Self-Expression Counselling

Creative Expression to Integrate Your Repression and Understand Your Pain

 

"Just as a burning fire inherently exudes heat, the unconscious inherently generates symbols. It is simply the nature of the unconscious to do so.

 

As we learn to read those symbols we gain the ability to perceive the workings of the unconscious within us.

This ability to produce symbols affects more than just our dreams: All of human life is a nourished by the flow of symbolic imagery from the wellsprings of our unconscious."

 

-Robert A. Johnson

 

Most of us are afraid to admit that we secretly live in quiet desperation, helplessly pushing down our emotional pain - so much so - that creative. purposeful living does not even feel like an option. Introducing a small doable, daily creative practice into our lives invites inner imagery and the personal symbols that give us clues to the path of our unique unfolding and a path to clearing difficult feelings. We each have an original, uniquely vibrant creative self to express that is beyond what we think we should be in our families and in society.

 

When you are overwhelmed with emotional pain, you will surely be repressing your creative purposes and your authentic self expression. Life can feel flat, exhausting and meaningless when your emotional pain body is active and is running your life. If you are struggling with depression, meaninglessness or low self-worth, you will be supported to start a daily creative practice outside of session time, such as writing exercises, journaling, writing down your dreams and daily focusing to help you find out who you are inside. You will guided and choose your own creative path.

 

Practically speaking we all need to learn how to listen to our inner life so that we can heal our issues of depression, low self-worth and anxiety. If we keep running away from our inner pain, we can travel through life ignoring what is original and authentic within us. We will ignore the wisdom of our feminine intuitive voices within. As we travel through our practical routines, depressed and repressed can feel like our "normal" and we may not even realize how much of our passionate, authentic and vibrant being that we keep pushed under.

 

Support for Your Inner Pain

 

"Self-acceptance is equivalent to personal power. Self-acceptance means we are unified: all our energy is centered and flows outward. Non-self-acceptance creates an inner rupture and inner warfare. In non-self-acceptance we use our energy to hide from our self. As a result we have less energy for directly coping with the world. Self-acceptance makes us fully functional." 

 

-John Bradshaw

I feel a profound care for who you are in your own unique creation, and a respect for the particular design of how your life needs to unfold. Your inner creative world holds the key, and together we can explore who you are and what you need to express in your life. The aim of the services on this site it to help you find your own inner strength and direction through creative tools and practices. I am a registered therapist with the Canadian Professional Counselling Association. My approach as a counsellor is support you to move through your emotional pain to make more room for more creativity, self-acceptance, personal insight, spontaneity and joy in your daily life.

 

If you are not feeling grateful and at peace with your life, the way it is right now, you can be sure that you are creating your life from your emotional pain body. I offer you creative tools, programs, encouragement and support for the parts of yourself that you hide and repress out of fear, hurt, denial, embarrasment and shame. Who you authentically are is on the other side of your unintegrated painful emotions. As a person who has traveled the path, I offer you an embodied creative encouragement for the larger you that wants to express itself in your life.

 

The main focus in self-expression counselling is to support you towards your creative and spiritual goals by moving through and integrating the emotional pain that sits out in front and blocks the expression of your creative self. I offer compassionate one to one in person counselling in the Vancouver, Canada area and by phone worldwide that will help you get to the truth and the heart of what emotional pain is blocking you from living your best life. I offer you support to find your own creative guidance for your inner work.

 

Expressive Art Combined with Weekly Self-Expression Counselling

 

Engaging in a daily expressive/creative modality on your own time while engaging in weekly one to one counselling on how to move your life forward deepens your exploratory experience  so that you may experience exponential insights and make the best use your counselling time. If you are unsure of what modality of creative self-expression that you would like to explore and dedicate your time to see Expressive Art Healing Modalities.

 

Exploring the Symbolism of your Life with Self-Expression Counselling

 

If you are not drawn to creative self-expression practices you only need to look more deeply into the symbolism of your daily life to begin to understand your place in it. Life events are like a form of "daily collage" where you can start to look at the patterns of your life for meaning and direction. Dreams are like a form of "nightly collage" where your unconscious and subconscious mind speaks to you in metaphor and pictures.  Learning how to "read" your life intuitively by paying attention to your daily events and night time dreams helps you to move forward into your life. 

 

Daily Life as a Creative Process - Your life situation is always expressing truths about you that you may not currently be able to fully understand. You may not be listening to what you need to feel genuinely happy. If you feel that visual creative expression are not for you, exploring the underlying meanings and messages embedded within your daily life as it is unfolding now and the state of your current relationships through Depth Journaling. You can begin to see why certain parts of your life work and certain parts do not and how to move forward with more depth, creativity and spirituality in your life.

 

Nightly Dreams as a Creative Process - If you have vivid dreams or are experiencing events in your life that are troubling your or that you do not understand you may want to explore integrating your shadow and recording your dreams to begin to understand your own submerged authentic needs and deeper desires. Working with your dreams helps you to see all the parts of you that want different goals and to sort out your contrary and conflicting motivations so that you can move towards your most authentic dreams and intentions.