Are you the person that everyone turns to when they need to vent and offload what is bothering them? Maybe they share personal problems and other juicy gossip with you? After a while, it is understandable that you can start to feel overwhelmed, stressed, and like you have the weight of the world on your shoulders.
After all, you are carrying around secrets, personal information, and other such tidbits of information that others have shared with you in confidence. This leaves you with no meaningful outlet for you to share and get things “off your chest,” so to speak. You can’t easily turn to another friend and offload onto them and tell them all the private information you promised not to share, can you?
This would be breaking the trust of those that confided in you, to begin with. If things got back around, which they always seem to have a way of doing, not only could they feel embarrassed, but also angered, outraged, and betrayed because you broke your promise to keep their information private and to yourself.
Fortunately, you don’t have to keep everything in and to yourself when you have your own personal counsellor to talk to. Individual counselling is a great way for you to offload all that information you are carrying around. You don’t have to worry about it getting back to the people that confided in you either!
Your counselling sessions are personal, private, and confidential. They are also judgment-free, so whatever you say that is positive or negative about the others confiding in you is between you and your counsellor.
Best of all, you have someone that is there to listen to you when you need to talk about other things too. For instance, you have a child who has recently started puberty and has become a “rebellious” teenager. You might want to talk about your career and future goals and objectives. You could even discuss relationship issues and concerns.
As a confidant, you already know the best way to help your friends that confide in you is to simply listen. You don’t want to give advice or tell them what to do, because if it doesn’t go as planned, you don’t want to be blamed. Rather, you know to ask probing questions to help them figure out on their own what to do or how to address a particular situation.
Your counsellor will also guide you in a similar manner by asking probing questions and helping guide you to the answers you seek. Plus, you can apply the techniques used during your counselling sessions to the times your friends confide in you.
If you need someone to confide in or have other issues you want to discuss in confidence with a counsellor in Toronto and the GTA, please feel free to contact me, Ellen Starr by calling 416-488-3102 today! I have over 27 years counselling experience helping individuals and couples with a wide range of issues and offer virtual and in-office sessions.
