Link: Anti-Racism Resources – Tara Branch
Resource Directory for Facing, Feeling, Understanding and Responding to the Suffering of Racism.
Lead: Versatile Activities with Paper
All you need is some blank paper for these 5 group activities! The Middle School Counselor wrote this article for the school counseling blog, Confident Counselors, back in 2017 to share her creative ideas for when time or funds (or both) are scarce. 1, 2, 3 Blast Away Anxiety When I have students…
Lead: Progressive Group Drawing
Creative expression group activity where everyone gets a turn adding one thing that each person must add to their own picture. For example, “a house” or “a red shape”. After everyone has had a chance to suggest something, group members can share and process the activity. Discussion can include perspective-taking, communication, resistance to ideas, acceptance, listening, social relationships, etc.
Learn: Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction (MBSR) Online
Free 8-week Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction Online Training by Dave Potter. MBSR is a blend of meditation, body awareness, and yoga: it’s learning practice and study how your body handles (and can resolve) stress neurologically.
Exercise: Defining Sobriety
Awareness and insight increase motivation to change and allow us to develop personally meaningful plans of action. This writing exercise is about sitting down to define what “sobriety” or stopping a destructive habit fully looks like in your life. What behaviors move you towards relapse and which ones move you away from that destruction?
Download: Coping Skill Lists Collection
Free printable handouts for various populations. Distress tolerance lists from DBT packets, fun distracting activities lists, self-care ideas, ideas for coping with hallucinations, and then of course, the straightforward kid laying out the good choices and the poor choices. We did not make any of these but they were found free of charge so we’re passing them on to you.
Advice on which Mobile Apps to Use & Recommend
One Mind PsyberGuide aims to help people use technology to live a mentally healthier life. Through rigorous evaluation of technology and promotion of scientific best practices, we seek to guide the science, practice, development, and use of digital mental health tools in various settings. We hope to improve access to mental health resources to those who lack access to traditional support, and to help people explore how technology can be used to improve wellbeing.
Read: The Importance of Being Funny
Joke-telling can act as both a sword and a shield to defend us from reality. As the late, great stand-up comic Joan Rivers put it: ‘If you can laugh at it, you can live with it!’ This book is for anyone who enjoys a good laugh, but also wants to know why.
The shoe that fits one person pinches another; there is no one recipe for living that suits all cases.
Website: Prepare for an Upcoming Medical Appt.
Doc Ready is a digital tool that helps people to prepare and make the most out of mental health related doctor visits. It helps people to know what to expect during a doctor consultation, plan what to say and record the outcomes of their appointments.
Intolerance of Uncertainty: Help Clients Embrace the Unknown with Behavioral Experiments
Intolerance of uncertainty is an important transdiagnostic risk factor for a wide range of difficulties including generalized anxiety disorder (GAD), obsessive compulsive disorder (OCD), depression, and eating disorders. Recent developments in the way that intolerance of uncertainty is conceptualized have led to a novel way to work with it – with the potential for…
Taking the Escalator: Comprehensive SUD Resource Collection
Taking the Escalator has everything from full group guides, to printable client worksheets and handouts, to a comprehensive SUD treatment model that they describe in detailed PDFs. The website also boasts links to a plethora of other resources targeting mental health and substance abuse topics as well as counselor development and group dynamics.
How to Write Your Life Manifesto & Why It Will Change Your Life
As we walk through life, it is easy to drift off towards everything and anything that calls for our attention. It can be challenging to keep our energy where it is most needed. We can easily get distracted and side-tracked in life. That’s why writing a personal life manifesto is so important. It’s like anchoring…
Fear in a Hat
Expressing Fear Anonymously in Group Set-up this activity with a sincere tone to really get the most out of it. You can keep it superficial or take it as deep as you’re wanting to go, with fear or regret or embarrassment, etc. Finish the phrase, “In this trip/group/program, I have a fear that…” on a piece…