Perfectly Imperfect

How did Solid Ground Counseling even get started? Looking back, I didn’t really know if or when this endeavor would ever see the light of day. I’d always assumed starting something from the ground up was for other people…not people like me.

Let’s be honest, I’m not perfect and I know drama (like tv style drama), my life has challenges. Who am I to try to help others work through real battles like depression, anxiety, relationship issues, social justice concerns, or anything else that people really struggle with?

Doesn’t a therapist have to have all their stuff together? Aren’t therapists walking exemplary pillars of perfection that apply calm to every situation? They have the ideal relationship skills that facilitate rational conversation…even within their own circles, right? I mean, isn’t this why people pay them to fix all the problems so they can live their best lives?

Um, NOPE! Therapists have problems too. And, we’re not “fixers.” We are all part of the human race, which brings on it’s own complexities that only another living, breathing, feeling, human being can understand. And honestly, trying to live the perfect life is unbearably exhausting. Believe me, I’ve tried it…more than once. In these 40-ish years of living, perfection is no longer the goal.

Actually, being “perfectly imperfect” is more my jam these days. Why? Well, I’ve learned to appreciate some things in imperfection. Let’s start with the fact that each new day brings new opportunities.

Take Solid Ground Counseling, for example. I didn’t wake up one day and decide to go into private practice, come up with a random name, and just start. Or did I? Not exactly. I’d been dreaming about opening a private practice since 2015 when I finished graduate school and decided to dedicate myself to 3,000 supervised hours towards an LPC.

In that very moment, I knew there would be something bigger on the way. I knew I wanted to help women and teens live life in such a way that beauty could be found in imperfection.

Space where even when the ground feels like it’s moving beneath you, you could have skills in your pocket to plant you firmly.

This space is your solid ground. It looks and feels different for each one of us. It’s not textbook one-size-fits-all. It’s uniquely yours. Unwavering. Planted. Stable.

You should know that I’m not a cookie-cutter therapist. The first time I cried in a session with someone I thought I was doing it all wrong and felt like a complete failure. Again, “gotta have it all together” right? No. This path is about being real and present; and that requires feeling and awareness.

That day, I learned it’s okay to be truly in the moment with someone else in the room. It doesn’t mean that I take on those problems as my own. It means that your struggles are real and that your feelings deserve validation, and that’s huge. You even reading along this far is huge!

This journey is yours! I am grateful to be able to help women, young adults, and teens going through tough stuff build confidence and feel strong. My role is to support you as you travel on your path to finding, rebuilding, or creating your own solid ground one step at a time.

On solid ground,

-Acelli