Understanding the approach and philosophy of your therapist helps you to better understand the foundation upon which your therapy is based. The specific approaches that a therapist uses are the ways in which they professionally identify and define themselves within their practice.

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Humanistic

A humanistic therapist focuses on the individual and each person’s perception, understanding, and internalization of their experiences. Humanistic therapy believes in self-determination, that individuals actively make choices about their behaviors and their responses to events in their lives. Humanistic therapy is holistic, examining the whole person as greater than the sum of its parts, and encourages clients in self-actualization through self-understanding, self-mastery, and through their creative expression.

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Contemplative

A contemplative therapist uses mindfulness, openness, clarity, and compassion to support their clients. Openness and clarity in contemplative therapy are the bringing of mindful awareness to everything we experience through our senses, including our thoughts and emotions, and not turning away from the experience becuse we are frightened, or because of its intensity, or in fear of pain.

Through our understanding of mindfulness—touching life deeply in the present moment—we can receive our life experiences and recognize our thoughts and emotions, whether positive or negative, as being simply thoughts and emotions. In this way, we are able to disengage and experience them without fear. Contemplative therapy believes in each individual’s innate capacity for compassion, connection, brilliance, and beauty.

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Narrative

Narrative therapy is a way of understanding how problems affect people’s lives. In narrative therapy, individuals view their problems as separate from themselves. The client has a significant and active role in determining the direction in which their therapy will move. A narrative therapist is non-blaming, respectful, and sees the individual as the expert in their own lives. In narrative therapy, clients re-author the dominant stories and conversations of their lives to make new meanings of their relationships, their understanding of self, and how they live and form their lives.

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Intermodal Creative Arts Therapy

Intermodal creative arts therapy is an approach in which the Creative Arts Therapist uses more than one creative arts area in their work. An intermodal Creative Arts Therapist draws on multiple creative arts areas and moves among them with their clients during sessions.

Unlike in Expressive Therapy, a Creative Arts Therapist must have formal training as an artist in an arts area, for example, in music, the visual arts, dramatic arts, or in dance. An intermodal Creative Arts Therapist has had formal training as an artist in more than one arts area, usually three different arts areas, and use these areas in their work.

In Expressive Therapy, the common saying is: “It’s the process not the product that matters.”

In Creative Arts Therapy, however, the created artwork is equally as important as the process.

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Eclectic

An eclectic approach in therapy is flexible and personalized. It combines the theoretical orientations and techniques from various different therapy models in order to address the unique needs of each client. Eclectic therapists choose the most effective therapy strategy based on the client’s specific issues, needs, and goals. Eclectic therapists draw from evidence-based practices such as Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT), Dialectical Behavior Therapy (DBT), Positive Therapy, Psychodynamic Therapy, and more—always with the focus of what works best with each individual client.

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CELACare Eco-Health, Inc.

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