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Hi! I'm Shayla
Writer | Facilitator | Integration Coach | Peer Counselor & Teacher
For over 30 years I've been on a healing journey, and for almost as long I have known my goal was to help other people with theirs.
​While my professional life for all that time took me all over the world to work in the corporate sector and tech fields, I gravitated towards roles that fed my fascination with human behavior and interactions. This gave me in-depth understanding of how people and systems ticked, along with decades of experience with facilitation, interviewing and training.​​
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In addition to an Internal Family Systems (IFS) informed coaching certificate from Pisgah Coaching Institute, I have over 25 years of practice as a peer counselor where I hold space for clients to do deep transformative emotional processing, and have facilitated workshops and sharing circles, along with teaching classes in emotional intelligence.
Since 2019 I have been on my own integration journey, and bring firsthand knowledge of how powerful it has been to healing my PTSD, intergenerational trauma, anxiety, dissociation and depression. Through this experience I learned not only that I had always yearned to be a writer, but also how I needed to befriend and re-integrate the parts of myself that I had previously exiled and hidden from myself and the world.
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As an integration coach I work with my clients to figure out what they hope to heal by doing a their own journeys and what might get in the way. I prepare them for being open to parts of self that could surface in a session, and help them process afterwards to ensure that those experiences lead to meaningful and sustained growth rather than fleeting insights.
FAQs
What if I'm already in therapy? Can I still do this work? Let's chat! In most cases integration coaching and/or peer counseling are excellent supplements for helping you get more effective therapy sessions and can work to assist your processing of work brought up in your therapy.
Do you take insurance? Unfortunately not. If finances are a concern contact me to discuss what might be options for you.
How do I work with you? For integration coaching sessions you can choose the amount of sessions (3, 10 or 22) that you want to commit to upfront and then use within a required timeframe. That way you set the pace of your healing. If you want to do peer counseling classes we will chat to see if you can join the next available cohort. I am happy to work with folks in either capacity. At this stage classes and integration coaching is held online, but I'm hoping to get in-person sessions up and running in Seattle soon.
I'm going through a tough time financially right now, do you have any discounts? Contact me to talk about your situation. For the integration coaching we might be able to work out a sliding scale price, or maybe a small group situation where you share the cost and time for a session. If you are interested in the peer counseling classes a scholarship may be available to cover all or part of your class cost.
What is the difference between integration coaching and the peer counseling training you offer? The two go hand in hand. You can join one of my classes to first learn the peer-counseling training and then later switch to individual integration coaching sessions to deepen your experience, or start with me as your integration coach and later decide if you want to do the group peer-counseling classes. It is up to you how you want to approach this work, but it is ok to do both as you will get more out of our time together and deepen your practice and skills that way.
Is integration coaching or peer counseling a replacement for regular therapy? No. This is different kind of work. Therapy is a clinical modality. I am teaching/coaching you on the skills to help you understand yourself and emotional landscape better and have a deeper, more healing relationship with all aspects of yourself. This work might not be for you if you are unable to reach or maintain that level of self awareness, empathy and compassion.