Christian Counseling and Lenten Ideals of Walking with Christ

Posted on by Dominick Flarey

Christian Counseling and Lenten Ideals

There are other motifs for Lent that Christian spiritual directors can also use to portray Lent other than the image of Forty and the image of desert. One such way is viewing Lent as a time of walking with Christ, not only during his public life, but also during Christ’s passion. One then is expected to carry one’s own cross to Calvary next to our Lord.
As Christians carry their crosses with Christ during Lent, they can also become like Simon who helped our Lord carry his cross. By sacrificing and offering up one’s crosses, one offers reparation for one’s sins but also the worlds. When in union with Christ, these ordinary trials of everyday life become supernatural sacrifices. With Christ as Our High Priest, we bring to him our offerings of trials suffering and pain, and we walk with him. St,. Theresa should us the power of offering little things. We do not need extraordinary actions but the simple offering of daily annoyances. We can also offer sacrifices and fasting. St. Ignatius in his Spiritual Exercises points out that when one fasts though, it is deeper than a mere sacrifice. Fasting goes beyond sacrifices because fasting deals with ordinary denial of everyday necessities. When one denies oneself superfluous things, they practice temperance and moderation, but when one fasts they deny ordinary things.
During Lent, Christian Counselors should encourage that their spiritual children carry their crosses, make sacrifices and fast and abstain properly. While our Lord in his human nature existed in temporal time and died historically, as a divine being, he is eternal. The Trinity as an eternal being is unbound by the time and escapes it vacuum. In the all seeing eyes of God, there is only one reality-the ever present. In this way, our sacrifices and words of consolation to Christ are seen and heard by him as he carries his cross. Hence we can truly walk with Christ to Calvary during this Lenten season, weeping as the holy women, helping him as Simon, and consoling him as his mother.

by Mark Moran, MA

Lenten Ideals: Meditations from the Stations for Christian Counseling

Posted on by Dominick Flarey

During Holy Week it is proper to prepare oneself for the passion of Christ during Christian Counseling sessions.  In meditation upon his suffering and death, we can grow closer in love with our savior and find pious resolve to offer our own crosses with Christ.  Meditation with Christ can also allow us to join Mary, John, Veronica, Simon and the Holy Women to the very foot of the cross.  While Christ’s death as a temporal reality happened historically some Two-Thousand years ago, Christ as the Logos also exists outside of time and within that ability can hear our thoughts and prayers as he suffers.  This is an excellent opportunity to mourn for Christ from a distant future but also in a tender present whisper in the echo of time.  We can literally console Christ in our meditation as he suffers for us.
Christian Counseling meetings should take advantage of meditations that can be employed by their clients when focusing on Christ during Holy Week.  Certain themes can be applied from the Stations of the Cross and utilized for spiritual development within the souls of the faithful.

Christian Counseling Themes Found in the Stations

A few themes that stand out the most from the Stations of the Cross will be reviewed here and

applied to one’s own personal crosses they may carry.  The First and most obvious theme of the Stations is conforming one’s will to the Father.  As Christ accepted his cross, he submitted his will to the Father.  This pain of mental submission initiated in the Garden and was carried to its finality at the cross.  In our prayers, we should mimic Christ in accepting the chalice of the Father.  Our prayers should be focused on what doors the Lord chooses to open not the ones we wish to have opened.  Through the meek and humble example of our Lord, we too should accept whatever crosses come our way.
 A Second theme that appears in the Stations is Christ’s calmness and magninty in the face of chaos and lies.  As those unworthy to judge him mocked him, he stood as a pinnacle example of Christian excellence and peace.  He did not return hate with hate, but stood his ground, professed truth and portrayed a magnanimous image for all Christian generations to follow.  This was clearly seen as Pilate condemned Christ to death.  How many times are we unjustly ridiculed or mocked?  Do we stand for Christ despite the heckling of the world?
A Third theme can be found in the numerous times Christ fell because of our sins.  Each time Christ looked up to heaven, and triumphantly and courageously lifted up the cross of our sins.  How many times do we fall for those we love yet continue to carry on especially when no reward is in sight?  How many times do we help others without any benefit to our own?  This theme can also be applied to Simon, who though at first hesitant became an example of helping others.  Little did Simon know that by helping a stranger, he was indeed playing a small role in his own redemption.  This is the truth behind helping others.  One cannot see the temporal value on earth, but will be surprised and amazed at the value of such small actions in the next life.
A Fourth theme can be found in the sorrows of our Lady.  The loss of a child is the most painful experience a person can feel.  Our Lady not only lost her son, but witnessed his cruel torture.  She saw him carry his cross, expire on the cross, hold his lifeless body, and witness the sealing of the tomb.  Her sacrifice of her son for our redemption has led many to refer to her as a Co-Redemptrix.  She herself, while unable to liberate man as Christ, still nonetheless suffered with Christ for the sins of man and suffered the mental anguish of seeing her only son die.  In this regard, the love of Our Lady for us is also a theme that cannot be diminished if one meditates on the Stations.
A Fifth theme is the fidelity of Mary, John, Veronica and the Holy Women.  Due to the fear of the mob and the Romans, few remained faithful to Christ in his darkest hour.  Judas betrayed him with a kiss, Peter denied him three times, and many of the Apostles and Disciples fled the garden like sheep scattered from the shepherd.  This betrayal stung our Lord more than any broken promises we have found in our life.  Yet, when times get tough, do we find ourselves standing behind Christ as a soldier, or as a scared lamb?  Has the Holy Spirit strengthened us enough to stand by Christ?   Would we flee the garden or be found at the foot of the cross on Good Friday?
A Sixth theme is the horrendous nature of sin.  While the effects of sin may not be spiritually visible to all, the debt of sin still nonetheless has an enormous debt to justice.  Justice demands restitution for that injustice.  Only Jesus Christ, who as man represented us as High Priest and as God became the perfect victim, could undo the imbalance of the sin of Adam.  Through this self-sacrifice of Christ on the cross one can see the heinous nature of the infinite debt of sin.  Christ’s mutilated body that hung from the cross clearly shows it.  Every sin ever committed unleashed itself upon the sacrificial lamb.  How many times do we blame the Jews and Romans for this crucifixion?  We should also look at our sins because ultimately it was our sins that did this to our Lord.  In this, we should weep bitterly as Peter did.
While many other themes can be found within the Stations, I think it is good to reflect on these during Holy Week.  Christian Counseling sessions can also reflect on these themes as well as others if they apply to individual situations.  If you wish to become a Christian Counselor, please review the program and see if the Christian Counseling courses match your academic needs.

The Role Of A Nurse Educator

Posted on by Dominick Flarey

The role of a nurse educator is growing in importance today. A nurse has several different imperative roles in today’s health care system, one of which is to inform patients and their families of the diseases that they are faced with. A step above that is a nurse educator. This nurse is using all of their clinical experience and skills to properly prepare their students. They also do a great job of mentoring and teaching fellow nurses who may be new or have less experience. A nurse mentor leads a very active and fulfilling life as they are both informative and emphatic.
Nurse educators are traditionally in charge of structuring, implementing and revising the type of educational materials that fellow nurses receive. This material fits a wide range of uses, from a more academic and scholarly feel to a more concentrated and specific approach for individualistic issues. Nurse educators are often a great sounding board for issues that arise for another nurse that they may be unfamiliar with and have not dealt with in the past. Nurse educators are the keys to assuring quality and factual based content is taught to the entire department.

 Practice and Goals

Because health care is such a diverse and constantly changing field, it is important that those in this position are comfortable with constantly learning and growing. New information and changes in procedural patterns are inevitable so a nurse educator must be willing to easily adapt. Being a leader is usually at the forefront of a nurse educators job. They practice in all type of health care facilities and are generally working with fellow nurses and patients alike.
A nurse educators primary goal is to create a set of curriculum and material that is all encompassing and helpful for their students. Because of their involvement in teaching and being of service to fellow nurses, future nurses and patients, nurse educators often experience a high level of job satisfaction. They take pride in their role of helping another person learn, grow and ultimately succeed in the nursing field. Being of service to others is why many people become nurses in the first place, this just adds to that principle by helping and encouraging others who have that same deeply engrained belief.
There are tremendous benefits for those who choose a career as a nurse educator. The medical field is one of the most stable markets because certain ailments are inevitable. So no matter how badly the economy is doing, surgeons, doctors and nurses will still be around to take care of the sick and dying. Because of this, nurse educators will also always be needed. Another huge benefit of choosing this particular work as a career is the cutting edge technology and information that will be available to you. Wouldn’t it be great to be one of the first people to know about a certain procedure? What about being able to read information about a unique and rare disease? These are the types of things nurse educators do on a daily basis.
Nurse educators are always learning something new and interesting. They are apart of an ever changing and growing workplace that is perpetually knowledge based and intellectually stimulating. Usually nurse educators work in a specific field of study. They often have specialties similar to those that doctors have. These fields can range from cardiology, family health, pediatrics and much more. A general comprehensive background is necessary but usually whatever concentration you are most familiar with is the one you teach. The type of qualifications needed to become a nurse educator usually require a master’s degree but there are some exceptions to this rule.
As a nurse educator you are also entitled to a pretty flexible schedule. Many choose to teach just part time in junction with their other work. Whether that be clinical work or actually working in hospitals directly with patients. Assessing the learning and knowledge of nurses is also a duty that many nurse educators carry out. Making sure that the nurses in the field and those who deal with patients every single day are well informed and knowledgeable is imperative to the quality of care that the patients receive.
There are many different things that nurse educators do but one of the most important is that they are there to teach, answer questions and to really listen to their students and patients. The role of a nurse educator is an important one and those who are willing to do the job are needed. To learn about becoming a nurse educator, access here.

Spiritual Counseling: Rediscover Your Inner Power

Posted on by Dominick Flarey
By: Zendra Marks

What is Spiritual Counseling?

Spiritual counseling considers the soul, instead of the body and mind, as the commencing point for the sense of your true self. It has an enhanced view of life, acknowledging that this world is often confusing mystery. It considers self-belief systems, universal and personal energy systems, karmic interplay, instinctive psychic realities, subconscious states of mindset, spiritual theology, metaphysical experiences, spiritual existence and higher self-cosmic relationships.
Spiritual counseling views why life is instinctively personal and why individuals want to develop their own distinctive, graceful relationship with it, naturally and without forcefulness. As the soul is considered as the beginning point, consciousness comes from the heart, while not overlooking the head or brain, and from this heart space care for the blessed interdependence of all living existence comes to the surface.

 What does Spiritual Counseling involve?

Spiritual counseling involves a process where one person reevaluates who he or she feels about and themselves and about other persons. Care for self and care for others is the primary concept of the personal and combined growth. As the spiritual counseling is holistic, there is no separation and division, no dichotomy between individual or collective opinions and response, all is fundamentally correlated. Spiritual counseling brings about a realization that life experiences grow into the supreme tool, with the incorporation of personal problems and personal venture. The main objective of taking spiritual counseling is to convey themselves and their own world with long cherished wisdom, spiritual consciousness and personal realism using integrity.
Spiritual counseling involves the process of developing consciousness of a spiritual identity. It does so by reminding the fact that all the human beings are more than their personalities and their problems.
It gives faith in oneself so that people have within themselves the knowledge and understaning to make the right decisions in life.
Spiritual counseling also ensures that people have faith in their potentials. That means each situation has a prospect of growth for them.
It enables people to have belief in the journey which indicates human lives haves some deep meanings.
Spiritual counseling also makes people realize that that all people are in fact spiritual beings.

  Why might one seek out a Spiritual Counselor?

A spiritual counselor helps people to learn how to handle the challenges of daily life in relationship with the spiritual world. Most of the people are accustomed to thinking of themselves as alone in the world. People tend to think that they need to figure things out on their own, and fight for survival.
After spiritual counseling, people would begin to understand that spiritual togetherness is real. Then they would start to see that life can be different. They will learn that they are not alone, because everyone belongs to one world – but during the times of stress or difficulties they may forget this. That is why spiritual counseling is so important, as the long years of habit can be difficult to undo all by oneself.
A Spiritual counselor helps people to meet the challenges of life from a new consciousness of collective existence. It offers support to be a whole person – the soul and spirit, emotions, mind and body, and the practical life here on the Earth.

 What are the qualities of an expert Spiritual Counselor?

A spiritual counselor needs the cross cultural consciousness, a deep understanding around spiritual sphere and other matters of spirituality. They are well aware of, and they are devoted to a spiritual passage in their own lives as well as the lives of others. By concentrating on their deep inner relationships, forming an open connection and a unique mindfulness state, they produce a holding and blessed space for the individual and collective growth of their clients.
Finally it can be said that the divine journey can be delightful and arising, however it can also be demanding, frightening and solitary. Anyone might have the spiritual experience; however holistic self-consciousness is a completely different thing. Spiritual development best happens at the point while the soul is strong enough to take a little bewildering.
As a result, spiritual counseling can be a great tool to rediscover the potentials one have and find greater meaning of the life. However, as it deals with the deep consciousness of the mind and soul of a person, an experienced and qualified counselor can make things much easier and comfortable. To find out more about spiritual counseling and to preview online courses, you may access here.

What a Good Nurse Case Manager Does.

Posted on by Dominick Flarey

Good health care can be a very important thing to have. One of the best ways to make money is to get a job in the health care field. Due to the nature of the work it can be very hard to find a job in the health care field. If you want to be a doctor or nurse then you are going to have to undergo the proper schooling. One great way to obtain your nurses license is to attend an online course. Many doctors have to take a pledge stating that they will act ethically in all situations. In the future the demand for nurses is going to be very great. Many elderly people need assistance with their day to day living. One good way to make money is to become a nurse case manager. A case manager can help assemble all the important details about your health problem. A nurse also knows how to administer emergency help to patients who are in need. It can take one or two years to train a good nurse.

nurse case manager
A nurse case manager is an asset to the healthcare field.

Becoming a Nurse Case Manager and the Need for Training

Posted on by Dominick Flarey

Becoming a nurse case manager can be an exciting role to take in the health care field, giving you a strong role within the organizations that you take employment with. These positions can

involve a great range of functions and various responsibilities, from coordinating patient files and cases, while managing the process of care and the actions that are taken within each case. Altogether there is a great deal to take on in the field, but it is all a very rewarding combination of a role, compensation, and personal benefits. Nursing case management has to start with the right training structure that will ensure you really grasp the important concepts of the career and are able to remain proficient within the field. This training should take place in the atmosphere that is going to best perform for you, providing you with a stable education base for starting a very pleasing career.

Organizing Medical Case Management

Posted on by Dominick Flarey

In the medical field, many people can be involved in your health care and recovery. It can get confusing trying to figure out who to talk to about what. Case management has made that easier. The case manager is the person responsible for assessment, planning, facilitation, care

coordination, evaluation and advocacy for options and services to meet and individuals and family’s comprehensive health needs. The do their job through communication and available resources to provide quality cost effective outcomes. They plan, seek and monitor services for different social agencies and staff on behalf of the client. The do this in four steps. First, they get the referral of a new patient. The case manager then develops a plan for delivery of care. They evaluate the results for each patient and make adjustments where needed. Finally, they evaluate the overall program effectiveness. They function in several different areas. In the health care and HMO setting, their duties may include checking benefits and negotiating rates along with many other duties. In the health care provider setting, they will verify original benefits, coordinate services and provide post care follow-up but that is just a taste of their duties in that area. In the employee setting, they verify medical reasoning, follow-up after work absences and provide health education.

Purpose of Case Management and Case Management Plans

Posted on by Dominick Flarey

One of the main purposes of case management is to help the patient with improving the quality

of their lives. It is a process by which a social service agency’s worker is assigned and can assist the patients and their families in connecting with the resources needed for their health care needs and helping them to navigate through the social service systems. Their role is to advocate on behalf of their patients and assist other medical providers with understanding the needs of the patient. With a good case manager handling the case, the collaborative process is made much easier because the patient’s voice and their decisions is the essential key. In order for the case manager to properly execute the required services, they will have to create a plan that will guide them and their patients through the overall process. One of the first steps in this planning process is meeting with the patient.

Benefits of Getting Substance Abuse Counseling

Posted on by Dominick Flarey

When I made the realization that my own mother was going through some problems with substance abuse not too long ago, I knew right away that I was going to have to do everything in my power to try to get her life back on track and help her to realize that she had a real problem and needed help. So I spent a lot of time looking into some of the different options that I had when it came to trying to get her clean. For starters, I wanted to look into seeing if I might be able to talk her into substance abuse counseling. I knew that this would be a great way for her to get the help that she needed. So I looked further into substance abuse counseling and it was not long before I was able to get her to agree to go to it.

Getting Substance Abuse counseling

Posted on by Dominick Flarey

If you know someone who has had some issues with substance abuse, then you might be wondering what you can do to help them get past this difficult time in their life. Well, it may not be easy, but if you can, then one thing that you might want to look into doing is getting them to go to some kind of substance abuse counseling This can be a great way of getting them the help that they need and this can also make a huge impact on the rest of their life, giving them the future that they deserve. So if you are interested in this, then you are going to want to look into getting substance abuse counseling for that person. Start by trying to talk to them about it and see if this is something that they would be interested in or willing to give a try for themselves.

Substance Abuse counseling
Substance Abuse counseling