Building Coping Skills: Exploring Sandtray Therapy for Anxiety and Depression

Welcome to the Santre Therapy Journey podcast, where we will embark on a transformative exploration of Santre Therapy. I'm your host Donna Meyers, owner and provider for the Canadian Santre Institute and I am thrilled to have you join me on this powerful journey to discover how Santre Therapy can bring healing and transformation to our clients. Hi everyone and welcome back to another episode of the Santre Therapy Journey podcast. I'm your host Donna Meyers and you asked, I listened. So the community of Santre Therapy, the Canadian Santre Institute community had asked that I speak about using Santre Therapy with our most common disorders that we tend to see in mental health, which tends to be anxiety and depression. So how is it that we use the Santre Therapy for anxiety and depression? I'm going to walk you through a few steps today including using Santre Therapy to teach coping skills. So let's dive in. So first step, you want to make sure that you're establishing that safety and rapport and if you've listened to these podcasts, you have heard me say this almost every episode. It is so incredibly important that you establish that safety, that trust and rapport, which helps create that therapeutic environment where clients can feel comfortable and support it, absolutely necessary. Take this time to explain the purpose and the benefits of Santre Therapy, emphasizing that it is a non-threatening, non-judgmental space for self-expression. Ensure that the clients understand the confidential nature of the therapy and provide an opportunity for them to voice any concerns or questions that they may have. Building trust and rapport lays the foundation for effective therapeutic work. Step 2. Provide your clients with a basic understanding of the neurobiology behind anxiety and depression. This can help normalize their experience and reduce self-blame. Explain how anxiety and depression impact the brain and the nervous system. For example, discuss the role of the amygdala responsible for that fear response and how it becomes hyperactive in anxiety disorders. Going back to cavemen, fight, fight or freeze, explain all of this to your client and help normalize what's happening for them. Explain how the prefrontal cortex responsible for our rational thinking and decision making may be impaired when in depression. Introduce the concept of neurotransmitter such as serotonin and dopamine and how these imbalances can contribute sometimes to anxiety and depression. This knowledge will help your client recognize that their experiences are rooted in complex biological processes which is validating their struggle and reducing the stigma of mental illness. Step 3. Introduce the center therapy, the materials and your setup. So introduce the materials and guide your client in setting up their center. Explain the purpose of the sand as that blank canvas upon which they can create scenes, express and explore their thoughts, their emotions, their experiences and challenges related to anxiety and depression. Provide a variety of miniature objects and symbols that can be used to represent different aspects of the client's inner world and experiences. Encourage them to select miniatures that resonate with them as personal connection to the miniatures enhances the therapeutic process. Step 4. Identifying triggers and stressors. An important aspect of coping with anxiety and depression is identifying triggers and stressors that contribute to these conditions. Invite your clients to think about and identify specific triggers or stressors that they experience. Encourage them to select miniatures from the sanitary materials that resemble these triggers. As they place the minis in the sand, ask open-ended questions to help them reflect on the sensations and emotions that arise. This process increases their awareness and understanding of their personal triggers, paving the way for developing targeted coping strategies. An effective strategy is teaching them to scan their body in a mindfulness activity to identify which part of their body may be activated, maybe in pain, aching or feeling uneasy. Step 5. Creating that safe place. Anxiety and depression can make individuals feel unsafe and vulnerable. Guide your clients to create a safe place within the sanitary, what serves as refuge from anxiety and depression. Encourage them to select minis that represent safety, comfort and relaxation. This might include miniatures of supportive people, items that represent serenity or even items associated with positive memories. As they construct their safe place in the sanitary, prompt them to notice any changes in their body, any emotions, emphasizing the importance of grounding and self-soothing techniques. This process helps anchor the client to a tangible representation of safety, which can be revisited in times of distress. Step 6. Externalizing anxiety and depression. Anxiety and depression can become deeply ingrained in a person's sense of self. In this step, invite your client to externalize their anxiety and depression by creating separate scenes or characters in the sanitary that represent these experiences. Encourage them to explore the physical and emotional qualities of these representations. For example, they might use rough textures or dark colors to symbolize anxiety or heavy objects to depict depression. This process helps clients view anxiety and depression as separate from their core identity, fostering a sense of agency and empowerment. It also creates a visual and tangible representation of their experiences, which can aid in processing and coping. Next, let's explore coping strategies. Step 7. Stick with me here as we go through as I identify 15 ways to use sanitary in teaching clients coping skills. Then we're going to jump right back into exploring the next steps. Coping strategies are essential tools for managing anxiety and depression. In this step, we want the client to explore coping strategies within the san trays. Ask them to select miniatures that symbolize different coping skills they have used in the past or that they would like to develop. Examples may include miniatures representing exercise, relaxation techniques, creative outlets, or even supportive relationships. Encourage them to experiment with different arrangements and combinations of these objects, emphasizing that coping strategies are unique and evolve over time. Discuss the symbolism and significance of each miniature exploring how they can be applied in real life situations. This process helps clients internalize coping strategies and reinforces their efficacy. So here are 15 ways to use sanitary therapy in teaching your clients coping skills. Number one, emotion identification. Have clients create scenes in the san tray that represent different emotions, ask them to identify and discuss the emotions present in each scene, helping them develop emotional awareness and coping strategies. Ensure that you have miniatures that do represent different emotions, including the inside out characters by Pixar, very, very famous characters that many of our clients tend to resonate with. Number two, grounding techniques guide your clients to create a grounding scene in the san tray, incorporating miniatures that represent that safety, that stability, and grounding techniques. This helps clients develop a tangible reminder of coping strategies they can use in challenging situations. Another grounding technique is having hands in the sand, very, very important to get your clients hands in the sand, identifying what they're feeling using all five senses. Number three, self soothing scenes, encourage your clients to build calming and soothing scenes in the san tray, incorporating miniatures that symbolize that relaxation, comfort, and self care. This can serve as a reminder and a resource for practicing self soothing techniques. Number four, problem solving, ask your clients to use the san tray to create a scene representing their specific problem or issue or a challenge that they're facing. Together, explore possible solutions and strategies, allowing clients to experiment and problem solve in a safe and creative environment. Number five, visualization exercises guide your clients through guided imagery exercises where they can imagine a specific scenario or situation and then create a corresponding scene in the san tray. This helps them visualize coping skills and build a sense of efficacy. I tend to use with the adolescence a video game scenario. I get them to imagine their life or their problem as a video game and have them create it within the san tray and then conquer each challenge using a different method of coping. Number six, resilience building, encourage your client to create scenes that represent difficult experiences that they have overcome or moments of resilience in their past, reflect on these strengths and the coping strategies used in those situations, fostering a sense of empowerment and resilience moving forward. Number seven, anger management, ask your clients to express their anger in the san tray by creating scenes that represent anger inducing situations or triggers, explore the alternative ways of expressing and coping with anger through the use of san tray, allowing for catharsis and skill development. Number eight, communication skills use the san tray as a communication tool asking clients to create scenes that represent a particular interaction or conflict. Discuss effective communication strategies such as active listening or assertiveness and experiment with different approaches using the san tray. Stay within the metaphor of the miniatures asking the miniatures to communicate with one another role playing and helping your clients practice using these communication skills. Number nine is stress reduction guide clients to create scenes that depict these stressful situations or sources of stress in their lives. Then encourage them to modify the scene by adding elements that represent stress reduction techniques, fostering a sense of control and coping. It's a good opportunity at this time to incorporate smart goals specific measurable attainable realistic and timely goals that they can use to reduce stress. Number 10, building support networks ask your clients to create a san tray scene that represents their support network, including people objects or miniatures of support. Discuss the importance of social connections and coping strategies that can be gained from these relationships. Think about the automatic response for sadness is to isolate is to hide under the covers and shut out the curtains and shut out the world, fostering that connection, building within their support networks so that they know that when sadness comes on, it's important that they go out and connect. Same with anxiety, the knee jerk reaction of anxiety is to protect us to keep us safe to avoid anything. Therefore, we tend to withdraw and not participate when in fact we want to encourage the coping skills of building those support networks and getting out and forcing ourselves to interact. Number 11, trauma processing, utilizing the san tray as a tool for trauma processing. I guide you to ensure that you have clinical supervision when it comes to trauma processing and that you are a competent mental health professional with advanced training in san therapy when it comes to trauma processing. Allow the clients to create scenes that represent traumatic experiences or associated emotions, provide guidance on regulating these emotions and exploring resilience and healing in the san tray. Number 12 is boundaries and assertiveness. Guide your clients to create scenes that represent personal boundaries and assertiveness. Explore scenarios where they may need to set boundaries and practice those assertiveness skills using the san tray as a platform for rehearsal and experimentation. Number 13, self-reflection and insight. Encourage your clients to create scenes in the san tray that represent aspects of themselves or their inner world. Discuss the meanings and invite self-reflection, helping your client gain insight and enhance their self-awareness as they navigate coping skills. Number 14, coping with change. Have clients create scenes that represent a significant change or transition that they have experienced. Explore coping strategies for adapting to this change using the san tray to experiment with different perspectives and possibilities. One way that I tend to do this in around perspectives, switch seats with clients. After they're done creating their san tray, I invite them, if I think that I am seeing a different perspective, I invite them to switch seats with me. And when we do that, they get to see what they've created from a different perspective and oftentimes it's very enlightening. Okay, so I have just gone over the 15 coping skills using the san tray. We're going to continue on in our steps here. So revisiting traumatic experiences step number eight. So for clients who have experienced trauma, it may be necessary to address and process these experiences within the san tray. This step does require sensitivity, a strong foundation of coping skills, and it's also important that you, the therapist, be competent in working with trauma and have advanced training in san tray therapy. With our clients consent and readiness, we can invite them to create scenes or use miniatures that symbolize traumatic events or associated emotions. We can encourage our clients to express their experiences in such a way that feels safe and manageable, ensure that appropriate support and resources are in place to address any distress that may arise during or after the sessions. Trauma processing in the san tray can facilitate the integration and healing of traumatic experiences, ultimately supporting the clients coping and recovery. Number nine, you want to be able to use san tray to rehearse their coping skills. The san tray provides a unique opportunity for clients to rehearse coping skills within a controlled environment. Invite the client to use the san tray as a rehearsal space for practicing coping skills that they have identified or developed within treatment. For example, if deep breathing is a coping strategy, they can create a scene depicting a challenging situation and then use miniatures to role play their desired coping response, such as taking deep breaths and visualizing calmness. This allows for experimentation, refinement and the internalization of effective coping skills, reflect on these experiences and provide feedback and validation for their effort. Number 10, building resilience and positive narratives, building resilience and fostering positive narratives are crucial aspects of coping with anxiety and depression. Guide your client in creating scenes that represent these moments of resilience, the personal growth, or positive experiences that they have had despite their challenges, especially over the treatment or the course of treatment. And to them to select those miniatures that do symbolize the strength or the growth that they have accomplished throughout therapy, prompt them to reflect on how these experiences can be applied to their current struggles. By focusing on the positive narrative, the client can gradually reframe their self perception, develop a sense of hope and cultivate the resilience that we hope for them. Step helps counterbalance the negative aspects of anxiety and depression with more positive resources and experiences. Firstly, step number 11, integration and reflection. So integration and reflection are essential to consolidate the therapeutic work done in the Sanctuary. By facilitating reflective dialogue with our clients, we are allowing them to integrate their Sanctuary experience and insight. Asking open-ended questions about their discoveries, their insights, and shifts in perception. Encourage them to consider how the coping skills that they've explored in Sanctuary therapy can be applied in their daily lives outside of therapy. Support your clients in creating an action plan to implement and reinforce their newfound coping strategies upon exiting therapy, while also identifying potential obstacles and strategies on how to overcome them. Validate their progress and emphasize the importance of ongoing practice and self-care. Lastly, I want to remind you that, as you know, the work that we do on a daily basis is difficult. Please, please don't forget to take care of yourself. Self-care in the Sanctuary is essential for any Sanctuary therapist, and it does work. Trust me. So by following the step-by-step process, Sanctuary therapy can be a powerful tool for teaching coping skills to clients managing their anxiety and depression. By creating a safe and creative space, integrating an understanding of neurobiology and providing opportunities for self-expression and exploration, Sanctuary therapy facilitates the development and internalization of effective coping strategy. The process empowers clients to view their experiences from different perspectives, externalize their challenges, and build resilience. Through integration and reflection, clients can integrate their Sanctuary experiences effectively, ultimately healing your clients faster. So folks, I hope you enjoyed today's Sanctuary therapy podcast related to anxiety and depression and how to effectively use the Sanctuary for coping strategies in managing anxiety and depression. Until next time, take care. This episode was brought to you by the Canadian Sanctuary Institute. For all your training needs in Sanctuary therapy, head on over to www.CanadianSanctuaryInstitute.ca to learn more.