Feminine Intelligence, Sacred Sexuality, and Ketamine Therapy: An Interview with Hilary Morris, LPC
Feminine Intelligence, Sacred Sexuality, and Ketamine Therapy
An interview with Hilary Morris, LPC
Can you provide some information about your professional background and expertise?
I am a somatic therapist in private practice and I specialize in treating trauma and post-traumatic stress disorder. I use a combination of methods to help reprocess and de-sensitize trauma (CBT, EMDR, Brainspotting) and then incorporate somatic processes to help transmute conditioned trauma responses from the body. I also work with those who identify as women and help them overcome unique challenges of being a woman.
How did you get involved in offering ketamine-assisted psychotherapy (KAP) to your clients?
I fell into this work by accident and it became a divine calling. I have followed the Multidisciplinary Association for Psychedelic Studies (MAPS) group since I learned about their work in treating PTSD when I was in college at CU Boulder. Since then I have been exploring different avenues to get involved in psychedelic therapy. A mentor recommended I explore the ketamine space with its recent FDA clearance.
What do you see as the benefits of psychedelic therapy?
Psychedelics create a window of time where we become lifted out of cognitive and behavioral rigidities that cause us psychological distress. They help us gain altitude and distance from the emotions, thoughts, stresses and anxiety that so easily entangle us. Because of how rapidly psychedelics down-regulate the brain’s default mode network, they accelerate clinical growth and eradicate defenses (guilt, shame, fear) around our healing process.
Can you explain divine feminine intelligence?
In the healing space we all become our own healers and access our own inward healing intelligence. We can go even deeper by splitting inward intelligence into feminine and masculine energies. When either energy is over or under-developed, we can feel off balance. Divine feminine intelligence is aligning with inward feminine energy in its purest form, and connecting to its source within each one of us. This is an individualized approach and differs from woman to woman.
Here are some generalizations about feminine and masculine energies:
Wounded feminine energies can appear in the following ways:
Mother wounding – not necessarily our relationship with our mothers, but ancestral generational traumas, the struggles of being a woman (and subsequent epigenetic factors) passed down from generations.
Wounding of the patriarch – models of women reinforced by patriarchal structures (ex: woman as martyr, sacrifice self to care for others, women as subservient to men, female oppression).
Menstruation wounding – recognizing the extent to which menstruation has been shamed.
Wounded or suppressed sexuality – absorbing cultural/media beliefs objectifying or sexualizing women, glorifying certain body type as “sexy,” the extent to which woman use men to validate emotionality and sexuality.
How does divine feminine work arise and show up in ketamine therapy?
KAP channels divine feminine intelligence, allies, and/or feminine spirit guides for clients who are open, ready, and willing. I encourage clients to come up with their own terms to describe their “inward feminine intelligence” for this type of work. Clients connect to their inward feminine spirit and ask her to show them the way.
Ketamine therapy beautifully and gently reveals where inward feminine energy has been wounded, suppressed, or misaligned. It shows how and to what extent women have absorbed messaging around objectification, repressed sexuality, staying small, people pleasing, or perfectionism to an unhealthy degree. Clients access their inner feminine on journeys and get messages for how to step out of wounding (self-abandoning, self-sabotage behaviors) and step into a place of POWER (self-honoring, growth centered, and self-actualized behaviors).
What about sacred sexuality and KAP?
KAP combined with counseling helps clients learn how societal messages, media, porn and past experiences have shaped their specific sexual identity. Part of the work I do with women (probably my favorite part) is imploring them to explore their sexuality and bodies stripped of all past conditioning, without a partner, in a very organic way. This is a technique I borrowed from a practice in Glennon Doyle’s book, Untamed. Betty Dodson, a subject matter expert in the field of female sexuality, also teaches women these practices. I begin with the question, “what would pure pleasure look like FOR YOU? Not for your man or partner, or anyone else, but for you?” They get out of their heads and sink into their bodies. I challenge them to disconnect from previous learned behaviors and focus purely on the messages and feedback their body gives them. Removing all judgment, I urge them to seek and discover pleasure first, before orgasm. And practice this. Then surrender to the divine flow of their body’s wisdom. This incorporates Ayurvedic tantric practices, beginning with oneness with body and oneness with self. From this place of empowered and sacred sexuality from within, they create healthy intimate partnership with another.
KAP invites women to unlearn limiting beliefs on the concept of pleasure (ex: pleasure is earned, you must amplify your pain to justify your pleasure, pleasure and sexual fulfillment are justified when we have a partner). I work with clients to help them create healthy sexual identity with themselves and fully embody their unique expression of pleasure.
Examples of pleasure (not necessarily sexual):
Linger for a few minutes longer in the shower
Curl up in a soft blanket (tactile pleasures)
Take extra time on the weekend to eat a favorite breakfast
Paint
Interpretive Dance
What do you see as the results of doing KAP and divine feminine work in combination?
Women no longer relate to self and others from a place of wounding or deficiency, but from a place of strength and POWER. They become fiercely and wildly independent. Breaking out of their pretty little box, they fully embody their power and sexuality as it was meant to be. They become a whole new type of sexy, not validated by men, media, or messages, but by divine feminine within. They learn to use their voice, PLAY, take up space, pursue expansion, laugh, flow, invite in levity. Softness, tenderness, and gentleness shifts their energetic makeup and over time they attract different types of opportunities and relationships into their energy field. This power and wildness spills over into every area of their lives. Divine feminine magic!
Do you have a case study example you can share?
Credit: Maria Art Pro
I work with several women who are healthcare workers/first responders and are immersed in a heavily male dominated industry. One woman came in feeling burnt out. We helped her acknowledge her wounded feminine energy. She closed her eyes, put her hand on her heart, and asked her inward feminine intelligence what she needed. Her inward feminine spirit was craving time and space for hikes in the evening, making nice dinners for herself, an attitude of tenderness and grace toward herself, wearing dresses on the weekend, and a regular interpretive dance practice. Once she provided space for these behavioral changes, her workplace struggles diminished as she stepped into a place of feminine power.
How do individuals get in touch with you to discuss this work?
Email: hilary@hilarymorrislpc.com
Website: www.HilaryMorrisLPC.com
Phone: 303-231-1015
HIPAA Compliant Text line: 720-443-0576
