Dear Healing Arts Professional,
Welcome to The Colorado Association of Psychotherapists
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November
2008 President's Message
Dear Members and Colleagues,
Was that the shortest Summer! Can I have an instant replay?
And where did the year go!
Everyone should have received my email in October announcing that we
had cancelled the Fall workshop. Many things needed to come together
to have a successful workshop but unfortunately didn't. We will
be looking into a workshop for Fall 2009 after the first of the
year. If you have ideas about what you'd like to see us offer,
please let me know!
CAP's primary role is to protect the right of psychotherapists to
practice in the state of Colorado. Our lobbyist keeps a eye out
for legislation that might be introduced in the Colorado Legislature
that might have a negative impact on that right. Should such a
bill be introduced, our lobbyist works with various legislators to
educate them about that bill's affect on our profession, with the
ultimate goal being to have the bill killed in committee, or on the
floor.
Non-licensed psychotherapists are governed by the mental health statute
and by the Mental Health Grievance Board at DORA. From time to
time, CAP may have a difference of opinion from the Board regarding how
the law is interpreted, or with how the Board functions. Through
our lobbyist, CAP works to have legislation introduced during the
Legislative session to clarify the statute and resolve the differences
of opinion.
When we are working to introduce legislation, we partner with other
therapist organizations in the Mental Health Coalition so we can
present a united front to the Legislature. That partnership gives
us greater visibility and credibility and it also builds on the
relationships we have with our colleagues in other therapy
professions.
The mental health statute is up for its Sunset review in 2010.
CAP will be working to identify changes to the statute that would
better serve our profession. To be most effective in the
Legislature, we need a much larger membership. The more members
we have, the greater our influence and visibility, and the more likely
we will be successful in our efforts.
CAP sends out membership packets to everyone on the DORA
database. I'd like to ask that if you have a colleague who is not
a CAP member that you encourage them to join. And if you have a
colleague who is not listed on the database, please, for their safety,
encourage them to take the jurisprudence test and become listed, and
invite them to join CAP. It is through CAP dues that we are able
to pay for our lobbyist and ensure that all of us continue to have the
right to practice in Colorado and do the great healing work that we do.
Have a wonderful holiday season everyone!
Ed Robb
President
of the Colorado Association of Psychotherapists
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The
Power Of A Loving Consciousness
by Pamela Welch, MA
Although I have training in several very effective psychotherapy and
hypnotherapy methods, I am continually in awe of the healing power
which lies, not in any specific technique, but within the
client-therapist relationship itself. By allowing myself to be truly
present with my clients in a state of loving consciousness, I witness
the deep profound shifts and the transformative realizations that can
emerge for people as a result. This is the type of healing and
wholeness that comes forth from "being with" rather than
"doing to" an individual in the therapy process.
John Welwood has stated that "all psychopathology springs
from...failure to value ourselves unconditionally." This means
that the most effective and powerful therapy will occur by creating the
conditions for healing to take place through a state of loving
presence. In fact, repeated research in such places as John Hopkins has
shown that the therapeutic impact attributed to the psychotherapist is
eight times greater than that associated with the treatment technique.
(See the book, Human Change Processes by Michael Mahoney.) In
other words, the consciousness and heartfelt presence of the therapist
is far more transformative than any psychotherapeutic technique and aside
from the client's own motivation for growth, it is the most dynamic and
essential part of the psychotherapy
process.
Obviously, our clients come to us because we have certain tools and
expertise to assist them. However, even the agenda of a particular
therapy technique can limit us by giving us a type of tunnel vision
which prevents us from seeing the true needs of the client in any given
moment. I have found that when I let go of my own expectations and my
concepts of how I think things will happen, it opens the space for
unlimited possibilities and the profound miracles that are possible in
the therapeutic process. This requires that the wisdom of the client's
own innate healing force be trusted.
As an experiment once, I sat with a client and listened as she talked
without interrupting with any questions, comments or analysis. Even at
points where I was convinced that I needed more information to assist
the client, I simply sat and truly received what the person had to say
in a state of compassionate consciousness. I was amazed at what
transpired. The questions that I had originally wanted to ask were all
answered as the clients process naturally unfolded through tender
feelings and deep shifts, without my interference.
Obviously, specific therapeutic interventions and techniques are an
essential part of the therapy process. However, this experience
illustrated to me that, as a therapist, my state of consciousness alone
can either enhance or prevent healing from taking place. This
realization has transformed my relationship with my clients and has
dramatically increased the effectiveness of my therapy work. Since this
original experience, I have had the power of a loving presence shown to
me, in various ways, again and again in client sessions.
Pamela Welch, M.A., C.C.Ht., BCPC
www.soultranceformations.com
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Doing Your Own Healing Work
As
therapists, our capacity to help our clients is continuously increased
through doing our own healing work. This piece was written as
inner child work and describes a hike taken by the author, Paul
Chubbuck, a Somatic Experiencing Practitioner in Fort Collins.
Her
red rock cliffs do not yield to direct routes as I walk with him - he,
the one so angry he will not talk to me. But walk he will, so
walk we do, between huge slabs of ancient seabed, upturned and dark
rust red in the pre-dawn light.
Slick
rock slopes draw us towards a promontory, ideal for watching sunrise, I
think. He follows sullenly.
I
would beeline towards that high point, but she has other plans,
repeatedly blocking us with unexpected drop-offs and slopes too
steep. Usually they are seductive-only a little too steep, or
just a bit too far to leap.
Each
time I consider taking the chance, but turn back at images of broken
limbs in the wilderness. I couldn't burden him with saving
me. Not his job at six years old.
So,
to climb safely for us both, we follow a nearly level ledge of
layered rock veering away from my goal which is now hidden behind
impenetrable cliffs.
She
never promises safe passage, only seduces me onward with her
beauty. Even so, in my wanderings, I have always reached my
destinations, albeit after numerous patient detours and turnarounds.
And
it is so this time again. I imagine her smiling at us as suddenly
we come upon a passage up and through the cliff, as easy as a few
flights of stairs. Now a higher ledge is our new road, beside yet
another unclimbable cliff. Back we trek in the opposite
direction, following her sensual curves as the dawning light grows
friendlier.
Still
silent he shadows me. It isn't my fault he's so hurt. Born
into a battle, his Father resented him from the start and his Mother
sometimes abandoned him. "Sometimes" might not sound
too bad, unless you realize that, for an infant, that's the fear
equivalent of "sometimes" being attacked by an angry grizzly.
So now he's mine to deal with, to suffer his silences, his sullenness,
his insolence, the only powers he believes he has, and all directed at
me, the grownup in his life. And we seem to be stuck together,
for better or for worse, to heal or to hell.
Yet
again, she opens graciously to us, this time with a steep but passable
couloir of crumbling rock taking us another rung higher. The peak
across the valley catches the first orange glow and I wonder if she'll
allow us to make the top by sunrise.
Sometimes
my impatience with him flares, like when he sabotages with his intense
needs my new relationships with women. "Complain to the ones
who hurt you," I shout angrily, "It wasn't I who hurt you and
you know it." But his despair is beyond reason and seems
inconsolable.
Coyotes
share morning news as our goal sits close above and to our left.
I wonder if she might yet block us from the summit. I turn twice
to offer him encouragement, but he is silent beyond scorn. Still
he is right behind me, has not refused to continue as in the past, and
now I know that we will either make it to the top soon, or be turned
back a final time.
Then
she yields to us again. I imagine her laugh when we come to a
tumble of auto-sized boulders breaking the solid cliff and we turn in
for the final scramble to the top. It's not too rough-going, but
six-year old legs are short. From a solid stance, I reach a hand
down. He takes it just long enough for a boost over the
edge. And then we are there -- front row seats and just in time
for the main show. We wait for that sweet moment when the sun's
leading edge pierces the horizon. When it comes, I break silence
with, "She's doing it again. Isn't she beautiful?"
"Yeah",
he answers, and deep inside my chest, the sun rises.
Paul Chubbuck, Somatic
Experiencing Practitioner
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Free
Publicity for Your Practice
Can
you write well about your area of expertise? Then spread the word
about your practice by contributing an article of approximately 500 words
to this CAP newsletter on a topic that would be of general interest to
CAP membership, such as the article on the power of a loving
consciousness by Pamela Welch in this issue. Your email or website link
will be included with the byline.
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