We are at our “best” when we are at our peak “mental wellness.” This is when we thrive in life.

This shows itself when we demonstrate:

• awareness of our own emotions and their causes
• initiative
• accepting change and the unknown
• purposeful attention
• creativity
• inner motivation
• having insights
• self-possession.

These are all inner abilities that can be developed. You can improve your mental wellness with a proactive approach – just like going to the gym.

Talk therapy works in three key ways:

1. Insight:

The therapist is a neutral observer who helps us understand more about ourselves and our life.

As we generate awareness of the different aspects of our self, our conflicts and how we interpret and respond to reality, the greater degree of control and choice we develop and the less anxious we feel.

Through therapy, we gain knowledge of our internal workings, opening up more awareness and therefore more options.

2. Experience:

Our experience, especially our childhood experience, shapes our brain – creating patterns of thoughts, emotions and behaviours that stick.

Our childhood environment imprints strongly – we had to adapt because we were our most vulnerable and dependant.

The therapist provides a supportive, illuminating and validating experience – often quite different to our childhood experience, helping re-wire our brain.

3. Relationship:

Relationships are imperative to our wellbeing – humans beings are social beings.

Our early relationships formed our blueprint for relating: we then repeat these patterns of relating in our adult lives.

The therapeutic relationship between you and your therapist offers a chance to explore, create and practice new ways of relating.

Decades of research has shown that it does.

Importantly, whilst medication can be necessary and offers relief, psychotherapy has been shown to create sustainable change and improvement.

28% of the British population talk to a therapist at some point. Therapy is not new. “Talking cures” have been around for a century (or millennia, depending how you look at it). Since 1900 modern techniques have been empirically developed and therapy continues to be increasingly popular and effective.

Therapy online is virtually the same as therapy in person in the same room as your therapist. The methodologies used are the same.

There are some key differences, however, in delivery method:

• It can be disinhibiting: there is evidence that talking to a professional online allows us to be more open.
• It’s very private: no being seen on the way to, from, or outside a therapy centre.
• It’s convenient: no travelling time to and from your therapist’s location.
• It’s comfortable: you choose where you talk, from the comfort of your own home, a private space or a location of your choice.
• It’s flexible: with The Circle Line, you choose when you have therapy, from first thing in the morning, lunchtime, late at night or at weekends.
• It can be anonymous: if you wish to talk without your camera on, you can.

Some say therapy online is less personal. Some say that the relationship between you and your therapist is less intimate. We say that is up to you. It is up to you how you use your session time, what you explore and if and when you want to find an in-person therapist instead. There is no right way, and there is a time and place for each medium. We are here to give you options.

Our therapists are trained in a range of approaches. You can read more about the different approaches here. The most common are “integrative” (i.e. a mix), psychodynamic, person-centred, psychoanalytic and cognitive behavioural. Many therapists integrate a range of approaches – and we’ve done the vetting so you don’t have to.

Many of our therapists practice Transactional Analysis (“TA”) – because research shows it works. TA is one of the cornerstones of modern psychology – an internationally recognised model and training that is theoretically sound, rigorous and highly effective.

The most important thing is that you choose the person who you feel comfortable working with and who you feel will help you get to where you want to be. You are the best judge of who you want to work with.

The first step is to use our matching tool and then have a chat and whilst doing so simply ask yourself – ‘Can I talk to this person?’  Your first session is only £25 to allow you to “shop around” at a low cost.

Our mind is at the centre of our lives.  Therefore by giving ourselves space to learn about it we can help with a wide range of personal challenges:

• Relationships: finding and maintaining love
• Friendships: mutually satisfying friendships
• Parenting: breaking unhelpful habits and learning to become a “good enough” parent
• Body and addictions: exploring our inner drives, conflicts and the underlying causes to help us care for our bodies and release us from compulsions.
• Work: recognising our talents and finding satisfaction in our work and relationships with colleagues
• Sex and sexuality: finding acceptance, connection and enjoyment from our sexual self.

By gaining clarity and insight about our behaviour, we can understand the links between human needs and behaviours and the ways that our organisation is effective or ineffective in solving its problems and serving our customers.

This helps improve our:

• leadership skill and competence

• personal development at all levels – from the individual, team, department and organisation.

• interpersonal relationships to improve performance and productivity

• solutions-focussed problem solving
• conflict resolution
• team performance
• effective communications
• personal impact.

Group-work helps us analyse and change…

• the dynamics of how groups work together
• the role and performance of individuals within the groups
• the dynamics of power structures and how power flows through an organisation to empower groups and individuals
• organisational culture to improve efficiency, harmony, productivity and creativity.

This is totally up to you and what you want and expect to achieve. Some people are looking to do some short term work, some are committed to a longer process.

We would say that longer-term work tends to give more sustainable results and addresses our more enduring patterns. We recommend having a series of at least 6 sessions with the same practitioner as a minimum.

Ultimately, it’s up to you.

We’ll match you with 3 people that our matching technology suggests are suitable for you. You can change practitioner any time if you feel the sessions aren’t working for you for whatever reason. You can also change your answers to the questions to get new suggested practitioners.

We would recommend talking to your practitioner about any concerns before you stop your sessions. Sometimes our reasons for wanting to stop or find someone else are all part of the learning experience and can tell us something about what is really going on for us.

As we always say… talking helps; do talk it through with your therapist.

The simple answer is the level and depth of the practitioner’s training. Here are some of the key differences between the two:

Our online Therapy Room will work with most modern browsers. We recommend Google Chrome. The technology we use is a standard part of most browsers, and the easiest way to check is to use this testing tool: 

http://test.webrtc.org

Allow access to microphone & camera, then simply press the green ‘Start’ button to start the test.

The tool will check whether your browser is capable of using our Therapy Room. Most are.