"... though the heart is breaking,
happiness can exist in a moment, also.
And because the moment in which we live is all
the time there really is, we can keep going...
Perhaps our planet is for learning to appreciate
the extraordinary wonder of life that surrounds even
our suffering, and to say Yes, if through the thickest of tears."
- Alice Walker
Welcome
We are wounded in relationship, and we heal in relationship.
How does experiential therapy help?
Experiential psychotherapy is helpful because just talking and gaining insight often doesn't bring transformation. Change is fueled by us really connecting to what is happening, and by us creating a safe space to actually do and experience something new & different from our suffering.
The magic of experiential therapy is that we learn to really be with our whole selves, in real time in a new way. And we learn to trust ourselves as we sense what underlies whatever we are struggling with. The work I do helps you learn to process your emotions through, and when that happens, we find suffering transforms into something life giving.
This isn’t easy. We’ve learned to shut ourselves down; we’ve experienced anxiety, or depression, or intellectualizing, or we've self criticized for so long that these are neurologically wired in tight - it takes some work to notice what we are doing and it takes courage and safety to dare to do something different.
“... it takes practice to slow down, unwind, and open. We have to work at loosening our attachment to our thoughts, relaxing our resistance to our feelings, and releasing the tension in our bodies.”
(Psaris & Lyons, Undefended Love)
Our work together builds your skills to be:
Mindful
Mindfulness practice revolutionizes therapy and life because it lets us be with what is present and cultivate what we need: safety, acceptance, openness, compassion. Through our work, you will become more attuned to yourself and present in each moment. You will gain a greater understanding of how the mind works and how it can mire us in the past, in stress, depression & anxiety.
Embodied
Emotional pain and trauma is held in the body. Talking is helpful, but how we've survived is by shutting down our body's natural responses, and how we heal is by opening back up again - slowly, and in a safe space. Noticing the tension, moving with an impulse, holding our trembling heart. Emotions are not "good" or "bad," they are transformational physical processes
that connect us with our innate capacity to heal.
Awake
Why is this happening? What does this mean? Who am I? Resonant answers come from deep inside, and from our experience of who we are beyond our problems. My practice is grounded in the visceral knowing that each of us is essentially good, worthy, courageous, loving and wise. When we are not experiencing this, it is because we have armored ourselves against it - for a reason that made sense when we did it, but does no longer.
Contact Me
For any questions you have, you can reach me here:
Clare Brown
919.601.9587