Tips for Choosing the Right Topic for Mental Health Counseling

Tips for Choosing the Right Topic for Mental Health CounselingThe topics on which a conversation about mental health or eating disorders should take place are pretty well established. This can be pretty useful in helping clients to choose the appropriate conversation starter. So, which of the topics do you think will be a good topic to discuss with your client?The first step is to ask yourself a relevant question. How much do you want to change your life? How many years would it take you to completely change? This gives you a starting point to judge the potential impact that you have with this topic.Then, decide what level of improvement you are likely to achieve. For instance, are you willing to improve by 10 points in a month? Or, are you likely to have a big improvement in a year? If you are interested in big improvements then you should probably use 'big improvements' as your topic. On the other hand, if you are more comfortable making smaller changes you may choose the 'small im provements' option.There are many common themes when discussing these issues. A number of them include self-acceptance, honesty, and respect for oneself and others. Other topics may include ideas about motivation, relationships, health, and weight loss, among others.The great thing about talking about these topics is that they often involve such basic conversation topics as fear, confidence, and doubt. As you look over the possible topics you should try to identify the type of clients you have and the emotions they are likely to be feeling. Your conversation will be much more successful if it includes topics that are not emotionally charged. Try to avoid discussing fear, doubt, and thoughts of failure.When discussing topics that involve emotional components, it is also very important to make sure that the topic is comfortable and that you are not judging the clients on their actions. Don't be surprised if some people won't want to talk about things like depression, but others do. By asking the right questions you will be able to find out the real reasons for why these issues occur and help them make the necessary changes to feel better.Once you have gathered all of the important information you need, it is time to start writing up your ideas. Make sure that you have all of the information that you need to write an effective script so that you can come up with an outline that is persuasive. A number of clients may ask you to produce a script before the conversation.Do not worry about the perfection of the script, as long as you can come up with an outline that is a good fit for the topic at hand. In fact, writing a script that is not for the right reason may result in a false sense of security. After all, that's why you started the conversation!