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Ali Harris Therapy & Co

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Ali Harris Therapy & Co

We help people who are struggling with their mental health to feel better

11/01/2026

Surviving the excesses of your heart & mind is a tricky business! Overthinking tries to use pure logic to understand the self and others. As a result, your thoughts go round and round, seeking a conclusion. It should work, right? But it doesn’t and thoughts tend to just spin endlessly, like an infinite wash cycle. Why? Probably because thinking isn’t feeling and the logical approach seeks to suppress feelings and trust in figuring things out without allowing emotions into the mix.

And then there’s the heart-led approach - feeling everything intensely but then living in a permanent state of conflicted overwhelm as a result. When you feel everything without subjecting those feelings to your critical faculties, you can wind up believing that every feeling is true and that can be very scary! It’s normal to have a lot of conflicting feelings but if you’re depending on those alone to help you navigate your life you’re going to feel pretty wrung out and stuck, because feelings can often produce so much ambivalence that it can be very hard to work out what to do!!

So, what’s the answer then?

I reckon it’s learning to calm the heart and the mind by giving equal time and weight to BOTH. Instead of allowing one to dominate the other, you can achieve balance by listening to your heart - feeling and then VALIDATING every emotion first; then engaging your brain and recognising that while valid, not every feeling is a fact or worth acting on. Reality-testing your feelings, (post-validation,) helps you to balance out and weigh up emotional responses without getting swept away in an emotional tide.

You can learn to do this on your own - but it’s often a bit difficult alone. Most of us benefit from help in this area, at least at first.

Therapy can be a great place to learn how to balance the demands of heart and mind. You have access to a person who cares about how you feel (and won’t dismiss those feelings, or let you dismiss them either!) but will also gently encourage you to explore those feelings and under-pin them with logic and reason. What eventually emerges is a balanced approach, which is emotionally informed and realistic too - the holy grail in internal processing.

It’s not always an easy thing to do but stick stuck at it and you’ll get there xx

Art:

10/01/2026

‘When I was a boy and I would see scary things in the news, my mother would say to me, "Look for the helpers. You will always find people who are helping.”’

I love this quote, by Fred Rogers, as a way to comfort children when scary sh*t is happening and they need reassurance. BUT I’d like to add to it for the adults - look for the helpers, yes, but then JOIN them - in small ways or large ways, from tiny micro-push-backs against hatred, to medium-sized acts of service, right up to in-your-face acts for positive change.

However you go about it, whether you donate time, energy, money, a smile or a kind word - please do continue to refuse to let all of the dystopian bullsh*t break your spirit.

Art: Katie Abey

09/01/2026

Tell me about the music that has pulled you through a dark time! Which artists or songs or genres feed your soul? Sometimes it can feel like music really can save your life - keep you hanging in there when things are tough… music regularly comforts, affirms and inspires me, esp when other support isn’t available.

Kae Tempest ‘s work has been particularly important to me over the last 7 years, but I have a long list of favourites that started with Clannad Irish Band & Enya when I was a kid, and included (and still includes,) Tori Amos, DeadcanDance, U2, The Beatles and a bunch of others.

Who’s kept you going?
Which songs do you return to?
😊

Art: Wild Woman Magic

08/01/2026

I know it’s REALLY hard to be a beginner at ANYTHING, especially something that SHOULD, in theory, feel simple - like setting boundaries, dealing with conflict, articulating your own feelings etc. - without feeling overwhelmed by apologetic shame and embarrassment. It’s very common though.

I’d say I don’t know why we apologise for sucking at things we haven’t been supported to learn - but that wouldn’t be true. The school experience is, for some reason, set up to value the capacity to pick up a skill quickly & easily, even though most of us don’t. Those who can are praised & made much of - the system is set up to laud & promote them, whereas those who can’t learn so fast are treated as less than - sometimes tacitly, sometimes overtly but the message is always received - be better, be faster, hurry up. Schools churn out young adults used to being controlled through the application of carrot and stick - reward and shame.

It’s a pity.
And it’s stupid.

Because in real life you learn best by doing something over & over - poorly at first, with encouragement & support, without judgement or assessment. Skills need to be patiently modelled. Your efforts should be applauded & your mistakes framed as normal & as the best way to learn (which they are.) You become better by degrees. And then, if you can keep practicing…mastery comes.

So, when you struggle to set a boundary, when you backslide into arguing with someone who is clearly committed to misunderstanding you, when you lose your temper when you should have calmly walked away, when you are tempted to beat yourself up for being at the early stages of learning to regulate your feelings & keep yourself emotionally safe and healthy, please remember that it takes time to grow. You don’t have to be perfect. You just need to keep showing up, doing your best, observing & validating your own feelings, looking for and taking up offers of support and kindly side-stepping people who present obstacles to creating the life you want.

Please extend grace to yourself, allow yourself to make mistakes so that you can LEARN from them.

You’re going to figure this stuff out.
You WILL get better.

Art: Please DM for credit

07/01/2026

Just because you THINK something or FEEL something it doesn’t mean that’s it’s REAL or TRUE. *** Read that again!!*** The voices and scenarios that run in your head are, more often than not, merely amalgamations of the things you have heard and seen; the more you hear and see a concept or situation, the more deeply embedded it is in your psyche and the more likely you are to accept it as true. It’s not necessarily representative of you or of the objective truth. It’s a bit like the power of advertising - if it’s shoved down your throat enough, eventually you WILL accept it. This is DANGEROUS…

If you act like everything you think or feel is true, you will cause MASSIVE problems in your brain case. The solution is to learn to NOTICE what’s going on in your head and cultivate your critical faculties - learn to question & ‘push back’ on unhelpful thoughts. Also it’s useful to develop the capacity to not to get overly attached to your feelings - simply OBSERVE and EXPERIENCE them.

If you want to stay mentally balanced and well, you really CAN’T just let any old thought or emotion that comes traipsing along hold sway, not without at least subjecting it to some scrutiny at your internal emotional check points:

- Is this objectively true?
- Where does this idea come from?
- Is it helpful?
- Is this worth dwelling on?
- if it’s not, how did this get in here?
- And how can I think about this more helpfully going forward?

Familiar, oft-repeated thoughts and anxieties are quick as fishes - hard to grasp - they’re so slippery and quick. But with practice you CAN grab them, examine them and, where necessary, throw them back into the seas outside your mind.

And in this way you will begin to learn how to stop creating problems in your head.

###

Art: Threadless

06/01/2026

You can’t make people choose you.
But you CAN choose yourself.
No begging for inclusion.
No repeated sucking up non-reciprocal, self-centered behaviour.
No going above and beyond for people who barely lift a finger for you.

If they wanted you, they’d be with you.
Turn down the volume on their words, their excuses, their hot air.
Focus on their actions (or their lack of same.)

That’s your answer.

Center yourself.
Re-orient your attention to finding people you enjoy, who clearly enjoy you right back.

Better, huh?

I LOVE that for you xx

Art: ebrulillustrates ebrulillustrates

05/01/2026

Oh, if only Alexa COULD take down the Xmas decorations (and better yet, put them up in the first place! 😆) Well, Christmas is well and truly over, the fever dream of Twixtmas, too, has departed, I’m out of cheese, there’s no more mince pies & Easter eggs are in the shops already 🙄 so, here we are freezing our asses off in a brand new year!

Truth be told, I’m SO ready to get back to work (that’s lucky, isn’t it!) and I’m looking forward to checking in with my current clients (and to getting started with some new ones too!!)

How ever you feel about this day, this week, this new year (whether it feels happy or not,) I wish you well and I am sending you warming vibes - let’s do this!! 🙌

###

Art: Rosie Made A Thing

04/01/2026

"Being aware of your cra*p and actually overcoming your cr*p are two very different things." So says Grey’s Anatomy’s Christina Yang, and I could not agree more.

Insight is useful - essential, even - but often the heart cannot process at the same rate as the intellect. Perhaps that’s why there are so many things that we *know* to be true yet they somehow fail to resonate (at least at first.)

We all know, for example, that it’s the thought that counts, that it’s what’s on the inside that counts, that Rome wasn’t built in a day and that honesty is (usually) the best policy, but these truths don’t always feel super useful.

If you can find a space - like therapy - where you can be supported to allow your heart to catch up to your head, you might find that elusive resonance after all.

But that will take a little while, so in the interim please remember that it’s ok ‘if your heart needs more time to accept what your head already knows.’

You can’t force emotional growth… but you CAN encourage it, and if you do, it will come.
Little by little.

Art:

03/01/2026

I’m really enjoying NOT trying to turn over a new leaf at the turn of the year. I’ve been doing that (or not doing that,) for a few years now and it’s not getting old. Sinking into self-acceptance feels good; gently chipping away at bad habits over time (without shame,) continues to be satisfying, and abandoning the desire to become some other ‘perfect’ person is still working for me.

This wasn’t always so.

I’ve careened from one ‘quick-fix’ to the next, desperate to find ‘the solution’ and be ‘transformed’ overnight.

Spoiler alert: That approach did not yield anything good.

But learning to take things slowly, & accept what is, and work with that: what I am, what I have, how I feel, what I need… well, that came off MUCH better. It just took a while.

So, if you’re feeling crappy right now, I’m sorry. Life is really hard sometimes. Things can really suck. Please don’t give up. You’re doing your best. That will look different on different days.

But you CAN turn the tide - and if you need some support, you know where I am xx

Art: By Lainey Molnar

02/01/2026

“I wanted a perfect ending. Now I’ve learned, the hard way, that some poems don’t rhyme, and some stories don’t have a clear beginning, middle, and end. Life is about not knowing, having to change, taking the moment and making the best of it, without knowing what’s going to happen next.”

Words: Gilda Radner
Art: allyouneediswall

01/01/2026

This New Year’s Day I want to invite you to join me in letting go of people who have let go of you. I noticed lately that I have fallen into trying a bit too hard with certain relationships. Calling, suggesting, inviting despite a distinct lack of take-up and/or reciprocation. And I wondered why I have been doing that.

Normally I’m pretty good at matching people’s energy. If they step back, I’ll try a couple of times to engage them And if they aren’t up for it, no harm, no foul. I just step back and leave the ball in their court. For some reason I’ve lapsed in that practice. I’ve ended up chasing some people.

But here’s the thing.If they wanted to see me, talk to me etc., they would.

I can see them doing other stuff with other people. I don’t need to invent a story of either excuses for them or conspiracy story plots by them against me.

I choose to see it as for now, our stars are not aligned. There are plenty of other things I can be getting on with. And people who do make time and space for me.

And if/when those others find or choose time to renew our connection…Well, I expect that will be lovely. But right now, I choose to prioritise my peace.

And I choose to focus on what I have, rather than get lured to chase tantalising relationships that seem temptingly close but are actually firmly out of reach (for now)

Do you sometimes do this?
How do you gently reign yourself in?

Art: thetypewriterdaily

31/12/2025

Before you get sucked into trying to instantly transform your life in 2026, I want to remind you that lasting, positive change takes time. I know that’s not what you want to hear, but it’s true just the same. Everyone enters through the same narrow gate. Self-mastery is painful and demanding. With this in mind then, try not to dwell on the enormity of the task before you; not how long it will take, nor how arduous it will be because if you let your thoughts linger there, you will become overwhelmed and frozen in place.

Instead, break your goal down into teeny, bite-sized pieces, and nibble on them regularly…or just as often as you can….or at first, just when you remember…

Pause to enjoy each mini success, every micro-triumph, wring pleasure and self-validation from each one, and address your missteps tenderly; see if you can learn to see them as opportunities to refocus, readjust and try again, rather than as evidence of your weakness or proof of future failure.

You can do this.
With help.
You can do it.
Seek support.
Reach out.
One step.
Another.

You are not alone x

Art:

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London

Opening Hours

Monday	12pm - 9pm
Tuesday	12pm - 9pm
Wednesday	12pm - 9pm
Thursday	12pm - 9pm
Friday	12pm - 9pm
Saturday	1pm - 6pm
Sunday	12pm - 9pm

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+447488233750

Website

https://linktr.ee/aliharristherapy

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I offer warm, personal counselling & psychotherapy, specialising in depression, anxiety & bereavement, tailored to your individual needs & oriented to help you feel better.