Spiritual Psychotherapy – Counseling for Mental Health

This course is useful for Counselors & Therapists who would like to integrate Spirituality into their practice

About Instructor:

Aman Varma has undergone accredited course training in CBT practitioner, Diploma in Hypnotherapy, Mental Health Practitioner, NLP Specialist Practitioner, Diploma in Psychological Counseling and Diploma in Modern Applied Psychology.

Yoga is not only physical exercise or posture. There is a whole psychological basis to it. This course is not about learning how to do different poses of yoga. This course is about learning how to take care of your mental health and live an emotionally charged life. If you are unfamiliar with the concept of yoga or assume it is about physical exercise please know it is more than that. This is a course on psychology.

In this course, you will learn three yoga paths that are Karma Yoga, Bhakti Yoga, Raja Yoga. Everything from basic understanding, core principles, and methods of practice will be included in this course. Along with the videos you will be able to do download mp3 files of all lectures. Below is the basic understanding of what these three yoga paths are.

1. Karma Counseling – the yoga/psychology of action and selfless service

Clients having problems of depression, anxiety, etc with regards to the Work and Career area can benefit tremendously from this skill.

This resonates most with those who are community-based and of an outgoing nature. Karma yoga purifies the heart and burns away selfish tendencies by encouraging a detachment from the fruits of actions. In this way, there is no expectation of personal gain or recognition. All actions are done with a focus on Oneness, therefore establishing a connection with the True Self. Mother Theresa is an example of a well-known karma yogi.

2. Bhakti Counseling – the yoga/psychology of devotion and love

Clients having problems of depression, anxiety, etc with regards to managing emotions, self-image and relationships area can benefit tremendously from this skill.

According to this path, a lack of faith in the Divine or Sacred Essence has caused us to lose connection to our Divine Self. The solution, therefore, is love, surrender, and devotion to the Divine qualities in everything. Bhakti Yoga asks us to purify and transform our egotistic self-love by focusing the mind on sacred thoughts and transferring all our love and emotions into the Divine essence that permeates all. Examples of Bhakti Yoga are chanting and devotional rituals. This path resonates most with those of an emotional nature.

3. Rāja Counseling – the practice of meditation

Clients having problems that arise due to agitation of mind, stressful lifestyle and more complex problems such as PTSD, Suicidal Thinking, ADHD, etc can benefit tremendously from this skill.

The restlessness of the mind has caused our attention to become carried away in stories and disconnected from our True Essence, according to this path. The solution, then, is to calm the mind through meditation in order to reveal the Oneness that we are in our truest essence. This is done via the Ashtanga (8 limbs) system, as outlined by Patañjali in the Raja Yoga Sutras. Most yoga classes in today’s society are steeped in the Raja Yoga path. This path is most suited for those with a nature that resonates with method-based practice.

4. Spirituality for Emotional Freedom

In this section, you will learn the core spiritual teachings that will help you overcome your problems in life. This course is divided into 4 lectures

1: Root of all sufferings

2: The ultimate solution to eradicate all suffering

3: Troubleshooting problems on the path

4: Desirelessness

In each lecture, we will look at the scientific reasons for our problems and scientific solutions to overcome our sufferings. “Suffering” is an umbrella term for all pains we experience because of our mind, body and world. The suffering includes common problems such as anger, jealousy, low self-esteem to major problems such as depression, suicidal tendencies, anxiety and other kinds.

There are many practices and principles that you will learn in this course, which covers a significant amount of teachings from Vedanta, Swami Vivekananda and Bhagavad Gita. All the yoga paths are based on Hinduism, however, these principles are more about love, mindset and humanity rather than religion. Therefore, they can be practised by anyone regardless of their age, gender, experience, and religious choice.

Counsellors and Mental Health professionals can use these philosophies and practices for their clients along with the regular counselling of CBT or any other therapy.