We’re excited to introduce you to the always interesting and insightful Ursula Baird. We hope you’ll enjoy our conversation with Ursula below.

Ursula, thanks for joining us, excited to have you contributing your stories and insights. What’s the best advice you ever gave to a client? How did they benefit / what was the result? (Please note this response is for education/entertainment purposes only and shouldn’t be construed as advice for the reader)

This is the advice I give to anyone who is looking for a new therapist, because finding the “right” psychotherapist for you can feel impossible. Nobody likes doing it. It’s awkward, uncomfortable, and time consuming. Therapy is an investment in your mental health and well-being. It is also a messy, difficult slog at times. Chances are your therapist will see you at your worst and your best, so picking that person can feel overwhelming and daunting.

I, like many therapists, offer a free 15-minute phone consultation, and I encourage potential clients to use consultations to get to know me and to speak with several other therapists before deciding. Going with your best friend’s sister’s neighbor’s recommendation, may not be the right fit for you. It may take a few tries, but don’t give up looking for your therapist. Therapy is a relationship like no other. It is the space in which you can share the thoughts and feelings with your therapist that you can’t, won’t, or don’t with family and friends—in order to have better relationships with those same family and friends.

Ursula, love having you share your insights with us. Before we ask you more questions, maybe you can take a moment to introduce yourself to our readers who might have missed our earlier conversations?

My name is Ursula Gabel Baird and I’m a California Licensed Marriage and Family Therapist and EMDR Practitioner. I trained in the community mental health sector for three years and am now in private practice. I see adult individuals and couples in-person in offices in Culver City and Pasadena and via telehealth throughout California.

My approach is integrative, using trauma-informed, relational, cognitive, and somatic modalities along with talk therapy and EMDR (Eye Movement Desensitization & Reprocessing). What that means is that together the client and I are looking at how they show up in their relationships, how their thoughts, emotions, and beliefs impact their experience, and how it all shows up in their body. For me, a holistic and integrative view of therapy is vital. Mind, body, behavior, relationships, our outer world—it all matters when it comes to our mental and emotional health. What we focus on depends on the client’s concerns.

A lot of my work is with clients who have experienced some kind of trauma. Everyone’s response to big or little trauma is unique, and the effects of trauma show up in each of us differently. It can present as anxiety, depression, addiction, hypervigilance, sleep issues, fatigue, prolonged grief, negative self-talk, creative blocks, or conflict in relationships to name just a few. Over time, what was once the solution and was a way to get through that trauma, or that difficult childhood, or difficult relationship, or difficult time in life—that solution stops working, and that is often when people come to therapy. I believe there is no blame, shame, or judgement in that—it is just something that used to work, no longer does, and my role as a psychotherapist is to help people find different solutions and move through what is keeping them stuck. For me, my own experiences in therapy have been during significant transition periods in my life. Going to therapy is about getting extra support during difficult times.

I want to add that there are many other layers of reality in addition to our internal world that greatly impact our mood and daily experiences. There is a multitude of social, cultural, spiritual, and political aspects that contribute to how we view ourselves and how we experience our lives. External factors such as family, religion, culture, institutions, and systems play a huge part in our well-being. Looking at how they impact our mental health and sense of self is also part of the conversations I have with clients.

Have you ever had to pivot?

Yes, starting a new career at this stage of my life was a huge pivot. I became a psychotherapist after a wonderful (albeit often stressful) 25+ years as line producer in the film production industry, mainly in advertising and TV commercials. I was fortunate to work with many incredibly talented and remarkable creatives, crew, and actors. As a high school and college student in the Midwest, I was a musician and actor myself, so getting to be a part of the film industry for most of my adulthood in Los Angeles was a dream come true.

The decision to pivot was both personal and professional. In 2015, my mother was diagnosed with COPD and only two years to live, and I decided to return to my own therapy. It was a place to process feelings about my relationship with her and eventually losing her. It was also a time of reflection and questioning what I wanted to do with the rest of my life. Loss and major transitions in life have a way of evoking those thoughts. After I started graduate school and gradually left my former career, there were times I was still uncertain I had made the right decision. I joked with friends, “did the world really need me to make another commercial?” and the answer that I kept coming back to was “no.” I had a successful, exciting, and challenging career for many years. It was ok to make a change. It was ok to want something different.

Working with therapists at different points in my own life was incredibly useful and positive, and my hope is to provide that for my clients. I view therapy as a space where I can continue to be collaborative and creative. I see myself as a guide and a witness to my clients’ experiences. It’s not easy to look at ourselves. It requires taking emotional risks, for me and my clients. I don’t ask clients to do something I myself haven’t done as part of my own healing. We’re all a work in progress. I think for many people, it feels really uncomfortable to be emotionally vulnerable, whether it’s with our therapist, a partner, a parent, or a friend. Our culture is not big on emotional vulnerability—just ask Brené Brown (author and expert on shame & vulnerability). But when we are emotionally vulnerable, that is when we are most available to connect with others. And that connection can be incredibly healing in our relationship with ourselves and in our relationships with other people.

Putting training and knowledge aside, what else do you think really matters in terms of succeeding in your field?

Two things. First thing—curiosity.

Don’t tell anyone, but I don’t have all the answers! So I stay curious. One of the reasons I stayed in my former career so long is because every project was something new. A new product, a new technology, a new location to explore. In psychology there all always new perspectives about our human experience. One of the things I love about this work is that I’m constantly learning. The more I share that knowledge, the more I help my clients.

Second thing is really two more things—play and humor. I know they may not be what you think a therapist should be striving for but hear me out.

One of the reasons I enjoy working with couples is because the relationship is right there in the room. We’re working on communication in real time, collaborating how to make their relationship better, more enjoyable, and yes, maybe even more playful. That’s a word that doesn’t get enough time in therapy – PLAY! With individual clients, talk about play comes up around the subject of self-care. But for many of my clients, they say self-care is just another task they have to complete. It feels like more work. If self-care were more like play, how many of us would do it more often?

With couples, I’m a big proponent of using play and humor to increase connection. Humor can diffuse tension and bring us closer. It can be a gentle reminder that we’re human and that none of us do relationships perfectly. As adults, many of us have forgotten how to play and we forget that at one time, this person we fell in love with was our favorite person to play with. What might that feel like in our relationships if we carved out a little more time to play? How could that change my mood if I had something to look forward to and anticipate?

I have to practice these things in my own life–play, humor, curiosity–because I take myself way too seriously, way too often. Because if I don’t practice them, I can’t really ask my clients to. Laughter or play, whether we share it or experience it by ourselves, can make getting through difficult times, just a little easier, and I think everyone could use a little more ease these days.

*Ursula’s latest exploration of play includes learning the bass guitar.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.ursulabairdtherapy.com/
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/ursulabairdtherapy/