Join Lisa to talk about attunement and how it is such an important part of the therapeutic relationship. But why is it that important you might ask … In our play therapy sessions, we can follow the script, say the right words, go down the therapeutic checklist, but if we are not attuned to our clients (or ourselves), our clients will walk away likely feeling not seen, not felt, and not met by us. So attunement is really the heart of the therapeutic exchange between us and our clients! (...by the way, the same is true in the parent-child dynamic) Join Lisa in a conversation and …  Expand your understanding of what attunement is and what it is not; Find out what gets in the way of us being attuned to our clients; Learn how to develop attunement at a deeper level for your clients (...to create an experience for your client where they feel energetically and emotionally met by us); and How to “explain” the felt-sense experience of attunement with a parent or caregiver Lisa shares a really beautiful experience she had at a play therapist training where she was role playing with another therapist and how she might have missed a really critical piece of the play therapist’s experience if it wasn’t for the power of attunement.  A final message - Thank you for being on the receiving end of the conversation today; for feeling with Lisa today; and allowing yourself to learn ways to bring in attunement more into your play therapy sessions so your clients can feel deeply seen, deeply met, and deeply heard by you.  Podcast Resources:  Synergetic Play Therapy Institute Synergetic Play Therapy Learning Website FREE Resources to support you on your play therapy journey  Aggression in Play Therapy: A Neurobiological Approach to Integrating Intensity * If you enjoy this podcast, please give us a five-star rating and review on Apple Podcast, subscribe wherever you listen to podcasts, and invite your friends/fellow colleagues to join us.

In this next Lessons from the Playroom episode, we’re going in a totally different direction. Lisa Dion has a very special guest to talk about perspective - a topic we often don’t talk about enough (... or in some cases, at all!) and the significance of it in our work as therapists and as beings walking through the world.  Lisa’s special guest is the lovely Dr. Rachel Altvater (Psy.D., RPT-S™). Rachel is an award-winning, pioneering expert, leader, researcher, international trainer, author, and supervisor in the field of play therapy. Her book, “Perspective: Contemplating the Complexities of Our Realities" was just recently published (...and is the main topic of discussion for this episode). She has also published her research in the International Journal of Play Therapy on technology use in play therapy, and is a contributing author in numerous scholarly texts on implementing digital technologies in play therapy practice. Join Rachel and Lisa in this highly thought provoking and human normalizing conversation that will start to create an alignment with who you are and the perspectives that you hold about yourself.  You’ll learn about: The birth of Rachel’s new book, Perspective: Contemplating the Complexities of Our Realities,  and how her “brain vomit” practice helped it come into “perspective”; How you come to see yourself, others, and the world (...really how you become who you are!); Why understanding perspective is so important for you to know as a therapist (or as any human being); How to explore the perspectives that you’re holding about yourself (...Rachel gives several questions you can start asking yourself today); and Questions that will expand your awareness about what perspectives you might be holding about others (including your clients). Enjoy this oh so lovely conversation that ends with a beautiful transition message from Rachel to you - You will never know how far your ripples of healing and connection expand into this world, but the more aligned you are with yourself, the further these ripples will expand in the direction they need to go.  Podcast Resources:  Synergetic Play Therapy Institute Synergetic Play Therapy Learning Website FREE Resources to support you on your play therapy journey  Aggression in Play Therapy: A Neurobiological Approach to Integrating Intensity * If you enjoy this podcast, please give us a five-star rating and review on Apple Podcast, subscribe wherever you listen to podcasts, and invite your friends/fellow colleagues to join us.

Join Lisa Dion for a really important and special conversation about a topic that has never been discussed in this entire podcast series … It's about supervision. And not just any type of supervision, but reflective-relational kinds of supervision. Some of you may likely be engaged in your own supervision and some of you may be supervisors ... you're encouraged to listen to this conversation in whatever way you feel is most meaningful for you.  To have this conversation, Lisa has three very important people in her life - Polly Douglass, Kim Buller, and Khris Rolfe are three extraordinary play therapists and supervisors and some of the top supervisors at the Synergetic Play Therapy Institute. They've been trained not only in Synergetic Play Therapy, but in multiple other modalities, and have a beautiful perspective about how to do this thing we call supervision in a way that is incredibly reflective and relational.  In this episode, you'll learn: What it means to be reflective and relational in supervision; How to cultivate a reflective and relational supervisor-supervisee relationship; What it means to be the external regulator for a supervisee;  How to support a supervisee in becoming more embodied in their work as a play therapist; and  How to offer an empowering supervision experience for a supervisee that ultimately develops their trust within themselves as a therapist.  Listen to this conversation that weaves together a beautiful tapestry of reflection and relationship within the supervisor-supervisee experience, and one that allows for the play therapist to “feel” about their client instead of just “think” about their client.  Podcast Resources:  Synergetic Play Therapy Institute Synergetic Play Therapy Learning Website FREE Resources to support you on your play therapy journey  Aggression in Play Therapy: A Neurobiological Approach to Integrating Intensity * If you enjoy this podcast, please give us a five-star rating and review on Apple Podcast, subscribe wherever you listen to podcasts, and invite your friends/fellow colleagues to join us.  

Lisa Dion’s next guest has made quite the name for herself in the world of EMDR Therapy (although this is not a conversation about EMDR Therapy, if you work with the population that we’re talking about today, you might want to consider some EMDR training 😉). Join Ann Beckley-Forest and Lisa in an inspiring conversation … one that is also quite near and dear to Ann’s heart … that will help you conceptualize how to work with children and families when adoption, foster care, or some kind of placement experience is part of the child’s life story.  Ann is a Licensed Clinical Social Worker (LCSW), Registered Play Therapist-Supervisor (RPT-S), Certified in EMDR Therapy and an approved provider for EMDRIA, faculty member of the Child Trauma Institute, and co-founder of Playful EMDR LLC Training and Consulting. Ann, with Annie Monaco, also wrote a fabulous book called “EMDR with Children in the Play Therapy Room: An Integrated Approach” - it’s truly a foundational book if you use EMDR Therapy and work with children. Here’s what you’ll learn: What attachment trauma or attachment wounding is (... as Shirley Jean Schmidt says, the idea of “the important good things that didn’t happen”); How a movement powered by adoptees has helped us take a look at language, stance and attitudes around adoption, as well as how to honor all the parts of the “adoption triad”;   The impact to the collective adoptive family nervous system and how adoptive/foster parents inherently vicariously acquire the child’s trauma history; One of the major reasons for unprocessed trauma in childhood and how we can address it in sessions; and Different reparative treatment approaches when working with children with attachment trauma or attachment wounding (hint: it’s not about cognitive processes, but ultimately attuned experiences). We hope that you’ll find a lot of value in this conversation and that you’ll continue to learn and study about this topic … because the odds of you, as a play therapist, having a child walk through your door that has an adoption or foster care or some kind of placement experience in their history is, well, let’s just say, quite high. You’re invited to start/continue your learning journey on this topic with Ann and Lisa today! Podcast Resources:  Synergetic Play Therapy Institute Synergetic Play Therapy Learning Website FREE Resources to support you on your play therapy journey  Aggression in Play Therapy: A Neurobiological Approach to Integrating Intensity * If you enjoy this podcast, please give us a five-star rating and review on Apple Podcast, subscribe wherever you listen to podcasts, and invite your friends/fellow colleagues to join us.

Original Air Date: July 17, 2019 Medical trauma can be prevalent for many children who have undergone medical procedures or experienced chronic and acute conditions. And it can show up in the playroom in a variety of ways, including in ways that can lead the therapist to jump to conclusions. Listen in to explore how to not only help children who have experienced this type of trauma but how to minimize future trauma as well. "One of the best ways to reduce medical trauma is by making the unknown known. Children need information and lots of it." - Lisa Dion Podcast Resources:  Synergetic Play Therapy Institute Synergetic Play Therapy Learning Website FREE Resources to support you on your play therapy journey  Aggression in Play Therapy: A Neurobiological Approach to Integrating Intensity * If you enjoy this podcast, please give us a five-star rating and review on Apple Podcast, subscribe wherever you listen to podcasts, and invite your friends/fellow colleagues to join us.