Accrington Counselling & Wellbeing Service

29/10/2025

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Doing "the work" in a relationship doesn't mean fixing your partner or managing their emotions. And it definitely doesn't mean losing yourself in the process. ⬇️

We're told relationships take effort. And they do…the kind that starts with your own self-awareness and emotional responsibility.

Real growth in a relationship begins with personal accountability. It looks like regulating your own nervous system, communicating your needs clearly, and taking responsibility for your own happiness and healing.

What it doesn't mean is becoming your partner's therapist. Or suppressing your needs to avoid conflict. Or taking on their unresolved trauma as your project to solve.

When you focus on your own growth instead of trying to change someone else, you stop waiting for permission to feel secure in your own relationship. ❤️

29/10/2025

29/10/2025

22/10/2025

❤️❤️

🤍

14/10/2025

How we feel and the emotions we experience are a central part of our mental health. Conversely how we respond to emotions is critical for our health, mental and physical. While they can perplexing, stubborn, frustrating, annoying, frightening and downright depressing at times, emotions are a fundamental and necessary part of brain functioning. In fact, they are central to being human.

Unfortunately societal beliefs often tells us we shouldn’t have emotions or some emotions are bad. Telling your brain it shouldn’t have emotions is like telling your heart not to beat or your lungs not to breathe, and it doesn’t make your brain very happy.

Emotions don’t always feel nice and can make us want to run away from them. And like any avoidance, short term this seems to work, we feel relieved. But inside your brain is feeling pretty annoyed at trying to hold it all in.

How you respond to your emotions is important. Research shows suppressing, berating and shaming emotions doesn’t help us deal with them at all and just creates more stress and make emotions feel even more difficult.

Naming, validating, expressing and recognising emotions seems to help us process them and help us become friends with them, rather than them having power over us. It seems to soothe those emotions and instead of adding a layer of more stress and difficult feelings, helps us deal with the ones we have.

read more about the science of emotions and how we can help our emotions in my books
📕‘A Toolkit for your Emotions’.
📚 A toolkit for modern life
📖 A toolkit for happiness

24/09/2025

Don’t let one setback colour your day. Pause and feel it, then - keep going

Image: https://www.instagram.com/newhappyco

20/06/2025

Know your circle. ✌️🫂❤️‍🩹🌎

08/06/2025

❤️ this x

03/06/2025

Fighting isn’t always about who’s right, sometimes it’s a cry to feel heard, seen, and safe. Try shifting the conversation. You might be surprised what grows when love leads the way.