If you’ve been reading about Chrysalis, you’re learning how relevant we believe contextual/systemic/social factors are to cultivating self-understanding. Most spiritual, theoretical and philosophical disciplines understand humans as social creatures who possess an innate drive to grow, develop and seek intimacy with others, and at Chrysalis we believe this to be true. If humans aren’t seeking connection, they’re likely engaged in avoiding it. Either way, consideration of how to relate to the group around us requires hefty expenditures of mental and emotional energy.
Community Engagement
At Chrysalis we also believe that principles guiding individual human behavior can be generalized to groups. The ways we treat ourselves are the same ways we treat our families, friends and communities. The internal barriers we have to treating ourselves with self-respect and kindness play out on a grander scale between groups of people in our communities and world.
Chrysalis providers are interested in impacting our communities. We are students of the emerging literature on community psychoanalysis and the use of these and other psychotherapeutic techniques for community intervention. We believe in using these techniques to foster connection with and among all of our neighbors, regardless of race, gender, economic, educational or class related stratifications.
Specifically thus far, we have engaged with local school campuses to present on careers in psychology and to work with counselors over loss and grief in the schools. We have organized talks in our community to deepen mutual understanding around racial tensions and are collaborating with several organizations to promote safe conversations around racial, cultural and political divides. Finally, we are currently working with a mentor/mentee project designed to increase the numbers of psychologists of color, and are hoping to engage with refugee populations to provide psychological services and meet other needs they may have.
Community intervention is an important part of our mission at Chrysalis, and we will continually use our training in the science and art of human interaction to make our corner of the world a better place.