Inspiring Conversations with Jessica Horness of Jessica Horness Counseling & Psychotherapy

Today we’d like to introduce you to Jessica Horness

Hi Jessica, can you start by introducing yourself? We’d love to learn more about how you got to where you are today?
I have the weirdest job on earth, which is having conversations that illicit change, and I got there by doing a lot of other very weird jobs. My undergraduate work is in classical acting, a profession I pursued due to a love of stories and their ability to transform us and make us feel less alone. When I realized I loved the process far more than the profession of theater, I set off on a very twenty-something self-discovery journey that led me around the world with a backpack, really taking time to soak up as much humanity as I could. During that time I fell in love with India, where I practiced Ashtanga yoga under the instruction of R. Saraswati Jois at the Ashtanga Yoga Institute.

After that, I did what any good young person with an acting degree does – I waited a lot of tables, which financed my yearly pilgrimages to study at the yoga institute in Mysuru. I eventually started assisting in Saraswati’s classes and teaching while I was at home. It was from Saraswati and, later, my current teacher Angela Jamison, that I really got an introduction to the work of healing as a relational practice.

After some time amongst the ex-pats, I realized that I was craving deep relationships and a feeling of being rooted in community. I moved back to Michigan to start investing in building community and cultivating a sense of belonging to place. It turns out teaching yoga is a challenging way to pay a mortgage, so I began a master’s program in Clinical Mental Health Counseling. It took ten years, but in beginning that program I had finally found a place where my enthusiasm for healing relationships and my love of storytelling could really flourish. I’m a huge geek about counseling and the process of human change, so much so that I annoy my colleagues by talking shop off the clock.

After a few years at an agency, where I specialized in supporting folks with co-occuring mental health and substance use concerns, I established my private practice in January 2023. I now work with folks with a range of concerns, including mental health, substance use, life transition, and diversity-related stressors. I also have an exciting new project training yoga teachers in trauma-supportive teaching practices, a passion project that completed it’s pilot run this July. Currently, I’m also dreaming up a future that includes mentorship and creating space for cooperative practice amongst various health professionals.

Can you talk to us a bit about the challenges and lessons you’ve learned along the way. Looking back would you say it’s been easy or smooth in retrospect?
Balance has been a learning curve. I’m passionate about my work, and that kind of excitement can make it easy to set the stage for overwork and burnout. Learning to prioritize joy and honor my needs as a human being, not just as a professional, has been one of my big struggles along the way.

I view the work I do as vocational. To be effective in meeting another person where they are and really being present and ethical in the way you guide them towards change, it’s so important to be really aware of your own “stuff,” your ego, your biases, where your energy might be disregulated or wavering. I was lucky to have great mentors during my early yoga teaching years to guide me through the times when I messed this up, when I wasn’t self-aware or responsible with my role in healing relationships. I feel so blessed to have great peers to work with through that now. That work was also super vulnerable and often a struggle as well.

Finally, being in the helping professions under capitalism is no joke. Learning to balance the vocational responsibility I feel towards serving others with my own financial needs has been a tightrope. It’s a hard pill to swallow when you realize that fulfillment won’t feed you or your cats.

Great, so let’s talk business. Can you tell our readers more about what you do and what you think sets you apart from others?
I’m a Licensed Professional Counselor. I offer psychotherapy and counseling services to individuals experiencing mental health, substance use, life transition, and diversity-related concerns. In short, I talk to people about their problems in a way that helps them lead richer, more fulfilling lives.

Do you have any advice for those just starting out?
Take your time to learn who you are. There’s this temptation to rush forward and start building and doing before we have a sense of self. We live in a culture that worships the young upstart and the prodigy, and forgets about the deep value of experience, self-awareness, groundedness, and depth. In the long run, how you show up for your work and for the world is going to matter so much more than what it was you were doing. The time you take to let yourself mature will make all the future work so much richer and more fulfilling.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://jessicahornesscounseling.com