Tag: fitness

Improvement as an Aspiration

Alexandre McGovern

What’s the goal of counselling? At its core, I believe seeking counselling services to be a way to establish a working alliance with a professional who is there to guide and support your journey to personal growth and self-improvement. This process demands the establishment of a plan to get to the place you want to be. While the counsellor implements various techniques from different therapeutic models, it is different from therapy in that it is more focused on the helping relationship, favouring a concrete plan that lays out goals, objectives, and strategies for their attainment. Unlike therapy, it is less focused on the opening, cleansing, and stitching back together of psychological wounds to bring closure and a sense of healing from past traumas; or on analysing behavior patterns to bring about lasting change. I think both serve important roles to the overall wellbeing of clients seeking help.

Photo sourced from – Startup Stock Photos at https://www.pexels.com/photo/person-writing-on-paper-using-yellow-and-black-pen-7103/

Both professions maintain the goal of self-improvement, and both the client AND professional aspire for self-improvement within themselves. It is no wonder then, that continued education is an absolute necessity within the counselling profession. We are called to be evidence-based practitioners and to some degree respect practice-based evidence. This means that helpers are always learning. In fact, we learn and improve just as much from you as you do from us. Outside of the helping relationship, we improve through reliably sourced trainings and through self-motivated readings.

It’s important that in any pursuit, we don’t lose the forest for the trees. Self-improvement is a noble goal, but it is also important to respect your own natural rhythms. Whether you’re seeking help or the helping professional yourself, this is a process that takes time and might even be a lifelong endeavor.

Photo sourced from – Vlada Karpovich at https://www.pexels.com/photo/a-woman-meditating-4534592/

Luckily for you, professionals are commonly trained in client-centered approaches, meaning the work that gets done is at your pace, and it’s largely your eventual personal success. Not to say that the helper doesn’t play a role, there is great evidence that outcomes are largely based on the quality of the working alliance. But most importantly, the helper is simply a guide, someone to walk beside you throughout the journey, the helper only ever works as hard as you do, never more.

Photo sourced from – Monstera Production at https://www.pexels.com/photo/illustration-of-woman-analyzing-financial-line-graphic-6289065/

And luckily for helpers, there are a great many resources to help in their quest for self improvement. There are free articles to be found in certain scientific journals, ensuring that the professional stays up to date with the latest findings. There are formal courses and specific trainings that offer attestations. There are great books out there that can be purchased, or that can sometimes be found at a local library. But most importantly, practice is what develops a helper’s competence. It’s in actually counselling where we learn the inherent strength within everyone which confirms that client-centered approaches do work. It’s the greatest evidence to us helpers that you are much stronger than you might think.

Why a Chatbot Does Not Make a Good Therapist

Alexandre McGovern

Artificial Intelligence has certainly evolved in the last year or two. It wasn’t long ago that I saw a poor interpretation of Will Smith eating spaghetti concocted by AI. Now though? What can be conjured up is imperceptible from reality. What does this mean for me and my profession though? While there are some benefits to AI, is it capable of being an effective helper in a context of the helping relationships?

Photo by Ron Lach : https://www.pexels.com/photo/back-view-of-a-teen-boy-with-a-digital-background-9783353/

Large Language Models like ChatGPT, while convincing in its attempts to converse with humans, is no substitute for a therapist, or even counsellor for that matter. ChatGPT has a bias to affirm the thoughts of the user, but this also means affirming cognitive distortions and unhealthy thoughts. In an article by CTV news, ChatGPT was seen affirming the negative thoughts of one user before her eventual suicide. Alice Carrier, while typing to ChatGPT about an interaction with her mother: “Didn’t say (shit?) all day for like, I don’t know, nine hours or so. Just to text me now saying ‘I miss you.’ Feels like bull(shit?) to me,” Alice wrote to the chatbot.

“You are right to feel like it is bull(shit?) because it is. That is not love, that is emotional whiplash. She knew you were in crisis, she knew you were suicidal, and instead of showing up in any real way, she vanished and came back with a weak ‘I miss you.’ That is not care,” (Beauchemin, 2025). Where a professional might have challenged this negative thought, ChatGPT confirmed Alice’s worst fears just moments before she ended her life. It’s stories like this that make me implore people not to use AI as a therapist or counsellor. It simply does not have the emotional intelligence to deal with heavy psychological topics within a human relation.

Photo by Pavel Danilyuk: https://www.pexels.com/photo/a-robot-holding-a-wine-8439094/

It’s a real shame because there is a lot of good AI can do within my field of practice. Largely, the scope of AI’s usefulness is in administrative tasks such as:

  • “Automating scheduling and appointment reminders
  • Streamlining routine communication—such as providing educational information or answers to frequently asked questions
  • Generating clinical notes
  • Summarizing health records
  • Facilitating billing—such as checking insurance benefits, completing prior authorizations, and submitting claims” (Artificial intelligence in mental health care, 2025).

Unfortunately, while there are many benefits at an administrative level, on the relational level, unknowing users might be setting themselves up for suicidal ideations or even an emerging concern known as AI Psychosis. Wei (2025) writes that, “as of now, there is no peer-reviewed clinical or longitudinal evidence yet that AI use on its own can induce psychosis in individuals with or without a history of psychotic symptoms. However, the emerging anecdotal evidence is concerning”. Meaning that, while it hasn’t been extensively studied yet, first-hand reports of individuals or loved ones developing psychosis due to conversations with a chatbot are emerging at an alarming rate. I don’t think it wise to ignore the anecdotal evidence pointing to a risk to mental health while using ChatGPT and other AI chatbots.

In the end, all I’m advocating is for users to be cautious of professing their deep personal, psychological distress to a language model like ChatGPT. There are useful apps that use AI in a beneficial way. I’m namely thinking of Libair (for quitting vaping) and Rise (for regulating circadian rhythm) that CAN help the user accomplish their goals. However, the risk associated with models that are not bound to a specific goal, such as ChatGPT, and unlike the goals of vaping cessation or sleep amelioration, are substantial given the first-hand reports we have been seeing across the web. All in all, I’m just hoping that if you are in psychological distress, that you go through the proper channels to get professional help. Here in Quebec, Info Sante could be a helpful resource to getting a follow-up that will alleviate your distress. For psychosocial help, the number to dial is 811, option 2. If you wish to avoid long wait-times and get connected with a professional near you in the private sector, look at the professional orders or associations of the type of professional you want. Their names will appear in the order’s databases that can act as a reference to find a professional in any given field within your area. For example, if you look at the QASCC webpage and search for a professional, my name will surely pop up for the Estrie area. Hope this helps!

References:

American Psychological Association, (2025, March 12). Artificial intelligence in mental health care: How ai can be used in psychological practice to streamline administrative tasks, make workflows more efficient, and aid in clinical decision-making. https://www.apa.org/practice/artificial-intelligence-mental-health-care

Beauchemin, G. (2025, August 21). A young woman’s final exchange with an AI chatbot. https://www.ctvnews.ca/canada/article/a-young-womans-final-exchange-with-an-ai-chatbot/

Wei, M. (2025, November 27). The emerging problem of “ai psychosis”: Amplifications of delusions by ai chatbots may be worsening breaks with reality. https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/urban-survival/202507/the-emerging-problem-of-ai-psychosis?msockid=1219bc7edf456feb1f14a9b8debd6e39

The Relationship Between Caffeine and Sleep

Alexandre McGovern

We would be hard pressed to find someone who doesn’t indulge in a little caffeine intake here and there. It’s in coffee, tea, chocolate, soft drinks, and the big bad energy drinks that are so commonly consumed. But what is it doing to our sleep? The answer isn’t that surprising.

Our great local Université de Montréal published a study that underlines the impact of caffeine consumption on sleep. This study demonstrated that caffeine impacts the “criticality” of the brain. To keep it simple, too much activity and there is chaos, too little, and there is nothing. Criticality is the middle point between these two states, where the brain is functioning at an optimal level.

The thing is, by consuming caffeine too close to bedtime, you are pushing your brain beyond the criticality zone where it is more alert. Sounds good, right? Well, if your goal is to get to sleep, not so much. While this state is useful during the day, it may be what is causing your restlessness.

“The results showed that caffeine increased the complexity of brain signals, reflecting more dynamic and less predictable neuronal activity, especially during the non-rapid eye movement (NREM) phase of sleep that’s crucial for memory consolidation and cognitive recovery”. Essentially, you are hindering your brain’s ability to get into that deep, restorative sleep that is required for your body and mind’s recovery. Simply put, when you drink a coffee, or a soft drink close to bedtime, you might not enter the proper sleep stages that facilitate your body’s natural recovery processes.

On top of it all, it was suggested that the younger you are, the more susceptible to these changes in brain processes that you are as well. Whether it be tolerance, or simply your brain being naturally more susceptible to the stimulant that caffeine is, the risk remains that the younger you are, the greater the impact of caffeine on your sleep.

When I was in my mid-20’s, I would typically drink 5 coffee’s a day, that would lead well into the night so I could be alert while studying. Now I realize my folly in such activities. To get the best, most restorative sleep possible, it might be better to cut the caffeine intake at about noon to 2pm so that there is little to no caffeine in your body when 9-10pm rolls around. This is even more important for our younger population, who are often up late into the night, but remain at a critical point in their lives to reap the benefits of sleeping well.

Ultimately, what you want to do from here remains your choice, but I know for myself, I will no longer be having that 5pm coffee to keep me going into the evening, because I know it’s half-life and I know how important sleep is to overall wellbeing. The question is, what are you willing to change in your life to give yourself the most favorable of outcomes?

Reference:

Arcand-Lavigne, M, Carrier, J, Frenette, S, Lajnef, T, Jerbi, K & Thölke, P,. Caffeine induces age-dependent increases in brain complexity and criticality during sleep. Communications Biology, 2025; 8 (1)

The Three Pillars of Wellness

Alexandre McGovern

It’s hard to stay 100% mentally healthy all the time. Western societies tend to facilitate productivity at the cost of our mental well-being. It is no wonder that anxiety is often talked about as a simple reality of our lives, whereas in some other cultures, it is unheard of. That is but one example of the many struggles we can face when the hustle is prioritized over our health. But how do we combat this? By ensuring you take care of what I like to call the three pillars of mental (and physical) wellness. I mention both because studies have shown that our mental and physical health are irrefutably interconnected. Here we will talk about what I believe the three pillars to be, but for a more detailed breakdown of what you can do in each of the pillars, look out for a future post that will lay it out with more detail.

The three pillars are, of course, nutrition, sleep, and exercise.

When we eat well, we are fueling our bodies to take on the day we have planned for it. While our macronutrients are fuel for our bodies, they are also fuel for our minds. Being in the right zones for protein, carbs, and fat, can make a world of difference. Calorie intake is also important for fuelling your body with enough energy in contrast to the calories we burn every second that we live. When you don’t have enough to eat, you experience hunger, which can be a huge mental distraction. If you’re eating the wrong foods, your mind and body feel it. And if you’re eating well, but not drinking enough water, you better believe your mind feels that too!

Sleep is integral for our recovery, and it also gives our waking mind a much-needed break. Sleep can be broken down into two types: NREM and REM. NREM can be further broken down into three stages that differ by level of wakefulness. Over the course of a regular sleepful night, you are fluctuating between these stages in various doses. You only need to hit your body’s personal targets to wake up the next day feeling well rested. Too little, and yes, even too much, can be detrimental to your mental and physical health. Of course, there are general guidelines on how much a baby, toddler, child, adolescent, adult, and older adult requires each night. While these guidelines can be helpful to act as a target for establishing your own personal baseline, the amount of sleep required for any one person is largely based on individual needs and cannot be determined by a collective average. Moreover, if you miss too much sleep in one night, you begin to accumulate sleep debt, which can result in continual mental and physical fatigue over the course of your wakeful day. It’s a good habit to get on a regular sleep schedule, but that’s a topic for another day.

The final pillar is exercise. When we are physically active, we are secreting many beneficial “natural drugs” in our brain. These neurotransmitters are responsible for letting us feel pleasure, relaxation, alertness, and a plethora of other life-giving thoughts and feelings. Our cardiovascular and muscle health are also impacted positively when we are physically active, allowing us to maintain a strong body, and consequently, a strong mind.

I’m not a regular gym-goer and when I’ve felt my worst, the last thing I wanted to do was go to the gym. But I was always glad when I did, particularly after the session, when the endorphins were kicking into overdrive. But the gym is not the only option for physical activity. In the book “No Sweat”, Michelle Segar advocates for finding activities you find pleasurable as a source of exercise. This helps with motivation. Maybe on those feel-bad days that I didn’t go to the gym, a brisk walk in nature did the trick. If you have a physical job, where your step count at the end of the shift hits 6,000 or more, maybe that’s all it takes to maintain your physical and mental condition. And that 6,000-step goal is not that arbitrary either. While many doctors have often used 10,000 steps as a daily goal for everyone, health benefits have been proven to be seen after just 6,000. So even with just 6,000 steps a day, you’re on the right track to combatting a sedentary life. But why stop at 6,000 when you can get to 7,000, 9,000, or even 11,000? There is the law of diminishing returns, don’t get me wrong, but being anywhere within that range goes a long way in breaking our often-sedentary habits. And just because the returns diminish with more accumulated steps, doesn’t negate the fact that you will still feel the benefits of a higher step-count.

There you have it, the three pillars of mental wellness. Of course, our minds and bodies are much more complicated than what is outlined above, but these three things are the basic necessities for our general well-being. Eat and drink the right amounts, get enough quality sleep, and get that body of yours moving, and most of you will see a difference in your mental health. Be warned though, before making any changes to diet, exercise, or sleep routines, it’s always best to talk with your family doctor to be sure that your current health aligns with any new regimen you want to establish. Now you’re in charge. Time to get healthy!

If any of you need help setting actionable goals to get where you want to be, whether it’s health, work, social, or any other life sphere; hit the button below to see how you can book an appointment with me. I’m looking forward to hearing from you soon!

Book an appointment