Ed Lyon Therapy
Stress Management and Performance Coach
Thank you for visiting. My name is Ed Lyon, a therapist specialising in Anxiety Reduction, Stress Management and Phobias.
My approach is holistic and integrative. My primary modalities are Cognitive Behavioural Therapy, Compassion Focussed Therapy, Brainspotting Therapy and Hypnotherapy, all of which you can find out more about below. I also use Meditative Techniques, Lifeskills Counselling and Stress Management to build client resilience and confidence. I believe that Compassion and Confidentiality are the foundation of any successful therapeutic alliance.
CFT helps us to identify how our relationship with ourselves, others and the world can negatively affect our daily life experiences, and bring kindness and compassion to our aid. CBH is a fantastic tool for identifying and directly improving how we feel, act and think in the world, allowing us to live more confident, accepting and fulfilling lives in the present moment. Brainspotting is a treatment developed out of EMDR and uses specific points in our vision to help work through unprocessed memories through somatic attunement, emotional honesty and verbal reintegration.
Developed by the Psychologist Paul Gilbert, Compassion-focused therapy (CFT) aims to help promote mental and emotional healing by developing compassion in clients toward themselves and other people. Compassion, both toward the self and toward others, is an emotional response believed by many to be an essential aspect of well-being, and includes kindness, empathy, sympathy and courage. Its development may often have the benefit of improved mental and emotional health. Some of the main techniques are CBT, Developmental Psychology, Evolutionary Psychology, Neuroscience and Buddhist Philosophy.
Cognitive Behavioural Hypnotherapy (CBH) is a modern integrative method which combines highly effective talking therapy techniques, Cognitive Behavioural Therapy (CBT) and Clinical Hypnotherapy to bring about positive and lasting changes.
CBT is evidenced based and comprehensively researched and is a recommended therapy by NICE (the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence) for help in managing problems caused by stress and anxiety.
Brainspotting therapy is a type of alternative therapy that uses spots in a person's visual field to help them process trauma. It accesses trauma trapped in the subcortical brain, the area of the brain responsible for motion, consciousness, emotions, and learning. This type of therapy was discovered in 2003 by David Grand, PhD, as an advancement of his work in EMDR.
Brainspotting works on the theory that feelings from trauma can become stuck in the body, leading to both physical and mental ailments. It is believed that the brain's memory of a particular trauma or incident is “reset” in the body and brain through Brainspotting. It is one of a few types of emerging therapies focusing on the brain-body connection, including Somatic Experiencing and EMDR. Traditional talk therapy is known as a “top-down” therapy, essentially solving problems with the conscious mind. These brain-body therapies are known as “bottom up” therapy, which aims to release the physical stress in the body, thereby leading to release the emotional stress in the body as well. Brainspotting therapy works on the midbrain, which controls parts of the central nervous system that are responsible for processes such as vision, hearing, sleep, and motor control.
In our first session, we will investigate what the problems or aspects of your life are that you would like to change. We will examine our thought patterns and beliefs and how they affect us psychologically and physiologically. We will also determine realistic goals for change and a plan for enacting those changes.
In subsequent sessions, we will expand upon how and why we may have come to the situation that we are in and discover ways to change the direct experience of our lives to be more positive and fulfilling, building our resilience and life-skills in the process. We will also learn techniques to ease the physiological effects of anxiety and stress.
I may also use hypnosis to 'practise' or 'rehearse' new thought patterns and physical responses. Clinical hypnosis is a very successful way of treating a wide range of physical and psychological issues utilising deep relaxation and mental focus to foster change at a very deep level.