I'm Done! But, still stretching!

I just completed my last project and class last night!!!  I feel a lot of weight lifted off of my shoulders now that this counseling degree is finished.  I didn't feel this way after my bachelor's degree because I was already enrolled in graduate school and I didn't experience relief after the M.Div. because I was still taking courses for the counseling degree.  I defintely didn't feel this way after high school because I was still like a disoriented looking chicken cracking out of the egg shell.  But, at the age of 34, it's like I am finally an adult now and I can move on with life in the real world.  But my desire to grow is still strong.  Experiencing an achievement or goal doesn't mean as much if I can't defend it or continue to live out that success. Leadership guru, John Maxwell, said, “Success is due to our stretching to the challenges of life. Failure comes when we shrink from them.”     
     
My last course was in Test and Measures and my class had to take a battery of tests to gain the experience of administering, scoring, and interpreting tests so that we can make better assessments when we are in a therapist position.  One of the common patterns that surfaced in my tests was anxiety.  This has been a tough year with some experiences positive and some negative, but all causing stress (a lot of material for stretching) with moving into a new home, having an adorable healthy baby boy, working an internship and a full-time job (days and nights), troubles with our rental in Kansas, and finding time to spend with family and friends.  Even though I have a great wife and awesome/squirly boys at home, raising a family brings its own kind of stress as well.

I look forward to having a more balanced life; though, I haven't experienced what that's like without being enrolled in class since I was four (save for a year in-between HS and college).  Am I going to fill the void with something else and continue to manage a high level of stress/anxiety or am I going to relax for a period of time?  What is life like without having deadlines to complete projects, papers, and other assignments alongside all the other demands/opportunities in life?
I enjoy the product of what God has blessed me with; can't wait to see what else is going to stretch me!

Success is best achieved in community.  Thank you- Family, friends, professors, and colleagues that have spotted me on some of these life stretches!  Honorable mention- My wife, Shanda!    

Tony Nichols

 --I find joy in helping other's experience hope and peace in their life. 

Combating Depression

Combating Depression

Feeling alone during the holidays can easily trigger one's depression.  When this happens the individual can begin producing self-defeating thoughts (i.e., I don't want to get out of bed.  I don't want to hang out with family.  These people don't want me around anyway.)  A person in this state may not need a new family but perhaps just some help developing healthier thinking patterns.

Cognitive Behavior Therapy is a therapeutic technique used to help the client combat irrational thinking and develop new skills.  Once the CBT technique is learned, one can also utilize its principles at home.  If you have depression you may not need a life long battle in therapy but just sixteen sessions or so to learn the technique for yourself.  If a person is struggling with low self-esteem he might be experiencing negative thoughts about his/her abilities and/or appearance, Due to these negative thinking patterns someone may pass up a promotion at work or avoid social situations with friends.

Challenge: Exercise with others

In order to relieve the client of these destructive thinking patterns, the therapist helps the client identify the problematic beliefs. This stage of the therapy is called functional analysis, which helps with learning how feelings, thoughts, or situations can contribute to maladaptive behaviors. This can be extremely difficult for clients that typically refuse to look introspectively.  The difficulty is exacerbated by not only asking the client to look deeper into situations differently, but when the client's mind is obsessing about one particular perspective (aka: tunnel vision).

The next part of CBT focuses on the maladaptive behaviors. Through psycho-education the client begins to learn new ways to manage his/her emotions in a healthy manner. If a person is struggling with depression there might be a chance that he/she is compounding the problem by self-medicating with alcohol or other drugs. This would be the step when the client practices new coping skills to use in real world situations to avoid a relapse or digging deeper into depression. The client would point out anxiety-provoking situations and then practice those social situations with the new skills.

The goal of CBT is to help a client gradually change his/her behaviors over time to produce a more healthy lifestyle, whether it is better managing emotions or developing healthier relationships.  Homework may be used in CBT such as exercise (to release those feel good endorphin's) or socializing with others that you may not engage with otherwise, as practice.

Practice makes perfect!

Tony Nichols

--I find joy in helping other's experience hope and peace in their life.         

Financial Principles

6 Financial Principles to Loaning Money

           If the bank loans someone money with horrible credit and the person does not pay back the money to the bank, then it's the banks fault for taking the risk.  On a more personal note, you aren't helping someone if you are loaning him money and he has bad credit.  You are setting him up to fail.  If you want to help him, teach him to better manage the resources that he has.  Two, it's always better to give a gift, with no strings attached, then to give or borrow money expecting something in return.  Three, if you have work for them, let them earn the money.  Four, don't let loaning money get in the way of a relationship.  It's better to say "no," then for the relationship to become strained because he can't pay you back.  Five, if you do trust the person borrowing money from you, have clear expectations for paying it back.  Talk about what the person should do, in advance, if he can't pay it all back.  Six, if a person does not pay you back, do not let them borrow more money in the future. 
        Money can cause a lot of tension with family and friends & partners in businesses; manage those transactions wisely to maintain healthy relationships.  Check out these statistics:

• 57% of people said they have seen a friendship or relationship ruined because one person didn't  pay back the other
• Almost 50% have loaned $100 or more to help out someone, but 55% don't get repaid.
• 71% lend money to immediate family members, 57% to relatives, and 54% to friends. Dave Ramsey on lending money

By: Tony Nichols