Short post

This week I am opting for a very short post again. Why? I migh hear some people think. Fact is, I love writing. But it is one of these times in the year that my body is shouting at me to slow down. Many years even this shouting was not enough. But now I have gotten so much better at listening. And we get along much better. Blogging is fun but it is not one of the things that I 'really' need to do during the week. So I am now on a basic regimen of tasks. My body is happy and I get to catch up on DVD and books, win-win.

Part of next week I will be on a work trip. I will certainly talk about it when I get back! It is great to be a part of such a dedicated group of people as the tutors at Online training for counsellors. We will talk about making our courses even better and adding new courses and workshops for our students.

More on online education

This week I want to talk some more on my favorite topic. Education for counsellors. If you read my post regularly, you will already know how important that is to me. That is the reason I qualified myself as an online counsellor next to my f2f diploma's in counselling and coaching. For those who want to train for online counsellling this course is starting next week.

But being a counsellor means you keep learning, I think curiosity is a great trait to have for a therapist. This week I am attending a counseling conference that takes place in Second Life. [it will be on until saturday so you can  still catch some of it. This is the 3rd year the virtual conference for counsellors is being held in Second Life. [if you don't feel secure enough in Second Life onlinevents is streaming it live from their website and you can still participate in the chat!] It is an excellent oppertunity to network, learn more about what is going on in the world of online counselling, new technologies and learning a lot more about virtual worlds and their possibilities. The starting day yesterday already had some very interesting topics. Most interesting yesterday was a discussion by Kate Anthony and DeeAnna Marz Nagel with the director of an upcoming documentary login2life. This documentary focusses on the positive sides of Second Life, how virtual worlds can be a haven a support for people with dissabilities. I can't wait to see the whole documentary!

I want to mention another online conference as well. Normally I do not go for paid conferences , but for this one I am making an exeption. The practice building conference is organised by Casey Truffo. Her book " How to be a wealthy therapist" is like a bible to me. A lot of therapists have problems with charging money for what we do and this book has helped me see that I am worth it! Marketing a practice is strangely enough not a part of most therapy training programs. That is were books and conference like this one come in. You gain so much knowledge and it is also such a great oppertunity to network and get to know other therapists. This alone can lead to business oppertunities somewhere in the future.