Stella’s Circle is always striving to support our participants in innovative ways so they can be healthy, confident and self-reliant. Innovative approaches to expressive therapies open doors for our participants to find their own strength on the road to recovery when traditional therapy is just not enough.

About Expressive Therapies for Mental Health
While traditional talk therapies form the basis of the majority of our work with participants, we recognize that they are not always effective for everyone. Innovative therapeutic mental health programming, or expressive therapies, have proven clinical effectiveness and Stella’s Circle participants who have taken part in these programs report exceptional results. Expressive Therapies are based on the assumption that people can heal through the various forms of creative expression and hands-on learning. Examples of such therapies include music, equine, pet, horticulture, photography, and yoga. However, traditional funding models do not support these sort of therapies, focusing instead on traditional modalities. As a result, our ability to offer these therapies has been ad hoc, making them less effective than they can be.

Proven Benefits 
Tremendous improvements have been observed in participants during initial offerings of expressive therapies. Expressive therapies can promote both verbal and non-verbal expressions of thought and allow participants to creatively process emotions. Participants are given the space to project and analyze their situations, make connections, and find their own solutions. Since the solutions are personally experienced in conjunction with intellectual understanding, they tend to be deeper, more profound, and last longer.

For more information about our Expressive Therapies Fundraising Campaign,  contact us at [email protected] or 709-738-7730.