A Compassionate Approach to Working with Anxiety – with Briony Martin (Apr. 2024)

We enjoyed an interesting and thought provoking in-person seminar with our host, Briony Martin.  The full day involved an excellent mixture of both theory, presentations, group discussions and 1-1 sharing on the topic of anxiety.

Briony presented the neurological information on the brain’s function and how it links to anxious feelings and thoughts.  She shared her own approach on working with clients in a compassionate way.  Working alongside the anxious person, listening, affirming and offering the safe, neutral space to be heard.  We practiced some useful listening exercises in our pairs.  Briony encouraged us to question our own anxiety, how it manifests, when it arises, what it feels like and how we manage these experiences.

We were invited to self reflect a few times, particularly to connect with our own anxiety and how we manage it, as well as it’s effects on clients who share their anxiety with us in the room. 

During the seminar, we thought about the anxiety being a part of the person, not an “othered” part and how anxiety is a natural and sometimes useful human presentation which has a purpose in keeping us safe in times of danger – an alert system. 

The group thought about and shared on the topic of the collective anxiety, the modern world, the impacts on people (especially younger brains), regarding social media, smartphones and technology.  We ventured into the subject of Climate Change anxiety and how we personally feel about this. 

I enjoyed the experiential part of the seminar, getting in touch with ourselves in both mind and body to explore anxiety in its felt sense.  

All in all the seminar was a well-rounded mix of the internalised and externalised experience of Anxiety.

_______________________________________________________________________________________________

Average feedback scores from our event:

Organisation of event: 4.8 out of 5

Speaker: 5 out of 5

_______________________________________________________________________________________________

Feedback from our event:

“Practicing techniques was helpful, and meeting other counsellors / psychotherapists and sharing ideas and experiences.  Very comfortable surroundings, excellent speaker – knowledgeable, warm and good pacing” – Sophie Page, Private Practice, Cheltenham

“Great CPD delivered clearly and great venue” – anonymous

“I particularly enjoyed the range of different teaching techniques – combination of theoretical and practical.  Thank you for a very welcoming, safe and well held session and also for being brave enough to bring up difficult issues” – Hermione, Totnes

“Organisation very good, nice venue with easy parking.  Speaker content good with helpful tips and relaxed delivery” – anonymous

“Good space and ambiance.  Well paced good speaker” – Sally Fenton