Helping to Empower Motivated Clients for 30 Years

​Shelly Smith is a Licensed Professional Counselor and Licensed Marriage and Family Therapist in good standing with the South Carolina Board of Examiners for Licensure of Professional Counselors, Marriage and Family Therapists, and Psychoeducation Specialists since 1997.

Early in her training as a therapist, she began having pain and unusual body sensations when working with certain clients. Suspecting that these clients' issues were triggering repressed traumatic memories, she sought traditional counseling for answers. While it was helpful to a degree, she realized that these repressed memories were not going to surface through traditional methods.

So in 1992 her search began for non-traditional, body-centered approaches designed to access the bodymind, the unconscious mind, in order to reveal and release traumatic memories stored there. 

Once these memories began to surface, and she was able to integrate and release them, she became fascinated with the impact of trauma on the body and how traumatic memories are stored. Since the research, now made popular by people like Bessel Van Der Kolk and Peter Levine, was not readily available at that time, Shelly had to trust in her own healing process and in time began to see a common thread in these "fringe" modalities - what made them effective.

Now, with thirty years of experience, practice, exploration, and study, under her belt, she has put together a method, which she recently discovered is very much like Somatic Experiencing, using techniques gleaned from a variety of body-centered healing approaches. It's called The Compassion Process®. 

She continues to be fascinated with how emotions, memories, and beliefs are stored in the body and with the the bodymind's ability to heal itself, naturally and easefully, once the thinking brain is out of the way. 

In 2005 she received life coach training from the Institute For Life Coach Training in Austin TX, a program designed specifically for therapists wanting to add coaching to their practices. This has allowed her to share these powerful techniques with people who don't necessarily need counseling or psychotherapy. 

Shelly conducts trainings and workshops throughout Upstate, SC, but primarily on her farm in Pickens County, SC.

Trauma and the Body: Shelly's Story (Interview Part 3)
​The Impact Of Trauma On the Body
See Part 4: Body-Centered Counseling and Coaching here.

Credentials

• ​M.Ed. in Counseling from Clemson University in 1991
• Post-Graduate degree training from Westgate Training and Consultation Network/Converse College in 1997
• Licensed Professional Counselor and Licensed Marriage and Family Therapist since 1997
• Life Coach Training from The Institute for Life Coach Training in Austin, TX in 2005

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Experience and Expertise

• Provided individual and couples counseling in various agency settings, specializing in anxiety, depression, PTSD, sexual abuse, and other traumas. 1992-1997.
• Private practice with emphasis on creative, body-centered approaches. 1997-present. 
• Worked collaboratively with holistic health practitioners. 2000-2005, 2013-present.
• Created and facilitated Equine-Assisted Therapy program for residential facility housing teenaged girls. 2006-2009.
• Founded Nature's Way Home: Counseling, Coaching, and Personal Growth Services. 2012.

Additional Trainings

Therapy In Motion: Bringing the Moving Body Into Clinical Practice, Open Floor International, 2021
Re-Bodying Life: Tamalpa Life/Art Process for Trauma Healing, Tamalpa Institute, 2021
Movement Ritual and Dance Explorations, Tamalpa Institute, 2021
Body Mapping, Tamalpa Institue, 2021
Hakomi Mindful Somatic Psychotherapy, 2021
​The Conscious Id, Polyvagal Theory & Discoveries In Neuroscience That Affect Counseling, 2017, Greenville, SC
Counseling Is the Development of Art, Science, and Illusion, 2017, Greenville, SC
Animal-Assisted Interventions, 2017 Columbia, SC
Neurolinguistic Programming, Introduction and Advanced, 2011, 2013
Sedona Method, Basic and Advanced Courses, 2001, 2003, 2004, 2005, 2006
Equine-Assisted Growth and Learning Association (EAGALA), Level 2, 2006, 2007
Equine-Assisted Growth and Learning Association (EAGALA), Level 1, 2006
Eye Movement Desensitization Reprocessing (EMDR), Level 2 Training, 2004
Eye Movement Desensitization Reprocessing (EMDR), Level 1 Training, 2004 
Therapist as Life Coach, 2004, Atlanta, GA.
Coaching for Clinicians, 2004, Columbia, SC
The 5 Rhythms, Wave On Wave, Nelson, BC 2003
Sedona Method, Accelerated Course, 2003
The 5 Rhythms, Sex and the Body, Chicago, Il. 2002
The 5 Rhythms, Heartbeats, Chicago, Il. 2001
Somato Respiratory Integration, 2001, Denver, CO.and Como, Italy.
The Hendricks Institute, Gay and Kathlyn Hendricks, Foundation Training, 2000, 2001, Washington, DC, and Santa Barbara, CA.
The 5 Rhythms, Endless Wave, Omega Institute, NYC, 2000
Life, Paint, and Passion, 1998, 2011, 2013
Pesso Boyden System Psychomotor Training, 1997, Asheville, NC.
Holotropic Breathwork,1994, Hendersonville, NC.
The Hakomi Method of Body-Based Psychotherapy, 1994, Asheville, NC
Adventure Based Counseling, Llama Trek for Clinicians, Pisgah National Forest, 1993

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Horse Experience

Shelly Smith was in her first horse show when she was five years old. She got her first pony when she was 9. By the time she was in her early teens, she was asked to show horses for various "horse traders" and trainers and had started training her own horse to jump. 

In 1978, she and her horse, Why Not Friday?, were the Small Junior Hunter/Jumper Champions in North Carolina. They qualified for the National Horse Show in Madison Square Garden and attended the Washington International Horse Show that same year.

She has attended clinics and received one-on-one instruction from some of the best and most trusted horse trainers in the country.