Julia Nussbaum

I am an experienced Psychotherapeutic Counsellor working face to face in Exeter and also online. I can support you with a broad range of issues and offer a safe, warm and  empathic space for you to explore whatever it is that brings you to seek support at this time. I particularly enjoy psychological and relational depth and bring this into my work when that is what is invited by you. We will always go at your own pace, and I will meet you where you are.

I am passionate about inner work, and completely committed to it within myself first and foremost so I come to our sessions with a deep awareness of myself and my own process, and so can journey deeply with others with safety and without judgement.

I am willing to accompany you to places old and new, dark and light, in acceptance of what you bring and where you are at.

Finding a Counsellor that you resonate with is so important when considering beginning a counselling relationship. The way in which client and counsellor relate to one another is fundamental to the work of counselling and how beneficial and healing it is.

Our first session would be an introductory session which would give you an opportunity to meet me, to explore some of what brings you to counselling to see how it feels for you, and if I am the right person for you to work with. 

Sessions would be weekly, usually at the same time each week (with flexibility when needed). Sessions are 1 hour.

Counselling is often sought when experiencing a crisis, depression, anxiety, a loss of some sort or relationship difficulties.

There are different levels of counselling. Short-term counselling can be helpful to address any number of issues and help find some balance when life feels unstable, chaotic, stressful or unmanageable. A weekly session can have a huge impact on your life, and enable you to find ways in which to deal with your particular circumstances and feel more energised, empowered and supported. Sometimes the extra support, to talk things through, express hurts or difficulties and to feel heard and understood is all that is needed.

Longer term counselling addresses deeper aspects of being and relating (although it doesn't have to). A few examples are;

• What makes me, Me? Or you, You
• How is my relationship with Myself?
• How do I relate to others and how has this been shaped?
• What impact does my way of relating have on my life and relationships?
• What influence does my family history/cultural context and society have on my current life choices and relationships?
• Am I choosing the kind of life I want, or am I being led by external expectations?
• How can I live a life that is true to myself?
• Who is my true self?

These are challenging inquiries, rather than questions with fixed answers.

This list is not a requisite for longer term work, but longer term work enables a depth of exploration that will put you in touch with this inner inquiry, and enable a shift in the way in which you navigate through life; beyond conditioned patterns and expectations from others towards a way of being and relating that feels true to You.

Counselling is hard to pin down. Hard to describe. There are as many differing ways that counselling can work as there are people on the planet or stars in the sky- its personal.

Below is a more in depth description of aspects of counselling and the way that I perceive it. Read it if you feel to, or better still, book an introductory session and come and meet me and decide from there!

“The curious paradox is that when I accept myself just as I am, then I can change.”
― Carl R. Rogers, On Becoming a Person: A Therapist's View of Psychotherapy

I have experience working therapeutically with primary age children in school, as well as 1 to 1 with adults of all ages. I trained within a Psycho-spiritual model and utilise a broad range of approaches depending on what you as a client want and how you work. I am client led but not passively. I bring a passion for depth and inner work and a compassion for the paradoxes of the human condition. I work relationally. I feel a therapeutic relationship is a powerful tool for gaining insight, self awareness and giving you more sense of your autonomy and ability to respond to your circumstances with a sense of choice rather than habit or conditioning.

I would describe my counselling style as warm and empathic. As a client who comes for counselling, you will feel you are in a safe space where you will be listened to, respected and honoured for who you are. The way that I approach counselling is largely Person Centred, although my training was eclectic including working with aspects of Psychosynthesis, Mindfulness and Transpersonal therapy. I trained within a psychospiritual framework which encompasses the whole being of a Person- Mind, Body, Spirit and Soul.

Carl Rogers (quoted above) was the founder of Person Centred counselling, which aspires to provide the conditions in which you can feel met, heard and accepted in a way that perhaps you haven't before.

I offer unconditional acceptance of where you are. Not to dismiss how hard or painful where you find yourself may be, but to enable a way to be with rather than struggle against whatever you are experiencing. I appreciate that mostly we just want the painful stuff to stop, and counselling does have an immediate effect in terms of feeling held, heard and supported, it also helps build resilience to bare what life brings to our door.

I bring myself into the counselling work. By that I mean I will be authentic in the way I meet you. I don't employ a particular technique or theory and apply it but rather view counselling as a space for two people to meet in a way that can enable intimacy and a therapeutic relationship to become possible. As trust develops the possibility for transformation becomes available.

There is no pressure from me to go anywhere you do not wish to go.

I feel I hold a space for both the light and the dark. There is something of my counselling style that provides warmth, nourishment, depth and patience.

A seed germinates in the dark, beneath the earth. The process of sprouting from seed form into something transformed requires a breaking, a cracking open before the new shoot continues its journey toward the sun.

A flower blooms and becomes a fragrant thing of beauty before dropping its petals which return to the earth. No one stage of this process is any more or less vital or desired than the other. They are an interdependent cycle. We too move in cycles, sometimes in bloom, sometimes in decay and everything else in between.

The aim of counselling is not just to bloom and become a thing of beauty, but to become aware of, accept and enrich all of that which creates life. I welcome all aspects of this cycle of creation.

Counselling can profoundly change the way you feel about yourself, how you treat yourself and thus how you experience your life.

I offer sessions on a sliding scale from £45-£60 per hour.