‘Until you make the unconscious conscious, it will direct your life and you will call it fate.’ C.G. JUNG
We often have a dream, a vision for our lives that we strive to reach and maintain. The idea of achieving this dream can pull us through many a trial or hardship, helping us to stretch and reach outside of our comfort zones, helping us to get creative and to connect with others.
Is something in your life is not lining up the way you had envisioned and this is causing you pain or difficulty on some level? You may be struggling with anxiety, self-doubt, depression, or feeling stuck and unable to either move forward with your goals, or out of a difficult situation. Someone you love may have told you that you need to make a change, to seek counselling.
The first step is often the hardest, and I’m glad you are here. I want to help guide you to untangle the knots, see things more clearly, and to take the additional steps. Pain is designed to move us out of stagnant and painful patterns (both those in your inner world and outer world) and to move towards a life that is more authentic, aligned with who you are, what you want, and what you value. Ultimately: a life that is more fulfilling, and imbued with a sense of purpose and meaning.
Work with me:
I work with who you are, and where you are at right now- with the intention and goal of getting you to a place where you can move towards, get closer to, and ultimately achieve the life that you want.
I have over 20 years of professional experience as a social worker providing psychotherapeutic and counselling services. This includes my own personal development and therapeutic work, which is essential for a practitioner to attend to when working with others.
I currently provide virtual counselling sessions for Individuals (aged 13 years to adult), Couples, and Families. I will never debate the merits of in-person sessions and do recommend this particularly for younger children. I am happy to report that many of the clients that I am working with virtually (both new and ongoing), still report feeling warmly supported during sessions. I often receive feedback that they feel heard and seen despite the fact that they are not sitting in an office with me, and they don’t have to worry about travel time, weather conditions, or having to cancel the session if they feel a bit under the weather themselves. It is a completely individual choice and understandable if you try it and like it, or try it and realize that you want something else.
Over the years, my professional and personal path have dove-tailed and culminated into a blend of studies that have informed my therapeutic approach.
It is difficult to stay in the track of a one therapeutic approach fits all model, when humans are more multi-dimensional than that.
My current approach is informed by spiritual, psychological and creative philosophies that include but are not limited to:
- Cognitive Behaviour Therapy (CBT)
- Existential Therapy
- Jungian Analytical Psychology
- Dream work
- Mindfulness-Based Cognitive Therapy
- Narrative Therapy
- Reiki Therapy
- Play Therapy
How I use these approaches in therapy depends on what you are communicating that you are struggling with and looking for, what I sense and observe as themes, strengths and obstacles moving through your life, and which of the above as a blend of approaches resonates with you the most.
I prefer a client-centered approach that incorporates your wisdom, intuition, and needs vs. “therapist expertise”, or me as the expert. You may be looking for guidance but you are the expert on who you are and what you need.
I help guide you in the process of uncovering and accessing that wisdom.
The Power of Story:
The world is built on stories that we live by and live through, in turn, we are often curating the stories we have been built on. These stories are ever evolving and often include situations that were not part of the plan that we had for our lives, for moving towards that ultimate vision of life. We are often working with a certain narrative when we feel good and when we don’t feel good. When we interpret a situation through a particular lens or narrative, we often do not realize that there are other ways to see and engage. It is not uncommon to hear phrases such as “there is more than one story at play” or “there is more than one way to see this story”.
I am most interested in helping to understand someone’s story as they have lived and are living it and in helping to discern which stories have been internalized that are limiting, lead to conflict and are playing themselves out in various areas of one’s life. I am also interested in finding out which story you want to be in, which life is calling to you, and in helping you chart the way to get there. How to go from the story you feel stuck in, to the story you want to be in.
Stories come from childhood. This is not about blaming your parents, it’s about understanding how we have developed the beliefs and scripts (self- talk, thoughts, and theories or stories about how things go, how people behave, how we encode and respond to certain situations) that we act on along the way and how they are woven through our everyday interactions and approach to life. It is not uncommon to have internalized thoughts, actions, and beliefs of our parents, whether we like this or not, and it is important to identify this and to release and work with this in order to move forward.
The Power of Image:
The mind and the body believe in images. This fact has been consistently exemplified in sports psychology with respect to athletes engaging in visualization exercises, mentally running through the plays of the game, and being successful with their goals. We are impacted by movies that evoke strong emotion and sentiment with a combination of story and image. Image is also a powerful and useful tool for accessing the non-verbal information deep inside of us.
What we project onto or receive from an image can be very informative in identifying a block, a story we carry, a pattern we repeat, our potential, and even a dream we carry. With this in mind, I often use Tarot cards to evoke a sense of story- what do you see in the card? Is this indicative of what is unfolding in your life that you are having an issue with? Or is this what you would like to have in your life? Aside from the esoteric value and meaning inherent in this age old “book of the Self”, the images are helpful for assessing what is being projected onto the card (both positive and negative) as well as for what can often be captured non-verbally that needs to be identified and expressed and either embraced or released.
*Please be assured that I do not give Tarot readings or tell you your future*. For those of you drawn by the use of Tarot in therapy and who utilize Tarot in their lives as part of their spiritual development and path, I will happily deep dive with you in this context for your sessions (including exploration of the messages you receive in your own Tarot delvings etc). The use of Tarot cards in therapy will not be imposed on anyone who feels uncomfortable with Tarot, this is something that I offer that seems to resonate with a growing number of people who are seeking therapeutic sessions on their healing path.
In sessions, Tarot card images can also be used as jumping off points for writing, journaling, or drawing exercises as well as guided visualizations that can often be quite useful in terms of both relaxation, mindfulness, and accessing deeper wisdom. Other uses of imagery, in addition to guided visualizations include drawing exercises that can be explored further for symbolic meaning and emotional impact.
The Power of Dreams:
Dreams have captured our attention for many millennia and have been at the heart of movies, stories, poems and songs. Psychologist, Carl Jung, saw dreams as the psyche’s attempt to communicate important things to the individual, and he valued them highly as a way of knowing what was really going on. In this way he saw the psyche as a self-regulating system with all psychic contents – thoughts, feelings, dreams, intuitions etc. – having a purpose. Many ancient cultures shared the belief, in one way or another, that dreams are important for offering a window into a deeper understanding of ourselves and our connection to the world and everything in it. Dreams are often a reflection of the subconscious in terms of what needs to be addressed, released or moved towards. Your dreams can be a useful source of information about your emotional world, relationships, problems you are trying to solve, and an incredible source of inspiration for your creative projects and personal growth. A nightmare can have a lot of power over your life, it can also lead you to a place of confronting fears, recognizing a part of you that needs to be healed, or facing a situation that needs to be addressed. These are all important to work with as opposed to feeling limited by. Working with your dreams can yield a surprising amount of guidance for moving towards a life that is more aligned with the deeper wishes of your soul.
Embark on the Journey inward, and move towards the life you want to have:
Individual, couples, or family counselling $160/50 minute session
To explore spiritual, creative and personal development courses: cherylgrantcreative.ca
