Sand & Clay Therapy

16/03/2026

I often wonder about the implications of executive function in Sandplay Therapy. 🌿💫🎨

Brilliantly helpful! Makes understanding Executive Functions so much easier?

>>> https://www.nclexquiz.com/mnemonics/executive-function-skills-cheat-sheet/

16/03/2026

15/03/2026

The Vessel Within🌿
A Safe and Healing Clay Journey for Women

30 March – 2 April

Sometimes words are not enough.
This 4-day clay workshop offers a quiet and safe space where your hands can shape in clay what your heart is still trying to heal.

Over four days you will create one evolving clay vessel that gently reflects a journey of protection, strength, and rediscovering yourself.

No clay experience necessary.

✨ Safe space
✨ Healing process
✨ Rediscover your inner strength

Facilitated by Rina Louw
Clinical Social Worker | Jungian Sandplay Therapist

Limited to 8 participants

📍 Secunda
📩 Contact Rina to register

12/03/2026

Children’s Sandplay Therapy Symbols

When children cannot explain their feelings with words, they often express them through play.

In the sandtray, symbols such as animals, houses, bridges, or dragons may reveal something about the child’s inner emotional world.

I wrote a short guide exploring common symbols that appear in children’s sandplay and how therapists can begin to understand them.

You can read the full article here:
🔗 https://rinalouwclinical.co.za or https://rinalouwclinical.co.za/understanding-symbols-childrens-sandplay-therapy/

10/03/2026

Jung in My Everyday Life

Today I worked for many hours.
There was intention.
There was service.
There was effort.

And yet, when the day became quiet, I noticed something unexpected — a small emptiness inside.

In Jungian psychology, moments like this are also symbols. They are not failures; they are messages from the psyche.

Sometimes the soul reminds us that activity and meaning are not always the same thing.
We can give a great deal to the world and still need something to return to the Self.

Perhaps the emptiness is not a void.
Perhaps it is a space asking to be filled with something deeper than productivity — presence, reflection, creativity, or connection.

So tonight I ask the symbol a question rather than pushing it away:

"What is my soul asking for now?"

— Rina Louw
Clinical Social Worker | Jungian Sandplay Therapist

09/03/2026

🐚 Symbols Speak Before Words

In Jungian Sandplay Therapy, healing often begins before words are spoken.

Children may not always be able to explain their feelings.
But through symbols in the sand tray, their inner world can still be expressed.

A dragon may represent fear.
A wall may represent protection.
A hidden figure may express vulnerability.

These symbolic images allow emotions to appear safely before they can be understood.

In Sandplay Therapy, the therapist protects the space and allows the symbolic process to unfold naturally.

Image first.
Words later.

📍 Secunda
🌿 Jungian Sandplay Therapy
📩 Appointments available

05/03/2026

🐚 Symbols Speak Before Words

In Jungian Sandplay Therapy, healing often begins before a child can explain what they feel.

Developed by Dora Kalff and rooted in the psychology of Carl Gustav Jung, Sandplay allows the psyche to communicate through symbols and images rather than explanations.

Children may build scenes in the sand tray such as:

• battles or chaos
• protective animals
• castles or shelters
• buried figures
• journeys across the sand

To an adult, this may look like simple play.
But symbolically, these scenes often reflect the child’s inner emotional world.

Many feelings exist long before they can be put into words — fear, anger, confusion, shame, or vulnerability.

In Sandplay Therapy, these experiences can appear safely through symbolic images.

When the therapist protects the space and does not interrupt the symbolic process, the psyche is allowed to speak in its own language.

The image comes first.
Understanding follows later.

If your child struggles with anxiety, emotional overwhelm, or difficulty expressing feelings, Jungian Sandplay Therapy offers a gentle and depth-oriented approach.

📍 Secunda
🌿 Jungian Sandplay Therapy
📩 Appointments available



https://rinalouwclinical.co.za/symbolic-and-non-verbal-process-in-jungian-sandplay-therapy/

28/02/2026

🌊 When the unconscious speaks, it often speaks in symbols.

In Jungian work, water almost always points to the emotional world and the unconscious — the deeper feelings a child (or adult) cannot yet explain in words.

In today’s imagery three powerful symbols appeared:

The Boat
The boat represents the ego — the part of us trying to travel safely across emotional experiences. When a child places a boat, the psyche is often saying:
“I am trying to manage feelings that feel bigger than me.”

The Lighthouse
A lighthouse is a symbol of the guiding Self.
It does not remove the storm — it helps the traveller orient.
In therapy this often reflects the child beginning to experience safety, direction, and the presence of a reliable adult.

Sea Life
Creatures from the ocean represent instinctive and emotional life — feelings that live beneath awareness: fear, curiosity, anger, attachment needs, and longing for connection.

When these appear together, we often see a beautiful message:

The child is beginning to navigate their inner world — and is no longer completely lost inside it.

Children cannot always tell us their story.
But in play, they show us.

🌿 Sandplay Therapy allows children to express feelings safely before they can explain them.

📩 You are welcome to contact me if you would like to learn more.

28/02/2026

🌱 When children cannot tell us their story

Not all trauma looks dramatic.

Sometimes it looks like:
• anger
• school refusal
• tummy aches
• withdrawal
• “I don’t know what’s wrong”

Children don’t always remember difficult experiences in words.
They remember them in their bodies.

So instead of talking about what happened, they show us through behaviour.

Your child is not being difficult.
Your child may be overwhelmed.

Play is a child’s natural language.
In therapy, children often show their fears, worries, and hurts long before they can explain them.

And when they are given a safe space to express it, something powerful happens — their nervous system begins to settle.

There is help. And there is hope 🌿

📩 You are welcome to message me to learn more about Sandplay Therapy for primary school children.
https://rinalouwclinical.co.za/trauma-in-children-play-therapy-sandplay/