going through is a beautiful, necessary part of the process… it gives us a map.
But to truly connect the dots, we have to drop down beneath the story and listen to the body itself.

It is within the physical body that our deepest-rooted experiences are held, and it is there that they need to be met, felt, and expressed. Naming the experience is the key that unlocks the door; listening to the body is how we actually step through it.
I bridge the gap between the mind and body - it’s the dual approach I use in therapy.

So to help people on their own journey of this, for those who are interested…
I’m starting a new series: (cont in comments)…

Every single day, we pay an invisible, exhausting psychological tax just to survive in our social lives.

We write off the cost as “just being polite” or “getting on with it because it has to be done” but your body is keeping a strict receipt.

When you spend your life constantly hiding parts of who you are, shape-shifting to fit in, and staying hyper-vigilant to judgment, your nervous system is trapped in a permanent, high-alert state.

*You are treating your normal, messy humanness as a dangerous secret that must be guarded at all costs*

When the pressure to keep everyone comfortable becomes your baseline, you flee north into your head. Living from your head, you become incredibly analytical, highly self-aware, and brilliant at intellectualising your stress. You ignore your physical nervous system reactions and tell yourself you are “handling it” because you can logically explain why you are overwhelmed.

But this creates a painful, lonely gap…

Your mind says, “I’m fine, I just need to make sure nobody sees me struggling,” while your body screams an entirely different story through a clenched jaw, a shallow breath trapped in your chest, or an invisible impulse to turn and run out of the room.

Most people make the mistake of looking for a quick fix. We’ve been conditioned to think that the solution to this kind of exhaustion is just a matter of reading the right self-help book, regaining calm at home every night to recuperate, or learning how to mask a little better so we can tolerate the pressure.

But it is not that simple.

You CANNOT think your way out of a survival response, and you cannot confidence-hack your way into safety.

True nervous system regulation isn’t about calming yourself down just so you can get right back to pretending.
We do not need to build up our tolerance for spaces, expectations, or relationships that require us to split ourselves in half. [cont in comments]…..

As someone who lives intentionally to the seasons, I couldn’t let the transition into summer go by without a reminder on this.

Autumn is a nervous system regulator for many. Soft light, pumpkin smells, quiet nights and cozy blankets. Our senses take everything in.
Winter brings hibernation, more permission to pause and be in stillness, reflection and quiet.
Spring brings new life. New energy. Coming back out into the world and slowly adapting to more light, a hope and growth and new beginnings.
And then there’s summer. A world of possibilities filled with high vibrations. But the cultural expectations can be some of the hardest expectations to hold. Don’t feel like you have to live up to these. Ask yourself what summer means to you.

For me, it means, more opportunities to be social, so I choose carefully which ones I want to lean into. It means pizza at the beach and later nights. It means campfires. It means appreciation. I look up and see a world full of opportunity and I often get enough from observing it and not necessarily being involved in it all the time. I still find time to restore and recharge….
Later nights mean slower mornings or afternoon naps. I drink more water and eat more fresh fruit. It’s more movement in the fresh air. It’s clean showers and bedsheets after suncream and heat over stimulation. It’s choosing what my energy needs and pulling back from others like choosing to drink a dr pepper in my sunny garden listening to the birds and not being at the local town festival when my social battery is low.

Don’t let society tell you what your summer looks like.
Look after your needs. You don’t need to wait until October to restore.

J x

Therapy isn’t me sitting on a mountaintop of emotional wisdom while you struggle below.

It’s more like: I’ve been in therapy, I am in therapy, and I’ll probably keep being in therapy every so often, right alongside you doing your version of the work.

I don’t see myself as “above” what you’re going through. If anything, my job is to stay close enough to it (in my own life and yours) that I don’t start pretending I’ve graduated from being human.

Because none of us do.

I think good therapy is less about “I have the answers” and more about “I know what it’s like to sit in the client chair, not know what to say, and still try anyway.”

That matters. At least to me.

So yes - I bring lots of training, experience, and all the professional bits.

But I also bring the ongoing reality of being a person who’s living her own life, who’s still learning, still unlearning, still getting it wrong sometimes, and still showing up.

If you’re looking for someone perfect, I’m not it.

• I’ll humour you • get something wrong and then circle back and repair it • bring an inside joke that has us in fits of laughter • hold two truths at once and help you consider a little differently • excitedly notice a pattern happening in the room right there and then • cry with you because I get it and I truly feel it • show you my hairs standing on end because that happens a lot • and all of the stuff in between….
And when I do these things - be human I mean - we build room for you to be human too. Help you feel able to connect and share how things feel, not just what your words are saying. Together we are just two humans coming together and seeing what that says for you.

If you’re looking for someone real who stays in it with you, that’s the work.

J x

Sometimes I work at the beach. Sometimes I’m in front of a screen. Sometimes I’m in the forest. Sometimes I’m in a meeting. Sometimes I’m out delivering inputs. Sometimes I attend an evening event. And sometimes I’m just on the floor listening to John Williams on repeat 🏰🪄🦉✨

I think sometimes social media can make it look like “showing up for yourself” has to be done perfectly. Like we should always be journaling, regulating, reflecting, exercising, healing, growing, resting, communicating beautifully, drinking enough water… all whilst somehow functioning as normal humans too 🫠

But real life usually looks a bit messier than that.

Some weeks I do these things often. Some weeks only once or twice. Some weeks not at all.

And I think that’s the point.
A lot of the things that support us aren’t meant to become another pressure or standard we fail to meet. They’re just small ways we can gently respond to ourselves when we have the capacity, awareness, energy, or space to do so.

Not perfection. Not optimisation. Just small choices, repeated where we can.

Life can be hard. Circumstances change. Energy changes. We don’t always have full control over that.
But sometimes we can offer ourselves a little softness within it.

And honestly….. I think “enough of the time” is often enough. I mean, one of my favourite sayings I live by is…
‘we can’t do everything all of the time’. 🤍

*right well I’m away to drink water because THAT has been hard for me this week 🫠

**HAHAHHAhahahhaaa also swipe for my met gala look apparently 😂😂😂😂😂😂

We often try to heal through thinking don’t we.

Understanding ourselves more. Analysing our patterns. Talking ourselves through why we feel the way we do.
Reading more. And insight matters. But the body also needs experiences.

Experiences of slowness.
Moments without pressure.
Fresh air.
Movement.
Stillness.
Quiet.
Spaces where the nervous system is no longer bracing for the next thing.
These moments matter more than we realise.

Your body is constantly gathering evidence about whether it’s safe. And our thoughts are a big part of that. As is your environment, choices, relationships and how we experience the world.
This means the small moments in your day like the way you move through the world, the pace you keep, the moments you pause, breathe, soften… they all communicate something to your nervous system.

Sometimes, small changes is enough, and through repetition, we can unlearn how to live in survival mode.
But sometimes we need guidance - that extra helping hand, because maybe you’ve never really learned how.
Someone to help us slow down enough and to help us actually hear what the body has been trying to say underneath the noise and the rush.
This is where my work comes in - my dual approach - where understanding meets embodied safety.

Here if you need.
I have one space opening up very soon so get in touch if this speaks to you. J x

A little glimpse into my work week this week so far.

On the surface, it looks like nice walks, coffee, peace, reading, online calls, voice notes to myself, post it notes as book marks and small pauses in between sessions.

But underneath all of that, there’s so much depth.

This week I sat with people navigating grief, overwhelm, past trauma, anxiety, relationship struggles, old family wounds, self destruct, and big life changes. I also met two new clients for the very first time which is never a small thing. Opening up to someone new, allowing yourself to be seen, speaking honestly about your life… that takes a huge amount of courage.

There are moments in this work that can look very quiet from the outside, but feel incredibly significant in the room. A long pause. Showing up late after a hard morning. A hug at the end of a walk&talk session. A deep breath. Someone realising they’ve spent years in survival mode. Someone noticing what their body has been trying to communicate all along.

And somewhere in amongst all of that depth, there’s usually me trying to figure out if I need slippers, a hot water bottle, sun glasses or gloves, thanks to the Scottish weather 🫣😝

I never take for granted the trust people place in me and in the therapeutic space.

And I try to practise what I encourage others to do too… slowing down where possible, stepping outside, taking small moments of care seriously, permission to not run for a week because you don’t feel like it, and then twice the next week because you do 😆 and remembering that regulation doesn’t always have to look profound.

Sometimes it’s just fresh air and a warm drink in peace between sessions.

The work is meaningful.
And so are the people within it.

J x

This might be me avoiding something… or not 🥲

There’s so much messaging around self-care… go to therapy, do cold water dips, attend yoga classes, book the paint and sip thing with your friends, journal every night, go on a retreat, attend the next event - all the things we’re told will “help.”
And they can.

But sometimes I catch myself reaching for them without really checking in with why.

✨ Is this actually what I need right now?

Or am I filling the space or hiding behind it because sitting still or doing something more basic might feel harder?

I don’t think it’s about the what really….. well, not always, it’s more about the why.

On this run, I was deliberately thinking about some of the harder stuff in my life lately. Letting it come up, move through, and settle as my body kept moving and releasing. I chose to make time for my stuff - and so it was easier for it not to all leak out in the lead up - because I knew I’d give it space.

But other times… a run is just a run.

And sometimes, if I’m honest, it probably is a bit of avoidance. 👀

I think it’s less about getting it “right”, and more about being honest with ourselves in the moment.

So… next time you go to do the next ‘thing’, ask yourself, are you moving towards it away from something?

🙃

And it’s only Tuesday 🤪🥲

….I’m sharing this because so many people think growth means getting everything “right”.
That other people have it all together…. Like therapists or elders or the person you saw holding it together incredibly well yesterday.

But it doesn’t mean that.

Growth is continuous.
It often looks like noticing your patterns sooner.
It looks like taking accountability without tearing yourself down.
It looks like making a mess of things sometimes, then meeting yourself with compassion and adjusting course.

We are not here to be perfect.
We are here to be aware, honest, and willing to begin again.

I’m only human. As you are.
And I’m on this journey too.

So I’m going to make myself a cuppa, give myself a little moment to feel all the feels, talk to myself kindly, maybe give myself a little hug, and move forwards this week with self kindness, understanding and encouragement 🤍

I hope you can do the same J x

So many people come to therapy believing they are the problem. That something in them needs fixing.

But most of the time, what we’re looking at are responses that made sense at some point.
Patterns your body learned to help you cope, manage, get through. And in fact, these are highly intelligent responses from our bodies and it means your body is doing what it’s meant to - keep you aware - to survive!

The work I do isn’t about getting rid of symptoms. It’s not about helping you learn more coping strategies so you can ‘tolerate’ more pain. It’s not about ‘fixing’ you.

It’s about getting curious about what shaped them in the first place. This is crucial to helping you move forward. Understanding quite often that it didn’t start with you.
With more understanding of the systems at play, you can build capacity to choose differently.
Helping you to resist, where appropriate, and cope with compassion when needed.

Because when you understand your responses as adaptations that your body makes - not flaws - something shifts.

The shame lessens as you realise they are not a personal failing.
There’s less judgement and more compassion.
More choice.

This is where the blend of talking therapy and somatic work matters.

Not just making sense of your story, but noticing how it’s still held in your body. The tension, the bracing, the habits that keep things in place.

And gently, at your pace, creating space for something different.

You’re not the problem.

But your experiences deserve your attention.

J x

Sometimes healing doesn’t happen through analysing everything.

Sometimes it happens in connection.
Connection with ourself for sure, but also connection with others.

The kind of connection that doesn’t ask you to perform or explain yourself.
Just being beside others. Moving together. Laughing. Braving the cold water. Sharing a moment of courage.

Our nervous systems are wired for this co-regulation.

We regulate through micro moments of connection all the time - eye contact, a smile, someone noticing us, a shared experience. These moments might seem small, but to the body they are signals of safety.

The laugh might come - the shoulders drop - the breath relaxes, the tension fades…. Your body is listening and noticing.

These body responses remind our body that we’re not alone.

So just a reminder, deep connection doesn’t always come from long conversations, exposing all our truths, or understanding every part of our story.
Sometimes it’s simply the presence of others who feel steady enough for us to soften beside.

And when the body experiences enough of those moments - whether in friendship, community, therapy or quiet shared spaces…. something begins to shift.

Where do you feel like this??

Not a wellness influencer, don’t worry 🤪
Just a therapist trying to get some nutrients in between sessions.

The reality is… we can’t do everything perfectly all of the time.

Sometimes self-care is slowing down, resisting pressure culture, tuning in to your body and needs, breathing, and doing the deeper work.

And sometimes it’s just a quick green drink because life is busy and this is the version that fits today.

Both count.

🥰

Which version are you just now?

J x

#eastlothiancounsellor #eastlothiancounselling #counselling #walkandtalktherapy #somatictherapy

It’s at that moment you see my eyes clock my water bottle. This massive, crushed and old plastic bottle from earlier that week - still going strong.
It definitely doesn’t match the whole ‘calm, put together therapist with a glass of water’ vibe I could be going for here.

But I use it anyway - with a [ooops here I am as a person and not a polished therapist] smile 💁‍♀️ and then we both burst into laughter!

At other times, it might be an in joke we share and laughter, a light reflection on something heavy from the week before, an absolutely disgusting gigantic water bottle, a side smile when we see what’s happening, a runny nose or cough that finds its way in at crucial times, coffee spilt down your top, your dog barking into the laptop, or even a window cleaner popping up and making me jump out my chair 😂
- the list goes on.

A light moment like this that lets the relationship speak for itself. It might not look much, but it’s the relationship we have that makes therapy feel possible, effective, safe. And I work relationally.

It might be because I’ve been doing this so long I don’t overthink these things anymore.
It might be that I just feel comfortable with whatever it brings up.
It might be that I trust the safety between us and can hold both the heavy and the light.
Whatever it is - I’m professional sure - but also HUMAN! And you are welcome to show up as a human too. Not a performer, not as a people pleaser, not as someone who needs to question what I’m thinking…. Just human. Whatever that looks like for you…. And if you struggle with that - I’m here to help you. J x

#eastlothiancounsellor #eastlothiancounselling #counselling #walkandtalktherapy #somatictherapy

As cringy as it might sound for some people, one of the first things I often do when someone arrives in therapy is notice how they’re in their body.
How are they arriving?
Whats the body holding from the morning passed?

Throughout our session together, we might pause and check in with how a story or memory feels physically - the tension in the shoulders, the lump in the throat, the tightness in the chest, the way the stomach twists, the energy radiating from the hands.
Just noticing what’s happening in the body as we explore what’s coming up. This is where my work bridges the gap between thoughts and body…. And it really helps us to heal and not ‘just talk about it’.

That same principle applies outside of therapy.
There are little pockets of time already in your day - a moment by the kettle, a pause in the car, standing in a queue - that can become small reminders to breathe, notice, soften, and come back into yourself.

This week on my reel I explored that idea and this carousel takes it a little further.

No extra time needed.
No big routines.
No life hack and big commitments.

Just tiny moments that are ALREADY there, quietly waiting for you to notice.

Even the smallest pause can help your nervous system settle, let your mind come down from overdrive, and remind you that you don’t always have to be “doing” to matter.

Sometimes all it takes is a brief moment of presence, right where you already are.
J x

@jacquelinegreencounselling

#eastlothiancounsellor #eastlothiancounselling #walkandtalktherapy #somatictherapy

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I am endlessly curious about people and the stories we carry. These letters explore the things we feel but rarely say out loud...the quiet experiences and patterns that remind us we’re all just human.

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