Counselling Formats

Three formats are available to suit your needs.

Video Call

After booking a session with Holly, a meeting link will be emailed to you. Wherever you are, check that you have a stable internet connection, and log on to the call with your preferred device.

Face-to-Face

Online video counselling has now become the norm, but you may still want to meet face-to-face.

Holly currently offers face-to-face sessions from her office in Taipei.

Email

You might prefer writing to Holly on a regular basis instead of having sessions.

Emails are generally 300-500 words in length, and exchanged weekly or bi-weekly.

 
 

Counselling Approaches

A counselling approach is a set of evidence-based principles and techniques that mental health practitioners use with people they work with to co-create change over time.

Holly integrates several approaches into her practice. These include:

  • The counsellor uses techniques like reflection, active listening, and summary to guide the client through solutions to their problems. Support is underpinned by three core conditions:

    (1) Empathic understanding: the counsellor tries to understand the client’s point of view

    (2) Congruence: the counsellor is a genuine person

    (3) Unconditional positive regard: the counsellor is non-judgmental.

  • Narrative Therapy is a respectful, non-blaming approach to counselling and community work that centres people as the experts in their own lives.

    The person is not the problem; the problem is the problem. This idea helps people understand the impact of problems in their lives without feeling like they are the problem. The counsellor asks questions to help the person thicken the narrative about their lives and in doing so, renew connections to their goals, values, hopes and dreams.

  • Known simply as “act”, this approach is a type of mindful psychotherapy that helps people stay present in the moment, and accept difficult experiences without judging themselves or others.

    Sometimes, the tendency to hold on to feelings about feelings adds to our suffering. Through developing ways to accept thoughts and feelings as experiences that come and go, people can start to commit to actions that align with their values, and be present for what’s important to them.

  • This approach is rooted in evidence that compassion is central to wellbeing, and that emotional healing happens through developing compassion for oneself and others.

    The counsellor and client work together to understand patterns in the client’s thoughts and the three emotion-regulation systems (Threat, Drive, and Soothe), whilst also addressing shame and self-criticism.

  • CBT helps with understanding the relationship between cognition (thought), behaviour, and emotion.

    It focuses on examining core beliefs behind our thoughts, feelings and emotions – ones that formed from early experiences and relationships. With guidance and structure, clients practice gaining self-awareness and ways to regulate their thinking, behavioural and emotional habits.

  • The main goals of psychodynamic therapy are to:
    (1) Enhance the client's self-awareness and
    (2) Foster understanding of the client's thoughts, feelings, and beliefs in relation to their past experiences, especially their experiences as a child.