Some of these choices are about my awareness of how blessed I am. The picture at the top of this post is a section of my office looking at the desk end. Those are the two domains of my professional life and reflect some of who I am.īelow is a picture of the therapy end of my actual office. The books I display are either therapy or business books. These days I have gone for simple, clean, uncluttered, professional. All these plaques sit in a box in a closet now. At times I had my walls covered with degrees, certifications, and several placards showing honors I have received. Now I have just one picture of the family. Simple and UnclutteredĪt times in my history, I displayed a large gallery of family photos. I hope that carries over to the process itself. Clients often comment on how much they like the warmth of the room. I’ve usually chosen “earth tones.” For the last decade or more, I designed my office with a grey/green feel. To the degree I had control, I wanted warm colors. The way we arrange a room symbolically expresses this commitment to balance. The importance of this is partly due to the need for all types of balance–spatial, time spent listening to each party, and my need for a balance in my understanding of all parties. This, of course, is difficult in some room arrangements but I did the best I could. I learned early that physical distance affected perceptions, both for me and for my clients. Balanced for couples counselingįrom early in my training as a couples therapist, I was always cognizant of attempting to balance the spatial distance between me and each member of a family or couple. Not because they are cold but just to cover. I even have a neutral-colored blanket on the back of the couch for those that wanted to cover. Now I try to set my room up much like a comfortable living room. What could the other partner do but also pick a chair? I am fine sitting on the couch. Most of the time I sat in one of the chairs through there were times I ended up on the couch, especially with those competitive couples where one chose the chair. I always had a full-sized couch and usually two living room chairs. What my space is like nowĮventually, I was able to upgrade my therapy office design to a real therapy office decor. I can make a pretty strong case for all these motivations. Maybe I was unsure about how much I wanted them to know me. Perhaps I feared real engagement with my clients. But now as I look back and see that perhaps I was just hiding, afraid of being known and possibly rejected. I think I thought that if I did not reveal much via my decor, I was providing a blank slate for my clients to project onto. Functional but no personality showing through. I think partly I lived with that because I did not have much money to put toward furnishings nor was I confident in my decorating skills. And yet for me, it took a while for me to figure out what to do with the canvas of my office.Įarly in my career, I just used leftover furnishings from the previous tenant. And often we did not have the authority to decorate the spaces and make them more “homey.” My early spacesįortunately for most of my career, I had the privilege of having therapy office space that I could decorate as I liked, as long as I did not paint the walls. In most cases, using these spaces for therapy was an afterthought. I just didn’t like it.Ĭhurch basements were utilitarian and of course, had multiple uses. But of course, we were in a medical setting where sterility is highly valued. These spaces did not have a therapy office decor. The walls were neutral, the lighting terrible, the seating functional and institutional. The hospital therapy rooms were totally set up with practicality as the only consideration. They just did not feel warm and friendly. These rooms were, in my experience, the least aesthetically pleasing settings I ever worked in. My least favorite places to see clients were in hospitals and in church basements. And I have no doubt that each space had an effect on the therapy. What impressions does your office design suggest? What does my therapy office design say about who I am and what this therapy experience will be? In my 40 years of practice, I have provided psychotherapy in over 15 different offices. A client comes to your therapy office for the first time.
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