my beautiful office

I’m loving being in my office. Morgaine, my office partner of twenty years is leaving her practice. She has a new business selling yarn and spinning wheels. As a result I’ve inherited some of her furniture. The new sand tray shelves and bookcase inspired me to move everything around and clean up my clutter. I’ve cleared out all the old papers and all the objects and books that no longer hold interest. Everything that is left is there because I want it to be there. Thus, it all gives me pleasure. It’s making me look at my space with new eyes, and to be more present in my work.

When I walked in today, I felt like a kid at Christmas, every object giving me a sense of wonder, all feeling like gifts. A woman I once went to for consultation, who was brilliant in regards to the theory I was interested in, would go on at length how the “clinical container” (the therapy office) should be devoid of personality. I took a lot of what she said to heart, but not this. Never this. I could no more work in an office devoid of personality, devoid of beauty, than I could work in a mall. It’s not healthy. It’s not human, or it’s not the kind of humanity I want to endorse. Plus, her space said a lot about her personality, for what we think is personality free actually speaks volumes about us.

My office is full of color and texture. There are shells, rocks, feathers, tarot cards, runes, statues of beloved deities, books of poetry, plants, and art everywhere. It is an office of therapist who is also a witch. It is an office of a witch who happens to be a therapist. The majority of my clients may never know that I’m a witch, but most eventually learn that this office is a place of magic, of changing consciousness at will. Today, I felt the spirits of the office recharged and renewed, mine as well, fully alert and interested in each client and what change can be wrought within the fifty minutes.

Something about my room today made me more mindful of my attunement to how the elements flow thru (or don’t!) each session. I pay attention to air by watching the breathe, the thought patterns, how boundaries are navigated, how beginnings and endings are experienced, all of these things I notice. Fire makes itself known by the energy of the person, how they experience their will and their sexuality, what pride and shame mean to them, understanding their passions, and their anger. By tuning into this, I tune into fire. I gage waters presence by examining the fluidity of the session, dreams, emotions, how the heart opens and closes. Earth shows up by attending to the body, watching how my clients inhabit their flesh, asking where things are felt as we talk, exploring their relationship to the physical world, and how they physically take care of themselves. My notes today reflected this, most say things like “fire went out when talking about work” and “things shifted when breathe focused on”.

Therapy by its very nature is magic. By committing to the sacred space (the clinical container!) of the therapy office and its fifty minute hour, we open to a shift in our consciousness. Part of therapy is to figure out what we want to shift and why, thus making our intent transparent and invoking it. The key to any magical working is clear intent. Once that intent is made, the elements of life have a funny way of jumping in to assist this coming into being. In my beautiful office, today I felt this happening. How lucky I am to do this work.