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Reading, listening and watching to inspire your thinking around issues of culture, change, psychology, oppression, and making a difference.
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My work exists at the intersection of psychotherapy, hypnotherapy, spirituality, mythology, ecofeminism, and manifestation. Coaching is a profession without enough grounding in professional study and scholarship. And psychotherapy has become medicalized, soul-less and very often ineffective.**
Bringing the knowledge of psychological theory (specifically spiritual and depth psychology) to be used within a new age model of spirituality and coaching (which holds that clients are not in need of fixing and have the capacity to be effective creators of their personal and spiritual growth) is how I make a difference in the world while making a living at the same time.
The Authentic Wholeness Advanced Certification Training Program is a serious learning program for coaches & healers who want to bring effectiveness, depth and gravitas to their work. The following articles, resources, podcasts, videos and presentations will give you a sense of how my thinking has been influenced in these areas and gives you some background in how I approach our work.
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**Please note I am not referring to cases of severe mental illness such as psychosis, dissociative disorders, or people that pose a danger to themselves or others in the general critique of psychotherapy.
Psychology & Psychotherapy: There are a gazillion reasons to criticize the fields of psychology and psychotherapy. But two realities that get little airtime are 1) the fact that our basic humanity and emotional needs have been pathologized in the culture, and 2) that our basic humanity and empathic responses to the emotional and psychological needs of our communities have been professionalized. Read Making the political personal: how psychology undermines feminist activism.
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The pathologizing of normal: Check out DSM 5: Diagnosing for Status and Money. As a recovering psychotherapist, I'm always quite saddened by the number of people who inquire about working with me but only if I accept their insurance. The devolution of our emotional and psychological needs into into a medical problem for which "insurance" pays the price is deeply disempowering to people seeking help and demoralizing for the professionals trying to provide it.
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Holding Space in the Psychic Container: Thoughts on the foundational skill of holding space for our clients, creating a psychic container or crucible of transformation in the coaching session. Setting the coaching session apart from the goings-on of the day and creating a protective force-field help the client feel safe and contained and able to focus on the work. Have a listen to the Authentic Wholeness Podcast: Holding Space in the Psychic Container.
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Attuning to the Energy in the Room: Thoughts on the foundational coaching skill of using the energy in the room, in the coaching, session, in the psychic container, mirroring and interpreting for the client, being utterly present and attuned to the energy in the room, the client's physical and nonverbal cues, the subtle energy dynamics that exists between coach and client, and the energy the client brings into the coaching container--using the energy as a tool for greater consciousness. Have a listen to the Authentic Wholeness Podcast: Using the Energy within the Coaching Session.
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Navigating Emotional Waters in the Coaching Session: The dominant culture loves power and action and drive. It doesn't have much regard for emotion and what emotions can communicate. A lot of people are afraid to feel their emotions, or brush them off, or hide them. That's why as coaches, its so important for us to stay with the client in her emotional experience, and to encourage our client to stay with her emotional experience, often for much longer than may be comfortable. Have a listen to Authentic Wholeness Podcast: Staying with Emotion in the Coaching Session.
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