reflections, Self-care, therapy

Therapist, know thyself (and take care of yourself)

aleksandrastaneva

Daily Limpias – or why it’s critical for any healthcare practitioner to take care of themselves.
A friend recently commented she could never imagine doing the work I do. “Being with all this pain, trauma, suffering all day, every day?!” She exclaimed. “Never!”

It is not untrue that the nature of my work is indeed to be quite often in the underworld. I often experience my work as a form of an undertaker who takes people on a journey in the darkest of their psyche. The underworld. It is often filled with pain and unexamined emotion, a storage of sorts that people have abandoned for years and have (un)successfully managed to escape from.

I found myself saying “But I thrive in the underworld!” and as surprising my own words resonated in my mind I do find this to be true.

I believe the reasons why this is the case are many, among them – my own story of having spent a lot of time in there, then having trained in matters of the heart and mind for over 25 years now and my fascination with darkness that started during my teens after my heart was broken and French Existentialism and the Stoics saved me.

Another key component of being so comfortable in the dark is my discipline and dedication to a daily practice of cleanse. Or as my Maestra Dr Clarissa Pinkola Estes Reyes calls them The Daily Limpias (from Spanish; limpiar means to clean):

🌀 Examine through Kind Eyes (the Divine, Goddess, the Universe or SELF)
🌀 Engage in daily bodily rest – yoga, stretching, dance, breathwork (any deliberate activity that connects me with my body)
🌀Attend to my Child spirit (connect with young parts of me and let them play, be carefree and joyful)
🌀 Attend to my Soul’s needs (invite beauty and everything that this represents, for me this is Nature, Stories, Dreamwork, social activism, ritual)
🌀 Tune into my Heart – and enter a dialogue where I only listen and inquire with compassion
I cannot imagine a therapist who doesn’t devote time daily to attend to themselves. This is a dangerous game they would be playing not only with their own process but importantly with their ability to hold another. So, therapists, healers of any sort, know thyself and take good and tender care of yourself.

With love in light and darkness,
Aleks 🖤🤍

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Published by aleksandrastaneva

Aleksandra She, who remembers. I work at the threshold, where psyche speaks in symbols, and the soul remembers. Rooted in Jungian depth psychology and Internal Family Systems, my work invites women and seekers into the quiet, often forgotten places within: the underworlds of grief, the wild terrain of desire, the sacred chambers of the inner child, inner mother, the Shadowlands, and Self. With a background in women’s heath research, in ritual, and in lived experience spaces, I do not offer diagnosis or treatment, I offer devotion to the unfolding Self. On the threshold of becoming- where we always are. Through dreams, parts work, myth, and the body, I walk beside those ready to meet themselves fully, fiercely, and tenderly. This is not fast work. It is sacred work. It is not about fixing, it is about remembering. I do not promise certainty. I promise presence, and a deep trust in the wisdom already within you. My work is rooted in the wild: in the seasons and the body, in the wisdom of the land, and in the deep ecology of the soul. I honour the personal as political, and the psychological as inseparable from the cultural. Feminism, ecopsychology, and embodied awareness are not add-ons here, they are the soil this work grows from. I offer one-on-one soulwork sessions, women’s circles, and immersive psychoeducational experiences that weave together depth psychology, parts work, and embodiment. Some of this work unfolds indoors, some in wild places—always with reverence for the wisdom of nature, the nervous system, and the feminine psyche. Welcome to the HORÓ nest. I think you might just be ready to re-member your Self.

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