Blog Post No.160
By Dr Jim Byrne
29th December 2017 – Updated on 16th December 2022
Dr Jim’s Counselling Blog: My Christmas and New Year Update
Writing counselling books, balanced life, and revised fees
Copyright (c) Jim Byrne, 2015-2017
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Brief Pre-script: As we approach Christmas 2022, I am hoping to have a little time off, with a bit of luck! I have been very busy seeing clients; doing assessment reports; writing bibliotherapy documents; and writing, editing and publishing books for the past year (and more!)
You can see our Top 20 Books here.
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Introduction
So now it’s (still) Christmas – 29th December – and moving towards the New Year marker. And it’s time to take stock, and to plan the next period ahead. 
We have recently (in December 2017) produced an ABC Newsletter, in which we recorded that we have produced three new books in 2017, plus some new papers. (We have not had time to write a new Newsletter since that time – five years of being extraordinary busy and productive!) And so I feel the need for a ‘fallow period’, before launching into the next writing project.
I have worked up to the present moment, and so I intend to take most of January and February (2017) off, from major writing projects, and to ‘sharpen my saw’ (to borrow a phrase from Stephen Covey, the author of The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People).
Of course, I will continue to see counselling and therapy clients.
The only change in this area will be that it’s time to put my fees up. These new fees will not apply to my current clients, until 1st April 2018, but they will apply to all new clients immediately.
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The fallow period
I am hoping and planning to have a fallow period from now until perhaps early March, during which I will try to clear my desk of a huge backlog of reading. For me, reading is a relatively ‘fallow’ activity, compared with writing and editing and publishing books and papers. (I do not think this will happen in 2022. I am way too busy.
At the end of that period, not only will I have rested my ‘writing/publishing muscles’, but I also have updated my knowledge base so I am all set for another nine months of active production!
Writing plans
Beginning in March 2018, I intend to write the first of three volumes of a series on How to manage effective couple relationships.
This has now been done, and you can see the latest version, with some extracts, here: Two books on couple relationships, and one on couple conflict during the festive season!
These books represent a distillation of my twenty-four years’ experience of working with couples to help them achieve happy relationships. The material (is) be divided over three volumes, because it is too much to fit comfortably into one book. And, because it includes a range of new ideas and new skills, it will be more comfortable for the reader to study one volume at a time.
I also hope to begin a new book on the nature of thinking; its relationship to feelings and emotions; and the best ways for counsellors to engage with these issues when working with clients in counselling and therapy.
I have not yet got around to that project on thinking; but my latest approach would be to focus on “critical thinking”, which is really “critical perfinking” – involving thinking-feeling-perceiving all in one grasp of the mind. (See some ideas on this topic on the Homepage of the E-CENT Institute).
And if I have any time left over, I will begin working on a revised book on Counselling the Whole Person.
Update 2022: This has now been done, and it can be found here: Lifestyle Counselling and Coaching for the whole Person.
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Revised fees, 2018
SCHEDULE OF FEES FOR FACE-TO-FACE CLIENTS
This list of fees is now out of date (Dec 2022), so please go to my main service page for an update: Dr Jim’s Counselling and Psychotherapy Division.
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Please contact:
Dr Jim Byrne: 01422 843 629
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You can see my full Information Pack for face-to-face clients here: https://abc-counselling.org/information-about-counselling-in-hebden-bridge/
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And you can see the December 2017 ABC Newsletter here!
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That’s all for now.
Best wishes,
Jim
Dr Jim Byrne
Doctor of Counselling
ABC Counselling and Psychotherapy Services
01422 843 629
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ABC Counselling and Psychotherapy, Hebden Bridge 