Carlene

Carlene Van Tongeren

Registered Clinical Counsellor

Carlene is naturally intuitive, insightful and brings her warm presence into the counselling process. She believes in the connection with someone you trust as vital to meaningful change in your life and has great respect for the courage this takes. Carlene will come alongside you to help clarify where you are struggling and work together with you to develop solutions to the challenges you are facing. Her training in Emotionally Focused Therapy shapes her approach to helping you deepen your understanding of the inner workings of yourself and your close relationships. She also integrates her creativity from her background in the performing arts and her goal-directedness as a competitive athlete to inspire a motivating counselling experience.

For the past 15 years, Carlene has been helping individuals and couples struggling in the areas of relationships, sexual intimacy, anxiety, loss, and life transitions. She is a Registered Clinical Counsellor with a Master’s degree in Counselling Psychology from the University of British Columbia and a Bachelor’s of Arts in Psychology from Simon Fraser University. She pursued an internship at the Vancouver Couple & Family Institute and has been committed to strengthening relationships in her community through counselling, teaching, group facilitation, and research.

Carlene’s naturally intuitive and passionate approach to her work engenders trust and cultivates hope with her clients as they work together towards meaningful change in their lives.

Carlene has been dedicated to her counselling practice alongside marriage, motherhood, teaching, and directing a non-profit counselling group. Carlene has been recognized as a highly trained scholar and skilled therapist throughout her career, selected for honours including the BC Premier’s Award of Excellence, Simon Fraser University’s Top All Around Graduate, and a finalist for Vancouver’s YWCA Women of Distinction of Award.

Her approach to creating individual and interpersonal change is based on a standard of excellence, experience, and genuine passion for helping you reach your potential. To contact Carlene for an appointment, call 250.792.5295 or email her at info@counsellingwithcarlene.com.

Carlene

I love this image of embracing the beauty in our rebuilding!

Kintsugi or Kintsukuroi (“Golden Repair”) – The Japanese art of repairing broken pottery with gold dusted lacquer. It treats the breakage and repair as part of the history of an object, rather than something to disguise.