By Samantha Beidoun • Photos by Hilary Nichols
Chelsie Skowyra is a Chelsea-based claircognizant, clairvoyant empath who finds great pleasure in helping others find peace in their true selves. Along with her Bachelor of Arts in Psychology and Sociology/Anthropology and a Masters of Marriage and Family Therapy, she’s blended in her own well-rounded spiritual mentoring approach. Skowyra and I went to grade school together, and I recently had the opportunity to take a fascinating dive into where the universe has led her.
Was spiritual therapy always your career path? If so, what got you into it? If not, what was your original interest in?
Chelsie Skowyra: Blending spirituality with psychology was always the universe’s plan for me, but it took me a little bit of trying to do the traditional path to figure that out. I went straight from undergrad to grad school with all intentions of becoming a couple’s therapist or a therapist for children. After spending years working with children and families experiencing trauma, I experienced secondary traumatic stress. The system was failing not only the families I was working with, but also the professionals.
This burnout led to my big spiritual awakening where I realized that there could be a path to healing that brought in all the parts of the soul that traditional psychotherapy left behind. I knew there had to be a path for being a healer that did not require sacrificing one’s own well-being.
It’s funny when I look back though, all the signs were there. My first introduction to therapy as a career was in a J14 magazine where they said Pisces make great therapists. As a Pisces, I took that to heart and ran with it. I recently found a paper from my time in grad school where I talked about the importance of balancing intuition with thorough assessment–another example of this work making itself known to me before I realized it.
What exactly does a spiritual mentor do?
Chelsie Skowyra: A spiritual mentor provides a space for healing and self-exploration through spiritual practices and concepts with an understanding of how the systems we exist in also play a role. A spiritual mentor may use tools like rituals, energy work, or tarot/oracle to help their clients make peace with their past and build a miraculous life.
How/when did you realize you were an empath?
Chelsie Skowyra: Recognizing that I was an empath was a gradual process. My family members always tell me that when I was a very young child, I would walk up to anyone looking sad in public and ask if they wanted to be my friend. As an adolescent, I remember crying about something a friend was going through and my mom asking why I had to make everyone else’s problems my own.
Becoming a therapist made it crystal clear. Where other people could “leave work at work,” I was going home and feeling every feeling that had been shared in session that day. It felt impossible to separate my story from my client’s story and that is when I truly realized that maybe I was more than just a little compassionate and empathetic. In my inner work, I’ve recognized how even my experience of fibromyalgia was a sign that I was absorbing other’s stress. I’ve had to learn how to celebrate my empathy while still protecting my well-being.
What is the most challenging part of being an empath?
Chelsie Skowyra: This might be a hot take because it’s not your traditional “it’s hard to feel the feelings of everyone else” answer. The most challenging part of being an empath is taking accountability for one’s own feelings and projections. It can be the easy way out to just label yourself an empath and think that any negative energy must be someone else’s. Empaths have to spend time with their energy so they can tell the difference between what is theirs and what is someone else’s. Taking accountability for one’s perception of what they are feeling, and why, is how they grow that skill.
You have created some journals, so journaling is probably an essential tool in your personal practice. What other ways do you encourage your true self to be expressed?
Chelsie Skowyra: Let yourself love what you love and love it deeply. I love music so I’m always curating playlists and including music in my rituals. I even created a whole workshop about shadow work inspired by Taylor Swift. Find the things that make you feel like life is worth living and share those things with the world… [even if ] imperfectly. Meditate for three minutes with your eyes open. Paint a watercolor picture with only one color. Take nature walks where you mindfully reflect on how nature mirrors your inner world.
You hold retreats anywhere from Michigan, Ohio, and New Hampshire depending on the locale you see fit for your theme. What would a participant in one of your retreats be able to expect?
Chelsie Skowyra: My retreats are a self-care experience for people who love a balance of connecting with the magical and grounded parts of spirituality. Every activity, the food we serve, and the gift bags (that are filled with tools that we’ll use during the retreat itself and for integration after the retreat) is intentional without the pressure of being perfect. These are not green juice only and meditate for five hours kind of retreats. We dance, we cry, we spend time in nature, we laugh, we do rituals. Every person who has attended my retreats remarks on how cared for they felt. I love giving people the space to just connect within and spend the time engaging in the spiritual practices that they normally don’t [make time for].
What do you love most about what you do?
Chelsie Skowyra: Watching people fall in love with themselves and respond to life’s challenges differently than they would have before.
What is your biggest strength?
Chelsie Skowyra: My compassion. I care SO deeply about everything and everyone. It constantly keeps me inspired to show up to this work. It provides an endless well of creativity that I have so much fun connecting to.
What challenges did you face when building your business?
Chelsie Skowyra: With my departure from the traditional therapy path, it can be difficult for me to find clients who understand exactly what I do and how it can help them. I encourage people to take ownership of their growth and healing, so it can also be hard for me to market myself when it’s not just *me* that is creating these outcomes.
When I first started my business, I fell into the law of attraction marketing trap where I paid a lot of money for business coaches to tell me that all I needed to do was believe in myself enough and my business would magically be successful. Of course, the law of attraction is part of building a business, but I needed solid structures and strategies to support that energy as well.
If someone were to come to you for services, what can they expect?
Chelsie Skowyra: If someone were to come to me for services, they can expect to be welcomed with warmth and gentleness. I love to start with a free consultation (or as I like to think of them, an intuitive meet-cute) where we get the chance to connect and talk about what they’d be hoping to receive from spiritual mentoring. This gives them the opportunity to see if they even like me and would feel safe enough to start this work together. It gives me the opportunity to see if spiritual mentoring would be right for them and to let them know if not. As a spiritual mentor, I don’t diagnose, treat mental illness, or provide emergency services. If someone needs those things, I provide them with referrals.
Even though I don’t treat mental illness from the perspective of eliminating or reducing symptoms, many people with depression, anxiety, ADHD, and other conditions have found adding spiritual mentoring to their healing to be super helpful. If someone is struggling with dissociation, depersonalization, or hallucinations, spiritual mentoring would not be a supportive option for them.
Once the decision has been made to work together, they can book a package of sessions and schedule. I usually meet virtually but have arranged in person sessions before as well. There is something extra healing about a spiritual mentoring conversation while walking through a nature preserve.
To learn more about Chelsie’s services please visit her website at chelsieskowyra.com or email her at chelsieskowyra.mft@gmail.com. You can also find her on social media @chelsieskowyra.
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