Natalie Boterman, BFA, MFA

Book A Free Consultation

“I am out with lanterns, looking for myself.” - Emily Dickinson

Most of us arrive in therapy carrying a lantern, seeking a self we suspect is in there somewhere, though we don’t know how to begin realizing it. I see people as already whole, but with things in the way of feeling at home within themselves. What you need is good light, good company, and permission to look at what’s actually there.

But light is not always kind. It shows the rooms we’ve kept closed and the furniture we’ve spent years walking around. Looking honestly is often disorienting before it is freeing. I would like to help you carry your lantern.

I came to this work through fine art and philosophy (BFA, MFA), and I still think like an artist. I’m drawn to the story beneath the one people first tell, and to the questions we usually rush past: what it means to live well, and what keeps us from it.

My therapeutic approach is integrative, which means therapy is shaped around you rather than around a single method. We might talk, sit with silence, make sense of old patterns, or build practical skills for the everyday. Some days will be philosophical and some will be plainly practical, and both are welcome here. I don’t expect you to arrive with things figured out. I’d rather meet you in the uncertainty, with curiosity, care, and respect. Together we can work toward self-acceptance, clarity, and a life that feels like yours.

Highlights:

  • Born and raised in Vancouver, I spent more than a decade living away before returning to the city that shaped me. I am happy to be part of this community and to join the team at the Vancouver Therapy Collective. Currently, I am a practicum student under the supervision of Dr. Christopher Brown while I complete my Master of Counselling and Psychotherapy (Integrative Modalities) at the Irish College of Humanities and Applied Sciences in Dublin, graduating in 2027. Previously I hold a Bachelor of Fine Arts from the Nova Scotia College of Art and Design (2012), Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada and a Masters of Fine Arts from Ecole Cantonale d'art du Valais, Sierre, Switzerland (2015).

  • My practicum work spans clinical and non-clinical roles. I currently work as a student practitioner at DCD/Dyspraxia Ireland, where I manage my own caseload under supervision, and I am beginning clinical placement at the Rathgar Consultancy Centre, a low-cost counselling service staffed by trainee therapists. Alongside this, I serve as Student Liaison Convenor in the Motion Picture Arts Program at Capilano University, guiding students through program questions, policy, and concerns, as well as the work I do as a teaching assistant. The convenor role is non-clinical, but it is very much counselling in practice: students often arrive in crisis, carrying far more than the question they came with. Together, these roles have given me a close view of how people seek support across different settings, and they have taught me to listen for what sits beneath the stated problem.

  • My master’s dissertation is an extended literature review on the use of nature in mental health support. It asks why time in nature supports psychological wellbeing, drawing on Jung’s individuation framework and transpersonal psychology, and whether that support survives technological mediation, using virtual reality as the test case. Research on anxiety anchors the review, and I examine whether nature’s restorative effects and its transpersonal effects are separable, and which of them a simulation can carry. The work sits at the intersection of ecology, depth psychology, and emerging technology, and asks what is lost, if anything, when the natural world is reproduced rather than encountered.