Sharie Bowman is a graduate of the Seattle University Mental Health Counseling Program. She has been practicing Mental Health Counseling in Auburn since 2007 working with a broad spectrum of individuals and couples. Among her areas of expertise are anxiety, depression, unresolved grief, complex developmental trauma, working with adults who experienced abuse as children, and conversion disorder.
In addition to being a prominent individual counselor she has presented at the International InterPlay conference about using InterPlay in Therapy and at the University of Maine's conference "Improvisation for Lasting Change" about the need for a body-centered and expressive arts approach to treating complex trauma in children and adults.
Sharie uses person-centered psychotherapy combined with techniques and ideas from psychodynamic, gestalt, psychodrama, group, expressive arts, behavior, EMDR, and biodynamic (body-centered) psychotherapies depending on the needs of the individual client and their primary support system. Her approach is person specific and may entail using tools such as expressive arts, movement, reading and homework assignments, meditation, dialogue, and inquiry. She believes that each person has a whole and healthy intrinsic nature with potential that is capable of being fully realized and expressed. However, in the process of developing through life, people often learn ways of masking their essential self as a protection and reaction to various experiences. As a therapist she sees her role as helping guide the client to experience more clarity, wholeness, and acceptance of their essential selves through fostering a safe environment that will allow the client to enter into their life more fully and actively using her training and experience to help the client reach their goals. Effective therapy is a direct result of mutual efforts, honesty, and a spirit of collaboration.
Outside of the clinical setting she is a certified InterPlay Leader and Trainer and leads the InterPlay Life Practice Program. She is also the Seattle Area Administrator for InterPlay. She has also participated in a variety of workshops and trainings that integrate body, mind, spirit, and emotion including EMDR, Biodynamic Psychotherapy, Expressive Arts Therapy, Core Energetics, and Authentic Movement Therapy. Previous to pursuing her degree in Mental Health Counseling she was a high school mathematics teacher and received a BA in Mathematics Education from Brigham Young University.
She is a member of the American Counseling Association.