I have seen a lot of mental health distress at home, and also how patriarchy, communalism and violence cause mental health distress. When I was struggling with a lot of these issues, I went to a really good counselor at the college I was studying in. That helped me to realise that I’d like to be like that for other people.

Seeing people’s unique resistance and courage to their problems and how beautiful a journey it is to find one’s way back to the self and the community, in solidarity.

A feeling of being understood and valid, and a sense that I am along-side them, next to them as we together figure out how distress can be reduced.

That they deserve a safe space which center their needs, feels helpful and does not discriminate them. Unfortunately, there are no clear answers to things like “how many sessions” because it is a process that does often go back and forth, so listen to yourself and ask if you’re making small shifts rather than looking at number of sessions. As Carl Jung said, “It is not that our problems go away or become smaller, but we grow bigger than the problem”

I aim for it to be a collaborative, safe, exciting and helpful relationship. Some of the things I do for this is letting them know that they can always disagree, be tentative in my interpretations and suggestions, seek feedback, be transparent and share notes that I take.

The amount of creativity, courage and resistance they display in the face of their problems.

I appreciate that I am calm, patient, respectful, creative and keep updating myself.

Reading, painting, baking, listening to music and playing with my cats.

I use post modern approaches a lot more. This means approaches that question power difference between client and therapist, and which also question that there is only one reality/truth. These approaches also question the source of our problems and believe that many of our issues originate in society/power/politics and so on. I do use tools from various therapies like CBT, solution focused therapy, narrative therapy, arts based therapy, therapeutic writing, buddhist psychology, acceptance and commitment therapy, emotion focused couple therapy, Gottman school of couple therapy and some family therapy schools as and when appropriate for the client.

I mention my pronouns in my first interaction with them, and I tell them about my understanding of queer affirmative work. I ask their pronouns and name. I ask about the sources of distress that originate in cis-heternormative patriarchy. I also make visuals to wish on relevant days like pride month or smaller milestones in their journey.