ABOUT ME

About Danielle

Hola! Soy Daniela - Welcome - My name is Danielle S. Castillejo. My father is German and my mother is Mexican. I grew up in the swirl of a mixed identity. That said, I love the anticipation of Spring and Summer in the Northwest - the long days and sunlight we miss in the dark winters. You can easily find me out on a trail, or working in my yard. Over the course of my life I have lived in Morocco, Mexico and traveled extensively. During that time I found healing and restoration through therapy and happened on the book, “My Shining Affliction” by Annie Rogers.

With all of my children in school full time, I applied to graduate school at The Seattle School of Theology and Psychology. Before my second year of graduate school I was invited to explore my story through The Allender Center, in a Story Workshop. I went on to complete Level 1 & 2 of the Certificate in Narrative Focused Trauma Care and am enrolled in the Externship for this coming year. Our culture has experienced such an intense ripping and cultural identity crisis. This asks healing practitioners, such as myself, to address internalized racism, story, and its effects on both myself individually, my family and my community. I am grateful to have begun this process with my MA in Counseling Psychology and studies at The Allender Center.

*También ofrezco terapia en español*

Working With me

If you choose to reach out and we embark on a journey together, it will be one that is co-created. I do not believe that I have all of the answers, nor all of the ideas or intellect to guide you. I trust my body and intuition. I trust your body and intuition. We will work with both narrative and somatic narrative. I believe our bodies tell a story.

Context matters. We are both complex and hold complexity. Wisdom requires presence. Through intersection of knowledge, I practice presence with others. Boyle (2011) states Jesus brought himself fully in encounter, “standing in the right place, with those relegated to the margins” (p. 72). Jesus embodied kinship with creation, setting precedence, for me to follow as practitioner (Rueb, 2018). In understanding the self and other as interconnected, the beauty in the encounter as therapist will be the idea that give-take, learn and teach, pain and joy can be interwoven to form community with whomever is before me (Cope, 2017; Rueb, 2018). The power of relationship is often lost in a culture of technology and individual rights; however, the unique understanding of God’s grace as entry, with Jesus fully embodied in the presence of all creation, is a pathway to stand outside the center that white supremacy hails as saving. The commitment to encounter is a commitment to life. 

Sometimes it can feel as if therapy makes things worse before things feel better. I consider it an honor to work with others on their journey of becoming more present and embodied - to know and feel and taste life. I bring my own cultural lens, curiosity, joy, life, pain and hope to the therapeutic relationship. If you’d like to know more, I’d love to connect with you.