2023 VSOF Conference Presentation Details

2023 VSOF Conference: Presentation #11

Title
Rewilding the soul: Experiential sand tray for indigenous youth

Presenter Bios
Dan Morta, is a Chilkat Tlingit of the Dakl’aweidi clan from Klukwan, Alaska. He received his
Bachelor of Science in Biology from the University of Alaska Anchorage in 2001, his Master of
Science in Botany from the University of Canterbury in Christchurch, New Zealand in 2004, his
Master of Art in Clinical Psychology from Pacifica Graduate Institute in 2002 and will complete
his PhD in Clinical Psychology from Pacifica Graduate Institute in 2025. His clinical interests
include the effect of language revitalization and language learning on people experiencing
acculturation, colonization, and historical trauma. As a clinician, modalities include gestalt
therapy, depth psychology, and traditional indigenous practices.

Rekha Khuon obtained a Bachelor of Arts in Psychology from National University in 2014. She
received a Masters in Social Work from the University of Southern California with an emphasis
in Macro Social Work in 2017. She became board-certified in California as a Licensed Clinical
Social Worker in 2020. In 2022, she earned a Master of Arts in Clinical Psychology from
Pacifica Graduate Institute and is in pursuit of her Doctor of Philosophy degree in Clinical
Psychology with an emphasis in Depth Psychology with expectations to graduate in 2025. She is
passionate about transpersonal depth work. Her clinical interest and scholarly work will be
focused on complex trauma and attachment wounds, breaking intergenerational trauma cycles,
and holistic and integrative healing practices.

Amy A. Picco graduated with a BS in Community Health Education from San Diego State
University in 1996, received her Doctorate in Osteopathic Medicine in 2004 and worked as a
board-certified family medicine physician until shifting her focus to psychology. She obtained
her MA in Clinical Psychology from Pacifica Graduate Institute in 2022 and is expecting her
PhD in Clinical Psychology with an emphasis in Depth Psychology from Pacifica Graduate
Institute in 2026. Her current clinical interests include expanding depth-oriented theories in the
adolescent and youth populations and expanding access to these therapies in youth, adolescents
and children in the community mental health clinic setting.

Presentation Description
This presentation will show how Oaklander’s (1978) Model of Gestalt therapy with children and
adolescents is a best practice and evidence-based approach for supporting patients who have
experienced collective, complex, and intergenerational trauma. Presenters will provide an
overview of the model, connect it to depth psychological approaches, and provide a case
example of its utility in supporting a strengthening of sense of self and experience of
empowerment with indigenous youth.

Amy Picco will describe how the Oaklander Model (1978) is devoted to each patient’s authentic
presence in the world. Patients participating in this method experience self-discovery through a
deeper awareness of their body, senses, emotions, thoughts, and fantasies that link their inner and
outer worlds. This approach offers an understanding of one’s life process through the
experiencing of one’s fantasy process, which Violet Oaklander believed were parallel. Because
this method demands mutuality from the therapist, a shared, honest, respectful, and joyful
celebration of our patients, we have found it to be especially useful in patient populations who
have experienced complex, intergenerational, and persistent social or culturally-based trauma.

Rekha Khuon will share how the Oaklander Model is a best practice for supporting patient
populations who have experienced disempowerment or collective culturally-based trauma by
exploring its connections with depth-oriented psychotherapies. One example is that the
Oaklander model (1978) encourages the use of projection, which encourages the patients’ sense
of self by connecting with inner experiences. Therapists utilizing this model have a combination
of skills, knowledge, experience, intuition, creativity, curiosity, and are mindful of their own
reactions to clients. This approach can be helpful for integration of a sense of self as separate
from the traumatic experience, and highlights how transformation occurs when patients feel
accepted, seen, and heard.

The final portion of the presentation will focus on a specific case example from Dan Morta’s
clinical training supporting indigenous youth. The technique presented is an expansion of
Oaklander’s (1978) work where the child is presented with animal figurines that are indigenous
to the child’s ancestral homeland. By choosing animals which symbolize particular parts of the
child’s psyche or lived experience, the child creates a meaningful scene in the sand. Using this
method, the child’s imagination is projected onto the animal figures who are archetypal and
primordial. From this place of deep unconscious projection, gestalt and depth psychology
techniques can be used to help the child explore her lived experience.

Three Learning Objectives

1. The participants will be able to identify at least three aspects of the Oaklander model that
   promote a deepening awareness of self.
2. The participants will learn how the Oaklander model shares key elements with depth
   psychotherapies for working with culturally-based disempowerment and complex trauma,
   such as the ability to build trust, be relational, and use various approaches to understand
   and express oneself.
3. Participants will learn one technique that expands on Oaklander’s work with animals and
   the sandtray.