Oftentimes in the therapy field, it can be illusive what true options are here for us other than private practice or community mental health. Depending on your program, you may or may not have had the support and education about what steps are actually required after you walk at graduation.

In The Alternative Therapist Lab, Rachel mentors you through your next steps based on what aspects of therapeutic service light a spark within you: teaching, mentorship, high-acuity diagnoses, group work, school settings, adolescents, couples, families, intensives, inpatient, outpatient, hospital settings, community support and more. In our space, you have the safe space to explore a hybrid — a mix and match — of your ideal way of service that aligns with your gifts.

If you are looking to get licensed, it is important to apply for your pre-licensure certificate so that you can begin accruing hours to put toward your licensure.

Licensure requirements include:

• Supervision hours by an accredited supervisor

• Client-facing hours (varies by state)

• Passing National exam

• Passing State’s jurisprudence exam

• Continued Education hours (typically required every 2 years)

Look up your requirements for your specific degree (ex. LMFT, LPC, LCSW) based on the state you are looking to get licensed in to get clear on your specific requirement.s

After a year and a half of accruing supervision hours and client hours, I listened to the pull with me that told me that the licensure path was not for me. If this is you and you are considering relinquishing your licensure certificate, know that there are options for you.

Within The Alternative Therapist Lab, I will mentor you in getting clear if this non-licensure path is for you and what it means for your “title,” scope of practice, ethical language, ways of service and more.

The more experience you have, the more clear your gifts and passions become in the therapy world. At the end of the day, our own “wounds” often become our greatest gifts to our communities and to our clients. Thus, our own personal stories can often be a catalyst for our direction.

I have created The Alternative Therapist Lab because we cannot do this work in isolation. Whether 1:1 mentorship or the cohort group, this is a space where you invest in peer-support to process your experiences with clients through a filtering lens to gift you clarity on your next direction or most aligned future direction to begin directing your energy toward.

Many people call themselves “therapists” these days without a degree to title themselves that way. While labels are just labels, there is a credibility and investment that you put into this field of work that has true value.

It is important to continually check yourself for your scope of practice and areas of competency. If you are serving from a place of lack and attempting to support dynamics and clients that are not in your competency, it is ethically critical that we refer out. Additionally, it is ethically critical that we market ourselves adequately. We have humans heads, hearts, lives and relationships “on the line” in this work. We cannot take our role lightly. Hold yourself with the dignity that all of your clients deserve.

Here, in The Alternative Therapist Lab, our discussions will ensure that our ethics and morals are doing good and not doing harm.

You got your masters degree. No one can ever take that “label” or those “letters” away from you. You can always use your MA MFT or MA MSW (etc) no matter if you choose licensure or not. While if you choose to not get licensed, you are not marketing yourself as a “therapist” anymore. No matter the route you choose, continued education and advancing as a clinician, therapist, coach, guide or “healer” of any kind is crucial because our world is continually evolving, as are the human beings within it.

In this mentorship program, I will encourage all participants to use their own passions and interests as a compass for their evolution as an advanced, educated, safe space for their clients.

Our ‘why’ will get us through the days that feel heavy, moments where our clients pain feels hard to hold, seasons where you’re unsure what you are meant to do next. If you know why you feel called to this healing work, it will become your anchor through the storms that will allow you to continue to shed the outer skin of ‘what’ you are doing to be of service.

At the end of the day your ‘what‘ will continue to evolve as you continue to evolve. Yet, through deep diving into our greatest dreams, the most authentic ‘what’ for how you want to use your degree in the world will come into clearer view.

The Alternative Therapist Lab is for you if you feel misaligned or unsure about the clinical/licensure path and are drawn to relational, holistic, or coaching-based work. You likely feel stuck between ethical fear and desire for autonomy. You want to find a path that feels more liberating, authentic and aligned with your mission and are unsure if that can happen within the traditional path or not. If this is you, welcome to The Alternative Therapist Lab.