HORÓ Psychotherapy - Aleksandra Staneva, PhD

HORÓ Psychotherapy - Aleksandra Staneva, PhD Dr Aleksandra Staneva • Internal Family Systems & Jung • Women-centered therapy & events

HORÓ Counselling is Dr Aleksandra Staneva's soul work healing practice for women offering therapy, psycho-education, and women circles Contact: horoforwomen@gmail.com

29/01/2026

This might be my favorite of them all, certainly the one I return to most often when I lose perspective in the quagmire of complaint. As always, find it as a solo print and part of the deck of 100, along with the story and process behind them, at https://almanacofirds.org

HORÓ - a favorite Bulgarian word of mine, holding me close to my roots, vertically and horizontally across oceans and la...
28/01/2026

HORÓ - a favorite Bulgarian word of mine, holding me close to my roots, vertically and horizontally across oceans and lands, is a metaphor for the space I have created for my psychotherapeutic practice.

HORÓ means a dance, usually performed in a circle or spiral, where people hold hands, what I energetically feel as the core of my offerings-a coming together. A coming home to oneself while being held, by hands both visible and invisible, known and far unknown.

The work of my practice lives where three deep rivers meet: IFS, Jungian Depth Psychology, and Feminism.

I sit with the psyche as a living landscape, full of inner voices, protectors, young ones, fierce ones, tired ones, all carrying stories that began long before words. Through the deep compassion that comes when we ground the work in the IFS process, I meet these parts with reverence, not to banish them, but to soften what has hardened in survival, and to restore the natural leadership of the Self.

What Jungian depth work has offered is that it allows me to listen for what moves underneath: the dream-image, the symbol, the archetypal force, the old myth stirring in the bones. I trust the unconscious the way one trusts the forest, not always clear, but always truthful.

And through feminism, I keep sight of the wider net: the oppressive structures that have shaped the ways women have been silenced, perfected, made small, and how liberation is not only personal, but ancestral, societal and cultural.

This work is not about fixing what is broken. It is about remembering what is intact. HORÓ is about coming home to the wild, wise centre that has been there all along, being both held and contained, while freed and connected to the infinite.

With heart 🌹
Aleksandra

27/01/2026

One morning in 1997, when he was 35, Nick Watkins read an article by a columnist he admired, in which the writer described particular memories of his own, not only the sight but the sound and feel of them. For some reason, these sentences revealed all at once to Nick what in the whole course of his life he had not realized: that it was possible to see pictures in your mind and use those pictures to reëxperience your past.

This was startling information. He knew, of course, that people talked about “picturing” or “visualizing,” but he had always taken this to be just a metaphorical way of saying “thinking.” Now it appeared that, in some incomprehensible sense, people meant these words literally. And then there was the notion of using those mental images to revisit a memory. It was an astonishing idea. Was it possible that this was a thing that other people could do?

In 2015, his condition was given a scientific name, aphantasia, and tens of thousands of people experienced the same shocked realization that he had. A flurry of research in the following decade would uncover associations between mental imagery and a bewildering variety of human traits and capacities: a propensity to hold grudges; autism; a vulnerability to trauma; emotional awareness; ways of making art and hearing music; memory of one’s life. Read about the people who can’t form mental images—and those whose imagery is too vivid: https://newyorkermag.visitlink.me/rT56lu

I once had a client who prepaid for five sessions and said, “These cover me until Christmas. I need to be fixed by then....
27/01/2026

I once had a client who prepaid for five sessions and said, “These cover me until Christmas. I need to be fixed by then.”

It’s a sentiment many of us can relate to, the desire for fast answers, instant clarity, or a timeline for healing. Especially in our fast-paced society, where services and even people can feel disposable, many of us have lost the ability to stay with discomfort. We swipe left, move on, or give up when something feels difficult. But that discomfort is actually the only way in.

Therapy doesn’t work like a quick fix. Real change, insight, and healing happen through presence, patience, and gradual exploration. Attachment wounds, patterns of the past, and deeply held fears don’t resolve on a schedule. They unfold over time as you allow yourself to be fully seen, understood, and gently guided through the process. Each session is a step, not a sprint.

Depth work is at the heart of this process. It means looking beneath the surface of your thoughts and behaviors, exploring the parts of yourself that you might usually avoid, and sitting with emotions that are uncomfortable or even painful. This is where the most profound insight, transformation, and integration happen; in the places we usually resist, hide, or rush past.

Therapy in general, and my work in particular, is not for those looking for instant answers or quick fixes. It is for people willing to stay with themselves, even when it feels uncomfortable, and to explore deeply, with curiosity, honesty, and patience. Healing requires showing up fully, leaning into the discomfort, and letting the process unfold, not rushing it.

If you are ready to do that, the journey can be transformative in ways you might never have imagined 🦋

a.

25/01/2026

I wrote this second volume of advice from Baba Yaga because I needed the crone more than ever, and I felt others might need her, too. Who is Baba Yaga? We can begin with the facts. Baba Yaga is a p…

Good therapy does not force or excavate. It waits. Meaning ripens in its own time. When we interpret too soon, we risk m...
22/01/2026

Good therapy does not force or excavate. It waits.

Meaning ripens in its own time. When we interpret too soon, we risk mistaking noise for truth and breaking what is still forming. Symbols ask for patience, not answers, for slowness, silence, and the courage to wait until they reveal themselves.

A way I have started to describe my work is as a steady watcher, a waiter of ripening, one who trusts that the person across from me will always unfold and unfurl in their own time.

🤍 a.

…For I see you in your wholeness …💫
17/01/2026

…For I see you in your wholeness …💫

11/01/2026

I am here within the Sacred Heart we inhabit- Scar Clan

you are dear brave souls and we remain determined instead of defeated in Spirit

Despite all and more so BECAUSE of many seemingly loose and yet without complete containment of their malicious ways to date

it ought not go now without honoring all young mothers and fathers -sons and daughters- tias y tios- abuelos, children, babies in utero — whose lives were wrongly taken by persons with fi****ms whether licensed to carry and or use them licitly or not

The most recent soul that we are gently placing on the list of lives wrongfully taken is a young mother of three children- shot dead at close range by a person who sounds to have lost all wits and proportion regarding helping citizens already trying to comply- or who are innocents going to or coming from home

This chapel is not the place to say what we already know -and in spades -about politics and malignant forces

Quite the opposite - keep and use your outrage and righteous fire to help those who are already helping what and who you most value from soul - enjoin in your own way

But/and also do this to help daily balance this “ship of state” no matter where in the wide world it might (too often now - even once is too much) be listing hard from the weight of some with malignant thoughts and actions

Ive walked with you many times over the decades and I know you recall my saying many times ours is not to change the whole world but to reach out and mend that which is within our reach- thus progress is made

I have my hand on your dear shoulder steadying you in this harsh crosswind

We are. Together
We stand. Together

Do your own act of goodness- kindness everyday. Refuse the sewer of slogans and screeching about what we already all know.

Dont be the queen of outrage the king of insult
We already know the not yet consciousness that has infected some.

Be what you were born to be -the healer helper who stands in their own tender truths with “willow will “

- sharp - flexible - beautiful- gentle- whenever each is needed.

You decide with prayer as you choose- and ever as much as you can— with true love.

Be with me.

With us.

A gentle relentless person who speaks for soul and decency in and for all

I send gentle fierce love
ITMI
I Truly Mean It
Dr e

Please click on my collage to see it fully ( i am so sorry i dont know how to digitally position it just right but trust, my heart is fully in this endeavor)

Ive noted in the collage - this image is released under Creative Commons license which means to share

🐺💓

Guess who’s back!!!HORÓ reopens its doors after a (longer than expected) break! I woke up this morning a little more mys...
05/01/2026

Guess who’s back!!!
HORÓ reopens its doors after a (longer than expected) break!

I woke up this morning a little more myself
fuller
More energetic and as ready as I can be
I have missed this. I have missed you.

Importantly, today I was finally able to do a full weightlifting session. Did I push it?
Maybe but wisely with 🐺 ears listening to every breath I was able to take without panting.

I was wiped out for over 3 weeks with influenza A and my Christmas holidays were spent in bed. Looking back, I really really need it.

It’s been a long tail of recovery that began with 10min walks around the block which would leave me breathless, to longer and longer time outside, to yin yoga, and then a few vinyasas, a bunch of baby weights sessions with bands, to 4kg dumbbells.

Today I got to use my Christmas present 💝 from my son - the 10kg ones (was quickly back to 5s and 8s) but oh, is it good to feel alive!?

The tea 🫖 is on. I will see you on the couch.

Here’s to a new year of meaning, compassion and reconnecting with what truly matters.

Yours in sickness and in health,
Aleksandra

So oftenAnimals are the onesThat were there For usIn the quiet hourIn the depth of painIn the lonely silence And offered...
05/01/2026

So often
Animals are the ones
That were there
For us
In the quiet hour
In the depth of pain
In the lonely silence

And offered so much
Perspective
Presence
and Connection
For 5 lifetimes
Something, the humans, simply
Could not.

Out of the grief
And the incomprehensible shadow that
Follows you after they
Have passed over
You learn again
You learn again how
They have thought you

About connection
About presence
About that silent quiet Presence
And about your own capacity to love

Yesterday I cried for my beloved Kotko
Who now will lay forever in my garden

Today I tear
Watching Shadow
Marvel at a butterfly
And through his green and curious eyes
I marveled at the unfurling morning.

Why I Wake EarlyHello, sun in my face.Hello, you who made the morningand spread it over the fieldsand into the faces of ...
02/01/2026

Why I Wake Early

Hello, sun in my face.

Hello, you who made the morning

and spread it over the fields

and into the faces of the tulips

and the nodding morning glories,

and into the windows of, even, the

miserable and the crotchety

best preacher that ever was,

dear star, that just happens

to be where you are in the universe

to keep us from ever-darkness,

to ease us with warm touching,

to hold us in the great hands of light –

good morning, good morning, good morning.

Watch, now, how I start the day

in happiness, in kindness.

Mary Oliver

I have always been the warrior woman. Nothing stops me. Challenges rain down and I rise, watching myself stretch higher ...
23/12/2025

I have always been the warrior woman. Nothing stops me. Challenges rain down and I rise, watching myself stretch higher and wider above them.
Tough, forged, unyielding.
My ancestors showed me how it is done.
Endure. Override. Survive.
I learned to ride the body hard, to treat it as something that exists to carry me forward no matter the cost. Hunger, exhaustion, pain, longing. These became things to push past, not listen to. Strength equaled control. Control meant never slowing down.

But there comes a moment when this way of being turns against me. What once saved me begins to cost me.

Surrendering to the body feels incredibly hard, almost wrong. A part of me still wants to push until the very end, to ignore the body’s signals and keep going.

That part believes stopping is weakness. What is to actually surrender?
To the bestest of companions I will always have around? My one and only precious body? The only one I got!

It is listening. It is letting the body matter.
It is the friend who says - I am tired. And then I attend to that. It is the friend who says Help! I am sick. And I help it heal in the best ways I could.

When I stop forcing, something else appears. A steadier strength. A connection between us. Because let’s be honest. What exactly does it really mean to say “listen to your body”?? It means getting soooooo attuned to its cues that you simply know its needs. Like a mother who knows.

A body that has been listened to usually means all agendas of our conscious mind get overturned. Because-you know?? You had a plan! And then your body had another plan. Surprised? Shocked? Only if you didn’t hear the whispers.

So listen. I am learning. Oh I am so green at this. It hasn’t been in my make up. I haven’t seen a woman in my lineage doing this. All I saw was a mighty all-veins-popping push through…. And I used to admire and respect that. And I still do but differently now. Cos when I listen I know that there are times to push. And times when you can’t and you shouldn’t.
It’s about knowing early enough. And that is only possible when your listening instrument is sharp. And the reward, a deeper sense of being alive.
Warrior woman, surrender.

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