Welcome to the Hearth!
This image, with the golden field bathed in the Sun’s light, feels like it’s giving me a lot of energy I can use to fuel me as I begin more endeavors in my practice.
I’m so excited to write my first blog entry! This is something I envisioned being part of my practice even before I started building it officially. Since I recently earned my full/unrestricted counseling license, I thought now would be a great time to start this particular experiment within my practice.
In this entry, I’ll re-introduce myself and take the opportunity to share about what I’ve been doing since I became a fully licensed counselor. So here we go!
I’m Braden Weinmann, Master of Science, Licensed Professional Counselor. I am an out-and-proud queer person who uses he and they pronouns. I was born and raised in Texas, and I still live and work here trying to do what I can to advocate for all queer and trans Texans. Personally, I don’t really know what my true gender is; I just know that most of the time I feel like a person moreso than a man. While I don’t have a firm grasp on my own gender, I love helping other people play detective with their own gender and how they want to express themselves. And along the way, I get inspired by my clients and by all of the amazing queer people I see in my life and online to keep exploring things that help me feel even more like myself.
Hearthlight Counseling PLLC is my fully-online professional counseling practice. Maybe one day I’ll look for an in-person space, but for now, I really love working from home and allowing my clients to access counseling from their homes. If I did have an in-person office thought, I would try to emulate as much as possible an actual fire in the room. I love the idea of engaging in counseling together by the light of a warm and comforting fire. I’ll have to research and see where the technology is in that regard.
If it wasn’t already apparent, I chose the name Hearthlight very intentionally. It’s my (maybe not so subtle) signal to my clients that there is a spiritual component to my being and to my practice. Being a Leo, the element of Fire is very important to me, and I conceptualize that I’m channeling the warmth and life of the Sun when I’m practicing counseling. I never force my spiritual viewpoint onto my clients, and sometimes the topic of spirituality doesn’t ever come up or need to come up in a particular counseling relationship. By writing this, I just want my clients to know where my mindset is when I’m walking alongside them in their journey.
At the time of this writing, I experience the pillars of my practice as Gender-Affirming Counseling & Dreamwork in Counseling. I’ve noticed that when I’m practicing these two areas of counseling with clients are when I feel most fulfilled, highly energized, and often help me achieve a state of flow. Since becoming fully licensed, I’ve focused a lot of energy into strengthening my practice in these two areas. I’m learning a lot and have already noticed improvements in my gender-affirming counseling, while refining my approach to dreamwork. One of the greatest visions I hold for my practice is that one day, it will be filled with clients who want to explore their dreams together and open themselves to the profound insight that can come from their dreaming experiences. I want to help people learn how to deepen their connection to their dreams. I want to create group spaces where people can share their dreams and gain really interesting insight into how other people make associations to their personal dream imagery.
My future blog entries will undoubtedly focus on the areas of gender-affirming counseling & dreamwork in counseling. I could see myself also using these blogs to talk about counseling books I’m reading. Since this is an experiment, I have some expectations in mind but I’m also allowing myself to be open to the process! I don’t have any set schedule of how often I’ll write these, but you can keep an eye on my Instagram stories where I’ll post blog links as I publish them. Regardless of what or how often I write, I will be deeply honored if anyone takes the time to read it and find value in it. Stay tuned for more!
