Adults
Explore non‑verbal, symbolic processes as ways to broaden, deepen, and enhance your communication with yourself
Sandplay therapy with adults
Sandplay offers a uniquely gentle yet powerful pathway for inner discovery and healing. In Sandplay, participants are invited to create with the sand in the tray and a wide selection of miniature figurines. Because the process is non-verbal and symbolic, it allows parts of ourselves and aspects of our experiences that are usually unconscious to rise to the surface and be expressed. The process has an inherent safety, in that it is the participant's hands and fuller self that choose what to bring forward.
As these previously unknown inner worlds emerge in the sand, we can safely witness difficult or traumatic experiences and identify and feel how these experiences live on in our present lives. Step by step, integrating these experiences into a cohesive and connected whole is the process of healing.
Sandplay also brings new perspectives and generates insights and understanding for participants. Ultimately, Sandplay is a process of agency, helping us orientate to our fuller selves and move in our own lives with greater awareness and choice, allowing us to shape new directions.
Participants typically move fluidly between Sandplay, art-making, and talking and reflective processes, choosing the approach they are drawn to on any given day.
Art therapy with adults
Similarly to Sandplay, art therapy uses non-verbal, creative processes that create the opportunity for people to come into fuller relationships with themselves. Art therapy is different from art-making in other settings. In art therapy, we orientate inwardly—toward our own unique creativity—rather than focusing on external expectations (such as someone else's idea of artistic skill).
Art-making processes can begin in a few different ways: either with an open invitation to create using the materials in my art studio, or by helping you identify images, metaphors, or symbols that you have referenced or discussed.
You might choose to create with clay, collage, natural materials, found objects, fibres, fabrics, or painting and drawing materials. I will support you in choosing the materials you're drawn to, creating a space where you can make something meaningful.
Sessions will also involve reflecting on your artwork and creative processes. I will help you reflect on your work and gain deeper understanding from what you have created. Over time, as you creatively explore more of your inner world, you will broaden, deepen, and enhance your communication with yourself. In this way, you will begin to know and integrate more of yourself and your life experiences—movements towards becoming your fuller self: a position of more awareness, compassion, and balance.
As a participant in creative therapies myself, I have experienced safe therapeutic relationships that allowed me to be more open and curious about who I am. I have mapped this more open and curious place for myself, and I offer the feeling of this place back to you as you begin your own exploration.
