By Chhori Laxmi Maharjan
FNC/Ankur Counseling Center
Chhori Maharjan is the senior counselor and program director for Friends of Needy Children, a non-profit organization dedicated to providing psychosocial therapy to disadvantaged children and young people of Nepal. Chhori and her team of psychologists at the Ankur Counseling Center provide counseling to adults and children in the Kathmandu area and the income generated through this counseling helps to fund free treatment for disadvantaged children, many of whom struggle with trauma, disability, and homelessness. Since 2006, Chhori’s group has provided training to over 700 mental health providers, including counselors, child care professionals, Buddhist monks, and women’s groups from all over Nepal. Here, Chorri describes what she has been up to since attending ACBS World Conference X.
I am thankful to the team of ACBS for providing me a chance to participate in the conference last year. It was my first exposure to the international expertise in contextual behavior science and ACT. Because of the scholarship from ACBS I got an additional chance to attend Sand play therapy as well as an exposure visit to Antioch group and Bradley University, where I started to share about ACT and its effectiveness. We discussed ACT with students, practicing psychologists, psychotherapists, sand play therapists, as well as some of administrative staff.
Being a beginner and an enthusiastic learner in ACT therapy, before starting orientation classes in Nepal, I referred ‘ACT made simple’, ‘Get Out of Your Mind and into Your Life for Teens’ and consultation with Dr.Louise along with my experiences. I organized orientation programs 2-3 hours long for staff members of my organization.
Similarly, in the last six months, five orientation classes were organized for teachers, students of clinical and counseling psychology, students of Buddhism studies, private and government colleges, along with the only Mental Hospital in Nepal. Also, during world mental health day (October 10), I had a chance to share about ACT.
After my orientation session, students, teachers have been visiting Ankur counseling center seeking books on ACT, and they have provided positive feedback to Ankur. They have shown their keen interest to learn more, have trainings, and planning to apply for the upcoming world conference in Sydney.
‘ACT Made Simple’, ‘I just want to be Me’, and ’Get Out of Your Mind and Into Your Life for Teens’ are commonly used books by the readers in Ankur library.
According to the need, I have been using some of the interventions effectively during counseling sessions such as diffusion, mindfulness, workability, mindfull movement, values base living, and more.
I translated ‘Leaves on the Stream’ and am currently translating a values exercise for teens by Dr. Louise into Nepali language for easiness and for its effectiveness.
Publicly I gave two Radio Interviews and one talk program.
Currently, I have prepared a training manual including ACT and its interventions as a major component. The training is named “Trauma counseling.” It lasts for five days, and is specially designed for volunteer peer counselors who have been rescued from servitude, and have had various traumatic past life experiences.
In addition, I have been communicating with some of the professionals for their commitment to give training on ACT in Nepal. Dr.Louise, Tim and Sandra are planning to come this year.
Dr.Louise and Ankur team have been in Skype for clinical supervision monthly.
Lastly, I would like to state that the five days exposure to ACT is just an appetizer, so I need to learn and get trained on ACT more and more just like a full meal course. Hence, all of my colleagues and I are looking forward to get a floor of ACT with a thrust again and again.
- Chhori Laxmi Maharjan, Nepal
Are you wondering how you can help to disseminate CBS in the developing world through scholarship opportunities like this? Please consider donating to the Developing Nations Fund via Paypal by using the button below. Your donation will help us continue to bring attendees and presenters from developing nations to the ACBS world conference.
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