The Journey of a Therapist
For quite a long time, I’ve felt a quiet pull to share more of what I’m learning - both through my work as a therapist and through my own journey.
And, if I’m honest I’ve been scared to.
What if I get it wrong?
What if someone disagrees with me?
What if I’m not qualified enough to talk about it?
What if people judge me?
Underneath all of those questions, I’m beginning to recognise something much deeper:
The belief that my worth is connected to what I achieve, what I produce and what I earn.
So, perhaps, beginning to share is part of my own healing too.
I’ve spent much of my life being capable, independent, adaptable and hardworking.
Those qualities have served me enormously.
But I’m learning that the things that help us survive aren’t necessarily the things we need to keep doing when we are finally safe.
For me, healing has been less about becoming a different person and more about slowly understanding the parts of me that developed for very good reasons:
The part that believes I must work hard to be worthy.
The part that finds resting difficult.
The part that fears being seen and getting it wrong.
The part that wants to stay in control because needing others once felt unsafe.
The part that can mistake exhaustion for laziness.
And the part that is slowly discovering that perhaps I don’t have to earn my right to exist, receive, rest, be loved or take up space.
My therapeutic journey has taken me through many different approaches and ways of understanding ourselves – and increasingly I find myself bringing them together through a very simple questions:
What happened to you?
What did you have to learn to survive it?
What does that part of you need now?
I’m beginning to think of healing as a kind of map.
Not a straight line. Not a formula. And certainly not something I have completed.
But a map of the places we might visit along the way:
Understanding our nervous system
Recognising our protective parts
Meeting the younger part of ourselves with compassion
Allowing grief to be felt rather than continually outrun
Learning the difference between rest and collapse
Developing boundaries
Allowing ourselves to have needs and desires
Loosening the grip of shame and self-criticism
Separating our worth from productivity
Learning to receive
Becoming more comfortable being seen
And eventually discovering what life feels like when we are no longer living primarily from survival.
I want to start sharing some of these learnings here.
Some will come from my professional experiences as a therapist
Some will come from what I’m discovering in my own life.
And some will simply be questions I’m curious about and exploring.
I don’t want to preach. I don’t want to pretend I have all the answers. But I want to open conversations about the things many of us experience but don’t always have words for.
And perhaps, over time, I can bring these pieces together into something practical – a resource or course for people who want to understand themselves and begin their own healing journey, but who may not have access to ongoing one-to-one therapy.
So this is me beginning.
Beginning to step out from behind my work.
Beginning to let myself be seen.
Beginning to trust that I don’t have to be perfect to having something valuable to share.
And perhaps most importantly - beginning to discover that I can contribute without having to earn my worth through how much I do.
If any of this resonates with you, you’re very welcome to come along for the journey and join my mailing list:
