Taraka is a therapist who cares about the wellbeing, mental health and self-care practices of those working with people from really challenging backgrounds. 

As a graduate teacher of English and Art Taraka worked in schools where abuse of teachers was normalised and staff weren’t offered ‘protection’ by administration. Taraka worked hard to develop rapport with students but mostly felt out of her depth because she didn’t have a big voice or enjoy harsh treatment of students to keep them in order. University didn’t offer much in the way of connection development for traumatised students (none). 

Overtime and experiencing student after student disengaged from learning and frequently displaying unexpected emotions and unexpected behaviours, disclosing stories of abuse, family suicide and failures of the child safety system, evidence of attachment disorders (now she knows what its called), mental health disorders, Taraka began the journey to become an Art Therapist. 

In 2009 when Taraka was doing her Post Grad Diploma for Art Therapy she could see the Art Therapy bomb had not dropped in Australia and she decided more support for a practice would be necessary, so she embarked on a Social Work Masters and did placements at a school established to provide an immersive English experience for newly arrived migrants and refugees, and in Hong Kong with a Refugee Drop in Centre. Taraka hoped developing a compassionate practice with clients from severe experiences would help her develop skills that would transfer to most other work environments in the future. It was like ten years in one year, due to the complexity of cases and lack of social services and sheer number of people seeking asylum in Hong Kong. Unfortunately, personal losses and relationship difficulties and living in the middle of the city of 7 million, it turned into the double edged sword for Taraka and she developed compassion fatigue. 

The turning point was finishing her contract with the refugee centre and then Taraka taught kindergarten English for 18 months, and the change of pace helped enormously. Children were laughing, playing and wanted to please and there were no trauma stories. Taraka also started her Master of Arts (Therapeutic Practice) at this time and formed a small group of participants to explore creativity in the workplace. These two actions helped Taraka get some balance back in her life, plus a very skilled and compassionate therapist assisted her to process stuck emotions.