Frequently Asked Questions About Counselling
Below are some frequently asked questions that reflect how I work as a counsellor. They offer a sense of my approach, and how we might work together in a way that feels collaborative, respectful and responsive to your needs.
Counselling offers a confidential and supportive space to explore whatever is troubling you. This might include emotional difficulties, life transitions, relationships, loss, anxiety, or a general feeling of being stuck. The aim is not to “fix” you, but to support you in understanding yourself more fully and finding ways forward that feel right for you.
The length of counselling can vary, depending on what you are seeking and what feels most helpful for you. Some people find support over a short period, perhaps a few sessions focused on a specific issue or life event, while others choose medium or longer term counselling to explore deeper patterns, relationships or ongoing difficulties.
Within an integrative and pluralistic approach, we regularly reflect together on your goals and how the work is progressing. There is no fixed expectation about how long counselling “should” last. You are free to attend for as long or as briefly as feels right for you, and we can review this at any point so that the therapy remains supportive, responsive and guided by your needs.
An integrative approach means that the therapist draws on more than one therapeutic model, such as person centred, psychodynamic or cognitive behavioural approaches, and integrates them in a coherent way. This allows the work to be tailored to you as an individual, rather than relying on a one size fits all method, while remaining grounded in sound therapeutic theory and practice.
Pluralistic counselling places collaboration at the heart of the therapeutic relationship. It recognises that different people are helped by different things at different times, and that you are the expert on your own experience. Together, therapist and client openly discuss goals, preferences and what feels most helpful, adjusting the way of working as needed.
At the heart of my work is a person centred approach, which means the therapeutic relationship is grounded in empathy, respect and seeing you as the expert on your own experience. Integrative and pluralistic approaches sit within this foundation.
Working in an integrative way, allows me to draw on a range of therapeutic ideas and methods, thoughtfully blended to support you as a whole person. Working pluralistically means that we approach this work collaboratively, with open conversations about what feels helpful, what your goals are, and how you would like to work together.
Within a person centred framework, this means therapy is shaped with you rather than for you—remaining flexible, responsive and grounded in your pace, preferences and needs.
No. You don’t need to arrive knowing the “right” type of therapy or what you want to work on in detail. An integrative and pluralistic approach allows space for exploration. Part of the process is working together to understand what you are seeking from counselling and finding a way of working that feels supportive and meaningful to you.
Sessions typically involve talking in a reflective and non judgemental space. You may explore thoughts, feelings, patterns, relationships or past experiences, at your own pace. At times, sessions may also include practical tools or focused exploration, depending on what you feel is helpful. You are always invited to share feedback so the work can remain responsive to your needs.
Not at all. People seek counselling for many reasons: feeling overwhelmed, navigating change, processing loss, wanting greater self understanding, or simply feeling that something isn’t quite right. You do not need to be in crisis or feel that your struggles are “serious enough” to justify seeking support. If something matters to you, it is valid to bring it to counselling.
Quite simply, I thought ALMA is shorter and easier to remember than my full name, Alina Maroukian. ALMA incorporates letters from my name without it needing to be spelled out in full, which would have also made for a very lengthy website domain. Coincidentally, it happens, to have some meaningful connotations in different languages, however primarily, I just wanted to keep things simple and provide an easier name to remember.