Vaughan Counsellors

Vaughan Counsellors Vaughan Counsellors provide psychotherapy and counselling to individuals in a safe and non-judgmenta

06/28/2026

This morning, when I was thinking about relationships between people and how we can make each other’s lives easier, I remembered one episode from my teenage years that influenced my life a lot.

It was during a family vacation, and I was walking on the beach. The area was mountainous, and I saw a steep cliff rising up. It was part of the shore that suddenly dropped down, but it looked like a rock that you could climb up.

Being a 15 or 16 year old teenager, I had a brilliant idea to climb that cliff. My parents were not around, and there was nobody to stop me. I quickly started climbing, and the process attracted me so much that I was completely focused on the here and now. I was not looking around. I was just climbing up.

The height was quite serious, and if I had fallen, I probably would not have survived. And even if I had survived, I would probably have spent at least a year in the hospital. But who was thinking about that at that moment? I was in the flow and thinking only about one thing: the pleasure of the process and reaching the goal.

But when maybe about 10 meters were left to the top, I got stuck. I simply could not find a stone where I could put my foot and move forward. I was hanging there on the cliff, and I could not move up or go back down, because it was already too high.

At that moment, I did not fully realize how dangerous the situation was, and I did not even have time to get scared. And then, when I was starting to understand that I was stuck, I saw a man who started climbing the same cliff to help me.

When he reached me, he silently gave me his hand. I leaned on it and was able to continue climbing. All of this happened without any words. He did not say even one word. He just continued climbing.

After that, I quickly and successfully reached the top and was safe.

But the most important thing that happened, I understood only years later.

Very often, when we help people, or our children, we blame them, criticize them, lecture them, and make their experience unforgettable in a bad way.

But sometimes, we just need to give a hand. Silently. Without moralizing. Just give the person a chance to reach their goal and learn their life lesson by themselves.

Depression is not always “just sadness.”Very often, depression is a state of emotional shutdown.It can happen when a per...
06/26/2026

Depression is not always “just sadness.”
Very often, depression is a state of emotional shutdown.

It can happen when a person feels overwhelmed, stuck, exhausted, or unable to see a way through what they are facing. The mind and body may begin to protect the person by slowing everything down, but this can also create a painful sense of disconnection, hopelessness, or lack of motivation.

In therapy, I look at depression through several possible lenses.

Sometimes depression is connected to early core beliefs, such as:

“I am not good enough.”
“I am alone.”
“My needs do not matter.”
“I cannot handle this.”

Sometimes it is situational and connected to stress, loss, burnout, relationship difficulties, or life transitions.

Sometimes depression is also linked to a lack of boundaries, when a person has been carrying too much, saying yes when they need to say no, or living in a way that disconnects them from their own needs.

Because depression can have different roots, therapy should not look the same for everyone.

The goal of therapy is not only to reduce symptoms. It is also to understand what the depression may be communicating and to help a person reconnect with safety, agency, self-worth, and emotional strength.

Depression is not a personal failure.
It is often a signal that something inside needs care, attention, and support.

What do you reach for when you’re feeling sad or a little low 🙂For me, it’s something simple and comforting — applesauce...
04/27/2026

What do you reach for when you’re feeling sad or a little low 🙂
For me, it’s something simple and comforting — applesauce. My small way of soothing myself.
What about you?
Food, tea, a walk, music, a blanket, quiet time…? Share your comfort ritual — and if you’d like, post a photo in the comments.
Also, feeling sad or emotionally low (I’m not talking about clinical depression) is part of being human. Often, it’s our heart’s response to something not unfolding the way we hoped, or to the realization of a loss — big or small.
Sometimes, the healthiest thing we can do is pause for a day, allow ourselves to acknowledge what was lost, be gentle with ourselves, and then thoughtfully consider what comes next.
What helps you find your footing again? 💛

02/23/2025

Your true self is based on your spontaneous, authentic experience, and it makes you feel alive. Your false self, on the other hand, is a defensive facade—it may seem real to others, but it lacks spontaneity and leaves you feeling dead and empty (Winnicott, 1965).

07/18/2024

How to stop comparing yourself to others?

04/17/2024

Close relationships are characterized by high levels of interdependence and are cornerstones in the construction of our self-concepts. In spite of the high cultural value we place on independence in the West, research findings suggest that our interpersonal self may be more fundamental to our self-concept than any inner-directed models of self. Strong, satisfying relationships that are mutually rewarding have the most impact on the sense of self. The better the relationship the greater the relational self-construal, the greater the sense of self-affirmation and self-authenticity. Plainly put, the people we love define who we are (R. Neimeyer).

08/30/2023

"This kind of denial isn't lying as such; it's simply what we humans do when we experience the discomfort of cognitive dissonance. When reality conflicts with our beliefs, we have to either justify or rationalize that reality, or deny it. We try to reduce the 'dissonance' between how we think things should be and how they actually are.

Self-objectivity, and therefore increased self-knowledge, negates the need for denial." Mark Tyrrell

08/26/2023

Erich Neumann’s work, Depth Psychology and the New Ethic, teaches us that war is often driven by the projection of evil onto others. Dr Yoram Kaufmann, a Jungian Analyst from Israel, echoes this point when stating that “the greatest act of evil is the projection of our own evil onto others”.

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