The W.A.I in the Wai Emotion Cards stands for Where am I? and Who am I? This is the idea and basis behind each pack of WAI Emotion Cards. In short Wai Cards help to bring forward communication when finding the right word or expression is challenging and difficult.
The Cards There are Fifty Six Cards in total, twenty nine of these contain images, eighteen cards contain text and nine cards are coloured cards. This is to allow a variety of options for use. The idea for Wai Cards was born using a mixture of simple images that relay several messages to the onlooker, you will notice that there are no distinct faces, religious or cultural references, this is to ensure that the cards can be used by all. Each card has several possible meanings, the client, exploree, or user will see individual meanings in the card or cards they select depending on their own world view or experiencing. For those clients who are not visual, there are the text cards which include a variety of feelings and emotions, for those clients who prefer to refer to emotions in colour, each pack includes a set of coloured cards for focusing work.
The mixture of images, text and colour allow a therapist or educator to work creatively, some therapists prefer to use colour focusing with their clients, building on the expressed emotion by adding the cards. People are unique and our system is creative, person centred and flexible allowing many ways to work.
There are no instructions within the pack, since producing the cards therapists have told us how they have worked with clients in many different ways, if you haven't already we encourage you to look at some of the customer reviews or visit our instagram account (wai emotion cards) for some suggestions on how they've been used.
A little History The idea behind the cards was born from Heidi's experience of her work in Counselling and and Baden's experience of SEND Teaching. Heidi is a qualified and professionally accredited counsellor who has many years of experience working for national rape and mental health charities and in private practice. A qualified Rape Counsellor, she specialises in helping clients explore their experiences relating to abuse. She has a Masters degree in Counselling and Psychotherapy practice, her counselling approach is Humanistic. Heidi operates a small counselling practice working with clients holistically, creatively and collaboratively, in her spare time she indulges her own love of art. Baden holds many years of experience managing special educational provisions and Pupil Referral Units in schools. He has over twenty years experience working in education, specialising in behaviour and SEMH settings. He works with parents and children to aid better communication between home and school.
Both Heidi and Baden have worked for many years with individuals on a one to one basis, through work experience both noticed that creativity can often offer a gentle gateway to communication with clients from all backgrounds. Whilst Heidi was training as a counsellor, working with hearing impaired clients in agency, she saw first hand how creative techniques used in counselling can move a session forward. She then set about designing the simple images on the cards that you see now and asked some friends in the profession what they thought.
The cards were originally trialed by a select group of counsellors and educational professionals in 2014 and the results were really positive, from that time a small print run was scheduled and then something wonderful happened. Through word of mouth and client work success other professionals requested the cards and now the cards sell worldwide, Originally packs were just 40 cards, but from 2019 we upped the pack size to 56, giving people more scope for focusing (we've added more coloured cards) and greater scope for exploration.