The Balance Between Boundaries and Humanity

The Modern Therapist's Survival Guide with Curt Widhalm and Katie Vernoy

The Balance Between Boundaries and Humanity

An interview with Jamie Marich, Ph.D, on what it means to redefine therapy and how therapists can incorporate this idea into their practice. Curt and Katie talk with Jamie about the importance of therapists being vulnerable both with clients and publicly about their own mental health struggles to reduce the mental health stigma. We also explore factors that keep therapists from being vulnerable as well as other therapeutic and cultural considerations when doing so.

It’s time to reimagine therapy and what it means to be a therapist. To support you as a whole person and a therapist, your hosts, Curt Widhalm and Katie Vernoy talk about how to approach the role of therapist in the modern age.

Interview with Jamie Marich, Ph.D,

Dr. Jamie Marich (she/they) is a clinical trauma specialist, expressive artist, writer, yogini, performer, short filmmaker, Reiki master, TEDx speaker, and recovery advocate, she unites all of these elements in her mission to inspire healing in others. Jamie maintains a private practice and online education operations in her home base of Warren, OH. Marich is the founder of the Institute for Creative Mindfulness and the developer of the Dancing Mindfulness approach to expressive arts therapy. Marich is the author of several books, including EMDR Made Simple: 4 Approaches for Using EMDR with Every Client (2011), Trauma and the Twelve Steps: A Complete Guide for Recovery Enhancement (2012), Trauma Made Simple: Competencies in Assessment, Treatment, and Working with Survivors, and Dancing Mindfulness: A Creative Path to Healing and Transformation (2015). NALGAP: The Association of Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual, Transgender Addiction Professionals and Their Allies awarded Jamie with their esteemed President’s Award in 2015 for her work as an LGBT advocate. The EMDR International Association (EMDRIA) granted Jamie the 2019 Advocacy in EMDR Award for her using her public platform in media and in the addiction field to advance awareness about EMDR therapy. Marich is in long-term addiction recovery and is actively living with a Dissociative Disorder.

In this episode we talk about:

• Who Jamie Marich is and what she puts out in the world.
• The story behind #RedefineTherapy.
• A look at what needs to be redefined in therapy and why.
• Discussion about balancing the art and science of therapy to allow for more flexibility within our field.
• Factors that contribute to clinicians rigidly adhering to evidenced based practices.
• How clinicians can make changes at a societal level to redefine therapy.
• The importance of clinicians being vulnerable and sharing their own struggles with mental health.
• An exploration of the balance between being authentic/vulnerable with clients and setting appropriate boundaries.
• Cultural considerations in redefining therapy.
• What keeps therapist from being vulnerable in therapy.
• Using a both/and approach to merge how therapy has been done in the past and how it will be done in the future as therapy continues to be redefined and reimagined.