Testimonials for Arriana *CT*...

always and will be grateful
i spoke to arriana for the first time she told me alot about not only my demise but about myself aswell she even made me think about how i was handeling the situation her advice made me really think what i could do about it i was so astonished she has made me change the way i think about my situation completley thankyou arriana x
Anne (33), manchester

Forever grateful
My name’s Sally and it's taken me several weeks now to be as relaxed and calm as I now am in order to return here and tell of the gratitude I feel for the help I received when I needed it most. It is simply not enough for me to just say thank you Arriana for the life-changing help you gave me that night, and so I want to say more than just thank you can say by itself. As everyone knows, real life can be painful, and nobody likes pain. What do you do when the man in your life packs his bags and announces he's found a younger woman and leaves you with 4 kids to cater for, serious health issues to deal with and only a part-time job to try and manage on into the bargain? You panic that's what.

I did, and the only thing I think I did right that night was when I phoned because I was so desperate and at my lowest ebb, full of panic, uncertainty and not knowing what to do, or who to turn to with the situation and circumstances I found myself in. Yet, when I was greeted by Arriana on the line and asked how I was feeling, as if she already knew, I said I was fine. Almost immediately she sensed that my version of being fine was the type I could well do without. Here I was so much needing to talk with someone, yet I was so reluctant to admit openly how bad I was feeling. My kind of "fine" she pointed out stood for F-fearful, I-insecure, N-negative and E-empty. Not only that, in my desperate state, somehow I was unrealistically expecting whoever I got on the phone to fix all my problems there and then.

Unable to accept the situation I now found myself in, I was so seriously confused and upset that I was somehow expecting that person to help me wind the clock back to before the time when my husband left so that I could prevent it from happening, or wind it forward to tomorrow when he would be on his way back so I could find out where or what I'd done wrong and put it right. Talk about unrealistic expectations, yet that's exactly how I was at the time.

Arriana explained that my expectations were totally understandable reactions to a dreadful situation that I didn't want to have happening to me and that I was in between the shock, hurt and trauma of what had happened and the complete uncertainty and confusion of what to do about it. In other words, I couldn't accept what had happened to me and my reaction was one of complete panic. When she pointed out that although my reactions were understandable, the result was that I was only increasing the total misery of my situation unless I took positive action to bring the situation under some form of manageable control.

Arriana showed me in her excellent way of putting things that unless I brought a measure of control to my otherwise chaotic state of affairs, the pain of yesterday and the dread of tomorrow were going to be my 2 constant companions, neither of which were particularly helpful or friendly, in fact, they were a real liability. Worse still was to come when she pointed out that there were now 2 great warriors who have joined in on the scene to deepen my dilemma, "fear and pride". I knew about those already as both had wreaked havoc through my mind all night prior to me making the phone call. Fear gripped me, and all I could think of was; what's going to happen to me and the kids. We''ll lose our home, everything. Pride instilled yet even more fear in me when I contemplated the thought of what the neighbours would think and say, and oh the gossip. We'll have to move even if I don't lose the house, I'll be the talk of the village, and what about getting to work, the kids to school, I've no car now, he's taken it and I've no money to buy one? All these and every conceivable negative thought and scenario had raged through my mind like a hurricane since he'd walked out on me the night before. I had done nothing the first night except suffer the pain alone, I hadn't even told my kids as I was hoping it was all a bad dream and I wouldn't have to as he'd be back the following day, but that didn't happen. 24 hours later I was an undeniable wreck with my life falling all around me and there was nothing I could do to stop it.

Arriana brought me down to a level where I was able to begin to accept what had happened to me, but more importantly, she also showed me that whilst yes, my husband walking out on me was a real problem, and that dealing with my health issues without a supportive partner was also a problem, especially trying to manage my children on my own under even more difficult circumstances now with little in the way of money to spare, the last thing I needed was an additional problem. When I asked what that was, she replied it was me. All these other things were real problems right enough, but the biggest one of all now was me, I had become the problem because not only was I not coping with the situation but I hadn't a clue how to even begin to 'deal' with it.

In her own unique way of putting it, she asked; "how well do you think the blind lead the blind"? Not very well I said. Next she asked, therefore; "how well do you think a problem deals with a problem"? She didn't have to say any more about that particular point, it hit me like a ton of bricks, I knew she was right. Calming me, reassuring and confirming me she said, this being so, it is important now to learn 2 great lessons from this experience.

One is, that it's not your fault, and you are not to blame, so don't beat yourself up, and two, despite this fact, it is nevertheless your responsibility to handle and deal with all that this situation entails. I remember well how there and then I began to really calm down and see where controlling the situation and minimising the damage brought some comfort to me
even though I had just been put through the emotional ringer. She made me see how in dealing with her problem which was me, instead of trying to deal with all the other consequences of what was going on around me, I could do likewise with regard to all the other issues I would have to deal with one by one and not panic at trying to solve them all at the same time.

Taking me back over the previous 24 hours of hell, she showed me how I had become an instant problem-solver by trying to sort all these problems out at once; I had lost complete control over everything, especially myself. I as the manager had become unmanageable. Instead she guided me carefully away from being a problem-solver, towards becoming a solution finder. Explaining in a simple straight-forward way, she pointed out that people who like to think of themselves as problem-solvers usually end up only convincing themselves they've got a real problem alright, but seldom get round to finding a realistic and timely positive solution to their problems. A solution-finder on the other hand quickly identifies they've got a problem alright in much the same way, but instead of focussing all their energy on the problem, they concentrate their energy towards finding a solution quickly. Here's how she put it to me.

You don't cool down by standing in the middle of the heat. Keeping your problems to the left and your possible solutions to the right will allow you be in the centre of control and see what fits where and when without wasting undue time focussing on just the problem, instead of spreading all your problems in a 360 degrees and standing in the middle . Being in the middle like that swamped and surrounded by your entire problems leaves only one question to ask: "how on earth do I get out of here"?

You've become part of the problem and not part of the solution. I'd heard that said many times before, but now I really knew what it meant and could even visualise it in my mind, yet before I spoke with Arriana, I didn't have any real perspective like that at all, just confusion and increasing the total misery of an already impossible situation.

Bit by bit she brought a sense of proportion and reality to my dilemma where before there was only a hurt and confused woman filled with a totally fearful imagination full of doom and gloom and terrible things going to happen to me and the kids.

I had no money that night when I called and if it weren’t for another dear friend who booked and paid for the call for me it wouldn’t have happened. We’ve called before, but usually it was just because we were curious about what the future might hold for us and a bit of a laugh really. I wasn’t laughing that night and I didn’t see this coming nor was I told it would be on the horizon for me, but even if it had, I probably wouldn’t have believed it anyway as I didn’t know there was anything wrong with my relationship. Just how wrong can you be? I am just so thankful that when I really needed the right person under those terrible feelings and circumstances at the time, the right person was there for me to help me deal with the here and now instead of some fantasy of the future. I can let go of all that now and let the future be whatever it will be, but I do have a better idea and understanding of what that will be because through Arriana, she has shown me that what I do today, I can reap tomorrow and that regardless of what the future brings, I know how to deal with it instead of just reacting to it. I no longer concern myself with living in either the past or the future, the right now, this very moment, in the here and now is all that I need.

She gave me other helpful advice which I have taken and put into action which I’m reaping the rewards of already, and pointed out that the tomorrow never really comes, because when it does, we will call it today again, and that is why I had to return to thank her. My only regret in all of this is that I don’t know what she looks like as there is no picture of her in the list of readers, but the greatest benefit is that I’ve seen her heart and its pure gold.

When I thanked her and told her that on the night I spoke with her just before we said goodbye, she told me her grandmother had taught her that a “Well-dressed heart is better than a well-dressed body anytime. Again, she was right. If anyone ever needs what I needed that night, I sincerely hope they get someone like her.

I can never repay Arriana for her kindness, compassion, patience, calmness and skill in the presence of an incoherent nervous wreck like I was that night. And yes Arriana, I do pray for the Serenity to accept the things I cannot change, the Courage to change the things I can, and the Wisdom to know the difference. And what a difference you have made to my life, a difference that even my children have derived great benefit from even in the absence of their dad. Thank you once again dear friend.

Sally.


Sally Henderson (42), Scotland