Welcome to CLARITY of SELF
– Karen Stewart

This website describes my Canberra based practice, Clarity of Self Counselling & Psychotherapy which offers:

• Face to face, individual psychodynamic psychotherapy.
• Couples therapy – within a psychodynamic framework (affective, attachment and developmental focus).
  
  I will work with you to explore your situation, thoughts and feelings. We will progress at your pace, creating safety and working towards mutual understanding as we go.
  
  I am a Masters qualified Registered Clinical Counsellor with PACFA (Psychotherapy and Counselling Federation of Australia, 24364).  I am a registered provider for Victim Support ACT, Victims Services NSW, BetSafe EAP and a number of private health funds. Check with me if you have insurance – Bupa, AHM, Medibank, HCF, Rural Health (emergency services & others).

Session information

Currently I am not taking on new clients. Refer to my Relevant Links page for a start place. I recommend you look widely (PACFA, ACA, APS) and search on the terms for the type of therapy that appeal to you. Call and chat to those who appeal to you.

Therapy sessions are 50 minutes in length and are by appointment only.

Contact me to make a first appointment for us to meet and learn a bit about each other. It is important you feel I am someone you can work with, and I think I will be able to help you.

2026 Fees* – My session fee is $165 for private individuals, $198 for couples, family or corporate payees. Fees are due at the completion of the session and can be paid by cash, direct debit, or by credit card. Due to the reservation of your regular therapy time slot, payment is required for sessions cancelled with less than 24 hrs notice for any avoidable reason.
2027 Fees* – will be $180 for private individuals (50m sessions) and $240 for couples (60m sessions).

Registered Clinical Counsellor

*Fee - Where does the fee go?  I try to stay affordable while earning a basic living but still, it may seem like a lot - more than an average wage rate, however as an example $150/$180+GST per session is for about 2 hrs of my time plus oncosts:
- 30% contributes towards direct costs - primarily rent, supervision fees, registration & insurance, some PD, supplies etc.
- 20% contributes towards indirect costs - training & supervision time, annual & sick leave & where possible some superannuation.
eg $150 = $75/hr less direct costs ($22) less indirect costs($15) = $38/hr wage rate. 
Due to the intensity of the work, and my focus with each client, A full client load is approx. 15-20 spaces per week, less cancellations due to illness, away times etc.

With the combination of a sharp analytical mind and a sensitive and creative personality, Karen is a compassionate and effective counsellor and psychotherapist with a passion for relational psychodynamic psychotherapy. Karen reads widely and has trained in related areas including Self Psychology, Psychodynamic Psychotherapy, Somatic Intersubjective Self Psychology, Specialist Supportive Clinical Management (SSCM) for Eating Disorders (ED), Emotion Focused Therapy, Acceptance and Commitment Therapy and Buddhist practices (mindfulness, DBT similar practices). Karen has an interest in trauma and it’s many manifestations, and how we live with and integrate it’s effects.

Karen presented a paper at the International Association of Psychoanalytic Self Psychology 2023 International Conference and has published in the IAPSP journal Psychoanalysis, Self & Context (PSC, April 2024). See my article here.
Current study includes a clinician level two year course (2025-2027) with the Institute of Contemporary Psychotherapy & Psychoanalysis (ICP&P) in Washington DC on Contemporary Approaches to Psychodynamic Psychotherapy (CAPP).

Karen receives regular professional supervision.

Karen will work with anyone who wants to access therapy and has a wide variety of clientele – all ages (primarily from 12 up), genders (LGBQT), trauma histories (obvious & invisible trauma), diversely abled (Downs Syndrome, ABI, sensorily and physically impaired, varied neurodiversity).

Read on for more information on Karen’s personal and professional work history:

Continue reading “About Me”

I believe that all people are innately creative and clever. Through our unique experiences in life, we have responded creatively and cleverly to survive and adapt to our situation and our lived history.

As children we may have withdrawn and hid, or ran, or fought, and we developed any number of techniques for survival of our selves – our sensitive feeling selves, and our physical selves. Psychotherapy helps to uncover the ‘hiding in plain sight’ and the well hidden, clever, stubborn, entrenched  strategies that no longer serve us well.

Continue reading “Philosophy”

Because it works! Therapy can be hard going at times but that is because over time, we may get to the real heart of your issues together. It can also be an amazing process of discovery and realisation never before imagined (after all – how can you imagine what you have never experienced?).

I will work with you on whatever you bring to therapy, whether it is to work out a specific issue in the short term, or to address a more entrenched way of feeling or being that requires a longer timeline. I am guided by the needs and wishes of my clients, in a client focused, respectful mutual exchange.

• The aim of therapy is to make living our life easier. It is about getting to know yourself better, and ultimately make changes to patterns of feeling, thinking and behaving.
• Psychotherapy provides a safe non-judgemental space in which to work on your self with the help of a qualified, empathic, nurturing and skilled person.

“In particular, the research indicates that body-focused psychotherapy is effective for a range of issues (Bloch-Atefi & Smith, 2014) including where talking therapies are unable to effectively treat the condition (Gordon et al., 2008; Röhricht, 2009).” (Thomas, 2018, p. 8 – see below).

Continue reading “Why Psychotherapy?”

To make an enquiry, contact Karen directly at the details below.