Aaron Swartz

ARE YOU STRUGGLING?....with Stress, Anger, Relationship Issues, Addiction, Bereavement and/or Depression, Affairs and Betrayals?
Does it feel like life is getting on top of you?
Could you benefit from a place to take some time-out?
... to explore your thoughts and feelings
... to get back on track again?

My name is Aaron and I am a practising Buddhist and Adult & Child Counsellor & Psychotherapist, Somatic Experiencer (SEP) & Comprehensive Resource Model (CRM)
I have been seeing children, young people and adults in Brighton, Hove & Lewes for the past 8 years. I am committed to providing Counselling, Psychotherapy & Somatic Experiencing in a safe, confidential and non-judgemental environment.

I am also a Couple Counsellor and and offer a safe space for couples to work through their relationship issues.
(Please see my Couple Counselling section below)

I offer the opportunity to talk about your thoughts and feelings in a safe and confidential setting. I provide face-to-face, individual counselling to anyone experiencing a range of emotional issues, with the aim of enabling you to gain self-awareness and to live more fully.  

I know choosing a Counsellor, Psychotherapist or Somatic Experiencer, is not easy. You need to find someone you can trust. The first session is an opportunity for you to see if I'm right for you.

I'm experienced in helping clients who have experienced difficulties with:

• Stress
• Couples Counselling
• Relationship issues
• Panic Attacks
• Affairs and Betrayals
• Anger
• Porn Addiction
• Anxiety
• Bereavement
• Redundancy
• Depression, and
• Addiction.
• Relationship issues, Sexuality and Intimacy
• Death, Dying, Illness and Suicide

• Loss of meaning or direction

HOW THERAPY CAN HELP
Counselling and psychotherapy provides an ongoing opportunity to explore your thoughts and feelings, face-to-face and confidentially, with an experienced therapist who will listen and think with you as you work through your difficulties.

The therapist is not there to give advice or make decisions for you, but to help you find and overcome the stumbling blocks that keep you from living a more satisfying life. Therapy is a safe place to reflect on how you respond to life events and how you relate to yourself and others.

Whether you want to discuss past experiences, concerns about the future, or issues with the way you are living right now, therapy is a route to greater self-awareness and reaching your potential.

SOMATIC EXPERIENCING

I am also a Somatic Experiencer (SEP). This is a powerful body based 'talking therapy', capable of relieving physical, emotional and psychological shock, stress and trauma.​​ Somatic Experiencing® teaches simple, powerful strategies that mobilise the body's innate self-healing systems - the same physiological processes that mend broken bones and fight disease.

Knowledge of trauma's patterns can help ease traumatic reactions as well as potentially prevent symptoms developing after an overwhelming event. Practising SE can be a significant support not just in your own life but to those around you.

COUPLE COUNSELLING

Have you relationship issues ? Is your relationship struggling? Are you fighting, bickering and arguing all the time?
Or maybe you have lost the closeness, love and intimacy, you once had.

Are you longing to ‘get back on track’ and find the love again?
Is your relationship ‘just ticking over, with no juiciness and excitement.
Or maybe you have met someone, and this has impacted on your relationship.

Couple Counselling can help. Let me support you.

I offer a safe, non judgmental space to explore the relationship issues issues that you are both struggling with. A space where you can ‘let your hair down’ and be your self. Where you can get the love you so want.

I have supported many couples in getting their needs met.

Many of the top relationship experts believe that we are attracted to another in order to heal some aspect of our self. We are often attracted to someone who displays some of the worst aspects of our original caregivers.

Usually our first model of relationship came from our original caregivers when we were young. This became our relationship model for love. Healthy of unhealthy, it has impacted on us in our current relationships. We often tend to seek out another that often mirrors that relationship. This is this done unconsciously.

Couple Counselling is an opportunity to begin to explore these relationship patterns and heal them.

I provide a safe space to begin to slow down and see what is going on. A space to slowly build the trust to be able to be vulnerable with each other and heal ones self and the relationship. Over time, the couple can begin to re-build their relationship and re-discover the love they so want.

Often couples come to me when they have reached a dead end and have got stuck.
Communication skills have broken down and the love they once had seems to have vanished.

I have spent that last 20 years exploring, understanding and working on relationship issues.
I have worked with Jewels Wingfield. and Jan Day, two of the top conscious relationship trainers in the country. I bring my experience, wisdom and skills to help support you in healing your relationship.

I use the work & techniques of Dr Sue Johnson (“Hold me Tight”) and Harville Hendrick ( “Finding the Love you Want” ) .
Both of these books are essential reading, to understanding relationship issues healing you relationship.

The journey of relationship is one of the most important challenges in our life.

We need support & wisdom to make it work.

I can support you.

TESTIMONIALS

'Aaron provided a safe and calm environment for me to relax and find peace within myself from past trauma. I am grateful for his mindfulness and attentiveness that helped me find a deeper sense of peace and inner mastery that I can take with myself into the future. The time we worked together was extremely beneficial and I am sincerely grateful for his help'

30 year old Male

'Thank you for helping and supporting me through a very turbulent and difficult time in my life. Time spent working with you was so very valuable and essential to me regaining the control of my life and rebuilding confidence'

28 year old Male

'I am delighted with the outcome of therapy ; some of the sessions have been difficult but in the end I am genuinely more at peace with the world.'58 year old Male

'The atmosphere was always peaceful, calm and safe. Aaron was open minded. I felt I could really express myself. I began to realise what I had to change to progress into the future.'

19 year old female

'I wanted to take another opportunity to express my thanks, Aaron. Thanks for your warmth and support. Thanks for gentle guidance whenever it was necessary and thanks for just letting me be when that was appropriate, too!'

43 year old male

'Thanks Aaron for helping me to manage to sort out the disputes I was having with my family and the difficult I was having controlling my anger.'

20 year old male

'Aaron is an exceptional counsellor & psychotherapist who is providing adults the opportunity to recognise and reflect on the many troubles and sorrows they have experienced. His calm persistence in supporting them gives them the chance to revisit and reassess their responses to major events in their lives so that they can face the future and build better lives for themselves.'

Brenda Figg-Wild MA
Pupil Support Co-ordinator.
Whitehawk Primary School

'Aaron is a warm and grounded counsellor & psychotherapist, competent in providing a safe and nurturing environment in which to explore a wide range of issues.'

K Hillkirk - Parent

Mens & Young Men Issues:

I also have many years of working with young men and men and understand the struggles they go through, especially Anger and Depression. I am a member of A Band of Brothers, a charity established by men committed to positive social change through personal development and community building. We mentor young men who have had challenges with drugs, violence, anger and self esteem.

For a confidential chat please ring me on
07768 762 123.

Cost:
As a way of making this service available to more people I have introduced sliding scale payment options. You choose which rate to pay based on your circumstances. If your on a low income, student or other circumstances, please get in touch, as I sometimes have concessionary slots available.
​
Full rate: £80.For incomes above £ 50,000
​
Middle rate: £60. For incomes less than £50,000
​
Lower rate: £50.For incomes less than £40,000

Couple  Counselling Fees:

Full rate: £120 . For incomes above £ 50,000
​
Middle rate: £90 For incomes less than £50,000
​
Lower rate: £80.  For incomes less than £40,000

INTEGRATIVE ARTS PSYCHOTHERAPY

Although I use a combination of different therapeutic models including Transactional Analysis, Gestalt, and Jungian Theory, I can also use the Arts as a way of helping clients to express difficult and buried emotions.
Using words is always a good place to start in Counselling & Psychotherapy, but sometimes the issues we wish to look at lie in the unconscious, and the use of language maybe insufficient into delving into the depths of the problem.

By using the Arts we can 'fast track' our way into the unconscious and get right to the heart of the problem. Not only does one get surprising results, but it also can be a deeply satisfying and rich process. Yes, Therapy can be fun !!!! Each individual must go at their own pace and sometimes using the arts is not always appropriate, but my experience with clients, has been that over time, having built up trust, using the Arts has can be a very powerful way to discover new parts of ones self that would otherwise be buried.

Both Children and Adults can benefit from working with the Arts.
The Art forms I may use could be: Painting, Sand tray, Music, Clay, Music, Dance and Drawing. Each person will find the art form that resonates with them deeply.

Below are some videos and articles about how Art therapy can be used in the the Therapeutic process:

An Unlikely form of therapy

The Benefits of Art Therapy

How Art Therapy has Helped Me