Social Justice Initiative

 

Thrive’s Social Justice Initiative

 

Thrive is dedicated to helping all women achieve wellness and unequivocal success regardless of history, background, or identity. We stand firm in our values for not only justice but equity. To us, anti-oppression, anti-racism, and therapy decolonization are not simply buzzwords.

Our values are transparent in our social media presence, but we would like to clarify how we embody these values in our therapy practice. The time of ”treading lightly” around tough topics as mental health professionals is over. We’re putting our money where our mouth is.

This is not the time to be idle.

We treat all clients with honor and respect as we partner with them in their healing journey. We never use our client’s vulnerability against them and we hold it as sacred to enter into healing work with another person. We recognize the limitations of dominant-culture psychology which primarily focuses on the individual + family of origin and we choose to consider cultural, societal, and ancestral influences, including oppressive systems, on our clients’ mental and emotional well-being. Many popular therapy modalities were not created with marginalized populations in mind, but many are rooted in BIPOC wisdom and practices. We honor this rich history through flexibility, fluidity, and adaptability in our work. We recognize our client’s autonomy as well as their systemic roadblocks.

At Thrive, our team believes in the importance of “handling our shit". We get real, vulnerable, and accountable for our own biases, privilege, and baggage, so we can create a safe space for every client we see. We take the time to learn about our clients' cultural influences as well as the oppressive influences that they and their ancestors have to navigate.

We are lifelong learners, acknowledging our imperfections, and remaining active in self-correction, repairing, and providing corrective experiences for collective growth.

We choose empowerment over pathology, working with our clients through diagnoses/labels that they resonate with and recognizing that often Western psychology discredits appropriate responses to trauma and oppression.

To that end, Thrive has created a series of initiatives we are actively taking as a company to advance justice for all, primarily in three forms:

 

Social

We reach beyond the walls of the therapy room to fight for social justice and the dismantling of oppressive systems.

We practice active anti-racism and decolonization of therapy within our organization, and beyond by:

  • Doing our part to implement and promote policies that do not perpetuate systemic oppression and White supremacist beliefs.

  • Decentering mental healthcare away from the dominant White, heteronormative, patriarchal, gender-binary narrative.

  • Decolonizing mental health care by focusing on culturally affirming practices.
    Actively reassessing and dismantling harmful mental health practices formed from and upheld by systemic privilege.

  • Hiring clinicians not only skilled in their craft, but who are also committed to inclusive work, and consistently challenging themselves to unlearn unhelpful beliefs rooted in White supremacy and systemic oppression.

  • Supporting clients through cultivating a practice of self-care, self-prioritization, and building a network of community care.

  • Utilizing our positions of power and privilege to advocate for social change and justice in the psychology field and beyond.

  • Amplifying marginalized voices - on our social media and elsewhere to provide forward momentum in anti-racism work.

  • Only working with partners who match our belief systems in putting together workshops, presentations, podcasts, and speaking engagements.

 

Environmental

We research, establish, and maintain sustainable business practices designed to reduce our overall impact on the environment by:

  • Constantly investigating our business and office practices in order to identify areas where we can actively reduce waste and increase sustainability.

  • Building ethical business relationships with small businesses that source supplies and services ethically and in an environmentally conscious way.

  • Providing online and virtual therapy to minimize the use of physical office space.

  • Being thoughtful of the spaces we occupy, and prioritizing office and event spaces that are energy-efficient, cognizant of their carbon footprint, and making concerted efforts to maintain high-quality sustainable practices.

 

Economic

We provide pro bono work, create long-term community partnerships, and increase access to care for all clients by:

  • Partnering with community organizations that serve disadvantaged populations to provide therapy free of charge to their clients.

  • Hiring unlicensed trainees who can offer lower fees for clients who cannot afford licensed clinicians.

  • Hosting free workshops and low-fee support groups in our community to support needs such as conflict resolution, money management, parenting education, etc.

  • Creating a nonprofit organization, The Thrive Collective, to ensure that all persons have equitable access to our therapeutic services. Through Thrive Collective we aim to increase access to services, offer group therapy at reduced costs, and host a series of personal development workshops for our communities. designed specifically to provide low-cost or free services and study materials to marginalized and/or underserved populations.

  • Accepting vouchers from external providers in order to support the accessibility of services for BIPOC clients.