Alchemical healing vs. psychotherapy

I worked as a psychotherapist and counsellor for 10 years, but now solely practice my unique form of alchemical healing as a coach, healer, and guide.

In the following subsections, I compare and contrast alchemical healing with psychotherapy so that you can consider which approach might be best suited to you.

Alchemical healing and psychotherapy: Two distinct healing Paths

Healing is a deeply personal journey: different approaches resonate with, and are effective for, different people.




While psychotherapy tends to focus at the ego1level—on understanding and shifting cognition, emotion, and behaviour—alchemical healing delves deeper: it seeks to catalyze soul-informed identity shifts, transmute psychological wounds, and spur spiritual expansion.

Both therapy and alchemical healing can be effective, but they are relatively distinct in their underlying philosophy, structure, and ‘feel.’

Psychotherapy

Psychotherapy can be defined as the assessment and treatment of cognitive, emotional or behavioural disturbances by psychotherapeutic means, delivered through a therapeutic relationship based primarily on verbal or non-verbal communication.

The goals of therapy are often to process challenging experiences, manage symptoms, and develop more functional ways of relating to oneself and others.

Typically, therapy is past and present focused (e.g., exploring how family-of-origin dysfunction has shaped a person’s self-concept).

psychotherapy

Therapy often includes:

  • Talk-based exploring: Engaging in discussions about your thoughts, emotions, and life experiences to gain a deeper understanding and facilitate ‘ego’ growth.
  • Gaining cognitive awareness: Delving into and challenging unhelpful thought patterns, beliefs, and past conditioning.
  • Emotional (and possibly somatic) processing: Engaging with techniques to process psychological wounds, regulate emotions, and move forward with greater resilience.
  • Learning practical tools: Often skills are learned to manage things like anxiety, depression, relationships, and stress.

Alchemical Healing

Unlike psychotherapy, alchemical healing goes beyond conscious understanding and processing.

As noted earlier, alchemical healing seeks to catalyze soul-informed identity shifts, transmute psychological wounds, and spur spiritual expansion.

Alchemical healing involves transforming patterns at the ‘foundational’ energetic level. This automatically shifts/heals the levels ‘above’ it (the cognitive, emotional, physical, behavioural) as the new energetic pattern is integrated.

These pattern changes lead a person to naturally embody new and authentic ways of being, knowing, and acting in the world. They also spur spiritual growth and awakening(s).

Alchemical Healing often includes:

  • Transforming energetically: Old wounds and blockages are transmuted through a variety of practices (e.g., energy healing/work, shamanic journeying). Talking takes place, but it’s energy doing ‘the work.’
  • Accessing intuitive guidance: Archetypal wisdom, dreams, symbology, synchronicity, inner-knowing, and spiritual connection guide the healing process—for both healer and client.
  • Connecting healing with nature and cosmos: Personal healing is connected to nature (e.g., the elements, the directions, seasonal and diurnal shifts, etc.) and cosmos (e.g., astrological influences, the quantum field). Inner and outer nature are not truly two.
  • Prioritizing wholeness over symptom relief: The goal is not to fix problems, but to help transmute pain and blockages. This release allows for the emergence of an authentic, empowered, and spiritually awakened self.

You can learn more about alchemical healing, here.

You can learn more about my unique approach to alchemical healing, here.

If alchemical healing resonates with you, feel free to drop me a line.

  1. Here, I am referring to the Jungian ego (as opposed to the Buddhist ego): the central part of our conscious mind, representing our sense of self, identity, and how we perceive ourselves, essentially acting as the organizer of our thoughts, feelings, and sensations within our conscious awareness.
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