As therapists, it is vital that we have a good support system in place for our professional and confidential work.
Personal therapy is one way in which we can get this support. Supervision is another, and it will be the focus of these posts.
In this post, I’d like to talk about how supervision can be a space for self-care.
I usually address the self-care topic from a personal perspective, as you can find in my book 20 Self-Care Habits.
Therapists are also human.
We need to remember that when we go to our own therapy or when sitting opposite our clients as their therapists.
In that respect, we need to acknowledge our humanity and therefore what we need in order to be able to best support our clients through their own process.
To aide in this, I believe supervision should be a space for reflection.
To reflect on who we are as practitioners.
Who we are in our relationships with each client.
To reflect on the work we do, how we do it. Is it good enough?
Is there anything new we need to learn to help a particular client?
Are we up to date on our professional development?
What do we need from our supervisor and from ourselves?
From this, we can expect to develop our self-awareness and understand ourselves, who we are and how we practice better.
This will improve our practice and our relationships with our clients and with ourselves.
Being reflective in supervision, being self-aware and self-understanding will allow us to understand the need for keeping boundaries in order to keep the therapeutic relationship and ourselves as therapists safe.
When we reflect on how we use our time, we will find the ability to just stop and be.
If we are telling our clients to do that, it will be a great modelling tool if we have already learned to do this ourselves.
Supervision should allow you to just be, to reflect and to develop yourself as a practitioner through self-awareness and understanding.
The more we talk about what supervision should be about, what it should cover, and how it should support therapists in their private practice, the better equipped we all will be, and we will provide the a better service to our clients
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