Consultations for Therapists

the philosohpy behind alchemy of erosBeing a therapist or a counselor can at times feel like a lonely job. It’s essential to have a space where you are free to discuss client cases and receive support, feedback, and guidance.

Individual case consultations can make a world of difference in helping us with our own blind spots and biases, developing new strategies, expanding our insights and perceptions of what we see in our clients, and receiving feedback on the effectiveness of our interventions.

Here are some of the areas an experienced process-oriented therapist-mentor can assist you with:

  • Working with transference and counter-transference
  • Distinguishing between counter-transference and being “dreamt up
  • Using your own momentary reactions in ways that are useful for the client’s process
  • Getting insight into your own blind spots and edges, and how these impact your work with clients
  • Developing new ways of working and expand your repertoire
  • Dealing with overt or subtle attacks in the therapeutic context
  • Deepening your understanding of your client’s process by using structural analysis, and exploring the deeper Dreaming in the background
  • Gauging whether or not you are the right therapist for a specific client
  • Dealing with complex situations around conflicts, and/or ethical issues
  • Helping you with areas where you are stuck

Consultations for Facilitators

Being a facilitator can be both an exciting and stressful job. Standing in front of a small or large group of people who are all watching (and evaluating) you can be exhilarating, traumatic, terrifying, inspiring, empowering, or disempowering. Most facilitators have had a mix of all of those experiences.

Receiving mentoring and guidance from an experienced process-oriented facilitator can help you with some or more of the following areas:

  • Designing customized interventions and workshop formats and content
  • Deepening your understanding of the group’s process by using structural analysis, and exploring the deeper Dreaming in the background
  • Creating a collaborative alliance with your co-facilitator, and working through (potential) conflict areas
  • Dealing with complex situations around facilitating conflicts, moods, atmosphere, hidden agendas and other background processes as they organically emerge in the group
  • Facilitating Deep Democracy: Helping you see the various polarities and roles in a group and how to make room for all the different voices, especially marginalized voices, so everyone has a chance to be heard and to express their side
  • Facilitating complex group dynamics around power differences, marginalization, insider-outsider dynamics, and diversity issues
  • Gauging when a group, individual, or couple gets to an edge and how to work with these edges in the moment
  • Assessing how your own feelings and reactions, as well as the dynamics between co-facilitators, are part of a group’s field and how to utilize these in ways that are useful for the group’s process
  • Getting insight into your own blind spots and edges, and how these impact your facilitation
  • Developing new ways of working and expanding your repertoire
  • Dealing with overt or subtle facilitator attacks