As your boat crosses the river, a storm tips you overboard.
Are you prepared to uncover the challenges you will find in these strange waters?
There are ways to get unstuck, but we must first learn why we are stuck. Realistically, we must also prepare to get stuck and unstuck over and over again. This is the divine comedy of the human condition.
If you elect to enter psychotherapy with me as your guide, among other resources, I will share with you a model of natural change known as "Harmonizing Rhythms" to help you understand the cycle of getting stuck and unstuck, just like falling asleep and waking up. If you are willing, we will also explore the pace of your life, be it in your relationships, your work, and your personal healing. Understanding the pace of these different aspects of your life, we will begin a journey to explore sources of inspiration, the most important of which is YOU.
If you are prepared to invest in yourself, this approach can empower you to reach out to your unknown future and to the possibilities of wonder and contentment.
I am devoted to providing a caring approach centered on YOU. Whether you have suffered trauma, loss, or disconnection from relationships or from yourself, I get it. Over two decades of psychological counseling experience combined with having lived through these issues in my own life helped me understand what you’re going through.
In your first appointment, I will engage you in a discussion of where you wish to go in treatment. Based on this conversation, you will have the opportunity to discuss how long a course of psychotherapy might take and what the healing activities could be during your future sessions.
Because one size does not fit all, I offer a variety of approaches to understanding your body, mind, and spirit. These include cognitive-behaviour therapy (CBT), exploration of childhood, nature-based wisdom, animal-assisted therapy, and psychedelic integration to treat trauma and loss. At Dawson Psychological Services, you can improve your health One Circle at a Time.
Unifying Approaches to the Body, Mind and Self
This approach takes to integration is informed by Gregg Henriques’ “Grand Unified Theory of Psychology” among other integrative models of treatment. For more information on this topic, visit the article I wrote on unifying psychological approaches. In a nutshell, all the treatment approaches just mentioned enter into a unified or holistic movement toward health.
Like the story of the blind men, each of whom “saw” the elephant in a different way, psychology is a little bit like the blind men who use their remaining senses to try to identify its many parts. But only if we look at all those parts as worthy of attention can we gain the cooperation of each part and an understanding of the whole elephant.
Internal Family Systems theory, developed by Dick Schwartz, is foremost in the therapeutic appreciation of the diversity and functioning of different parts of the mind, body, and self. No Bad Parts, a readable book by Schwartz, suggests that – like its title – we have “no bad parts”. However bad we might feel, all our parts must be included in our understanding of ourselves.
This principle applies to psychology as well. There are no bad parts in psychology. That includes our minds, our bodies, and our feelings. In my approach to therapy, I focus on CBT, childhood development, nature-based wisdom, biological rhythms, and our cosmic evolution. The present moment is the container in which our various parts are brought together (that is, integrated) into who and what we are. Like no parts of ourselves are bad, psychological theories are “all-good”! Psychological theories not only provide tools for understanding, but also ways to connect with other life-forms, including our partners, pets, and friends.
Like our breath, each part of ourselves contain gifts we can accept or inhale (like oxygen) and gifts we can give away or exhale (like carbon dioxide). We each have things we can share (such as sharing carbon dioxide with plants) and things we absorb (such as the oxygen that plants share with us). Neither is bad; they are both good for all of us if they are in harmony. It is my purpose to help you find harmony in your life. I use the unifying models and theories already mentioned to help bring the different forces in your life that are out of sync back into harmony.
Novel Treatment Approaches
Animal-assisted therapy and psychedelic integration therapy focus on the natural world. They have been around for at least several hundred years and they are not as recent as one might think. Though they have not been formally researched on a large scale until the last few decades, psychedelics have been used by indigenous peoples since time immemorial and began their use in clinical settings in the 1950s.
Animals have assisted people for a very long time as well. Cave paintings around the world suggest indigenous origins of agriculture and often spiritual relationships with animals. Animal-assisted therapy as it is presently used appeared in the 1800s by Florence Nightingale, who observed that small pets reduced levels of anxiety and stress in adult and youth psychiatric patients.
Risks
Risks of canine-assisted therapy include loud barking, distraction from the purpose of therapy, or allergic reactions to dogs. Take a look at the Animal-assisted Therapy page on this website for more information about risks and benefits of canine-assisted therapy.
Risks of psychedelic integration therapy may include difficulties reconciling oneself with:
a. psychodynamic, familial, or interpersonal conflicts, and,
b. a desire to relive ecstatic states of consciousness or as an escape from the problems of daily life.
Confusion and distress may be associated with the difficult personal themes that can arise after a challenging psychedelic experience. Because I am not involved in psychedelic medicine sessions, risks associated with being under the influence do not apply to psychedelic integration therapy. However, the emotions evoked after difficult psychedelic medicine sessions can be more intense than usual.
Knowing these risks, more conventional therapeutic services such as "talk therapy" or CBT can be provided in lieu of either animal-assisted therapy or psychedelic integration therapy. As a client, you have a right to choose which service you would prefer to receive to address the issues that bring you to see a psychologist.
Resources
For more information, read about integrating difficult life experiences – including those with psychedelics - on the Psychedelic Integration Therapy page.
Read about the helpfulness of meeting my friendly labradoodle on my Animal-assisted Therapy page.
In addition, provide a well-researched self-help approach to support you in making the psychological changes you want. As my client, explore the changes you want in your life by following the guide available on my companion website, Psychological Health for Life.
To meet me, check out this 20-second video:
Welcome to Dawson Psychological Services!
For more information about my wide array of treatment approaches, read the "Time to Heal" pages.
To book an appointment, email Dr. Dawson at [email protected] or call (855) 782-6583 and start your journey towards a healthier life.