Jo Burch Counselling and Psychotherapy

01/05/2025

One of my favourite spots among the oak trees just to stand, take it all in and let out a long breath. Bliss.

Being able to experience the joy of my body absorbing the vibrancy of the colours, shapes, sounds and smells of Spring.

The fresh green of the leaves, the purple of the bluebells, the bright light of the sun shining through the branches, the birds singing and calling to each other. It all feels so alive and full of energy and so do I.

What an amazing day for May Day, or the Celtic Beltane, meaning the fire of the deity Bel, which marks the start of summer and the mid point between the Spring Equinox and the Summer Solstice.

💚 ☀️ 🌳 🔥 🌺

02/11/2024

🧡

Healing a wounded soul is a delicate process that unfolds in its own time. Like a shattered vase carefully pieced back together, mending a broken heart requires patience, gentleness, and meticulous care.

Each fragment of trust, hope, and love must be rediscovered and reattached with tender precision. Rushing this intricate emotional restoration only risks further damage.

Instead, honor the journey of rebuilding, allowing each moment of healing to settle and strengthen. For it is in this gradual reconstruction that a heart not only mends but often emerges more resilient and beautiful than before.

~ Etheric Echoes, Etheric Echoes

~ Art by Freydoon Rassouli

20/04/2024

*Reemergence*

Shocked, frozen in time,
Flat, numb, grey, lacking in life,
Now, awakening.

09/04/2024

Research showing the mental and physical health benefits of touch

More consensual touch helps ease or buffer against mental and physical complaints, meta-analysis shows

31/12/2023

You are a lot 🧡

On the stroke of midnight tonight ~

#2024

31/12/2023

Welcome it all; all parts are sacred 🧡 ~ from

Do not reject a sense of rejection,
or abandon a feeling of abandonment.

Do not resist your resistance,
or run away from the urge to run away.

Do not make sadness sad by leaving it,
or enrage anger by disconnecting,
or make loneliness more lonely by pushing it away.

Hold the broken heart with as much love as the happy heart,
never lose the sense of being lost,
and do not doubt the presence of doubt.

Do not fear fear,
or desire the absence of desire,
or worry about worry.
(And if you do, don’t worry).

All parts of you are sacred,
the light and the dark alike;
all are worthy, deserving of unconditional love.

-

12/11/2023

There is a pleasure
in the pathless woods,
There is a rapture on
the lonely shore,
There is society where
none intrudes, By the deep
Sea, and music in its
roar: I love not Man the
less, but Nature more.

~ Lord Byron

What a pleasure it was to be with nature yesterday and all its autumnal hues.

Nine miles around the area of Ladybower and Derwent reservoirs. Starting in bright, warm sunshine at middday and ending by the light of my torch on my phone in the chilly darkness just after sunset.

On my own but not alone.

Rapture…

10/11/2023

There's a little girl
within me who still
thinks that if she's
quiet enough,that if
she behaves enough,
that if today, she's just
enough to be good
enough, that someone
will come back for her.
But the woman I've
grown into knows now,
no one is going back
for her, except me.

~ Tanya Markul

03/11/2023

Beautiful ☺️🧡🤗

be soft with your sorrow.
let her crawl into your lap
and embrace her gently

she needs strength
to become courage

so hold her close,
stroke her back,
and she will leave compassion
with you
when she goes

~ Jen Brady

29/10/2023

“Instead of trying to toughen up and develop thicker skin, she decided to create boundaries that honor her soft courage and sensitivity.”

~ healing meme therapy
(Art - Pekka Halonen)

22/10/2023

“When speaking to your body,
you do not
have to jump to
I love you.

I feel you.
I respect you.
And I am
learning
to love you
is an acceptable place
to start.”

~ .e.bowman.poetry

When living in a body that experiences pain and feels all the feelings very strongly, it can be hard to appreciate that body.

People who experience chronic pain and fatigue among other difficult sensations often tell me they think their body is letting them down and failing them.

How can they love what is so uncomfortable and distressing?

Our bodies, as I have come to appreciate more and more, hold such great wisdom and when we are able to tune into them and acknowledge the pain, the pain often quietens and even subsides, and perhaps unbelievably when we’re in the thick of it, goes away altogether.

So, loving your body may be a step too far to begin with.

But can you perhaps start to talk to it in the way of the lovely words of .e.bowman.poetry?