Clinical Supervision for Counsellors & Psychotherapists in Kendal, Lancaster & Online
I offer clinical supervision for those in helping professions who work with children and/or adults; including psychotherapists and counsellors, as well as others such as yoga therapists, forest school practitioners, eco-therapists and coaches.
My Approach to Supervision
As a supervisor, I explore individualised approaches to create a safe, supportive, and collaborative environment. I encourage my supervisees to reflect openly on their feelings and reactions in sessions, explore how they relate to their clients, and consider how external factors may influence the therapeutic process. I provide guidance when navigating complex situations, offer constructive challenges, and support professional growth through reflection and constructive feedback.
I feel the value of supervision lies in what we co-create together — a reflective, relational space through which your work is thoughtfully explored, your professional growth is nurtured, and your clients’ wellbeing is safeguarded.
Using Hawkins and Shohet’s Seven-Eyed Model, supervision covers multiple perspectives: it examines the client’s experience, the therapist’s interventions and responses, the therapeutic relationship, the wider context of the work, and the supervisory relationship itself. This comprehensive approach helps therapists gain insight into their practice, identify patterns, and explore alternative ways of working when challenges arise. Within this structure, each supervisory relationship is unique, shaped by the interplay between supervisor and supervisee. Together, we draw upon both of our experiences, knowledge and insight.
Supervision serves a variety of purposes including:
To ensure the efficacy and integrity of therapeutic practice, enabling the therapist to provide the highest standard of care to their clients.
To support professional development and reflective learning, helping the practitioner to deepen self-awareness, competence, and clinical discernment.
To function as a holding and resourcing space, offering emotional support, containment, and the opportunity to process difficult material or countertransference responses.
To maintain ethical and quality standards, including a responsibility to attend to boundary, risk, and professional accountability.
A little about Vanessa Bear
(though you will find more information here)
I am a UKCP-registered integrative psychotherapist and psychotherapeutic counsellor, qualified to work with adults, children and young people. I have experience in CAMHS, NHS, schools, and charitable organisations. I have a private practice in the South Lake District.
As well as working with individuals and groups in various settings, I also work outdoors and hold qualifications, training and experience as a Mountain Leader, Forest School, basket-making, and nature connection. I am interested in the role that relationship with more-than-human nature has in resourcing and supporting therapeutic work and sense of belonging. I am also trained in a variety of embodied and body-connected practices including yoga, yoga therapy, yogic mindfulness, somatic trauma therapy.
Trauma-Informed, Embodied and Creative Supervision
I offer trauma-informed, embodied and creative clinical supervision for therapists, counsellors and helping professionals in Kendal, the South Lakes and online. Supervision with me is calm, steady and centred on safety. We pay close attention to your nervous system, your emotional and embodied responses and the real impact of your clinical work. Together, we use a pace that supports your window of tolerance, including pausing or grounding when needed and we work with brief overviews rather than detailed trauma narratives to keep the space regulated and reflective. You can read more about my trauma-informed approach in my blog here.
Alongside talking-based reflection, you are welcome to explore creative or embodied methods such as somatic noticing, movement, drawing, image-work, nature connection or sand tray. Nothing is ever imposed, and everything is shaped collaboratively so that you can bring your full self into the work. My aim is to help you feel resourced, clear and sustainable in your practice, grounded in an approach that honours both your wellbeing and your professional growth.
Fees, Availability & Location
Individual sessions are available in-person in Staveley near Kendal indoors or outdoors, or online (Zoom)
Group sessions available in-person in Staveley near Kendal indoors or outdoors, or online (Zoom). You can get in touch to wait for a group to come together or let me know that a group that you are already a part of would like sessions.
Supervision can be ongoing and focus on clinical work, using the seven-eyed model of supervision, or could be a one-off or additional to other supervision, with a specific focus on my specialisms and interests of self-care, somatic trauma therapy or eco-therapy.
I am currently a supervisor-in-training with CSTD Bath.
Location
I offer clinical supervision in Staveley, Kendal, Lancaster and online using Zoom. Sessions can be in person indoors or outdoors, or a mix of all of these.
Cost
Choice of 1 hour, 1.5 hour and two hour sessions depending on your professional requirements and needs.
My sliding scale is based on the ‘Green Bottle’ sliding scale devised by Alexis Cunningfolk and the wording used by the RTN membership sliding scale.
Please read the description of each band here to decide which applies to you. The sliding scale is based on financial availability, rather than on income or job status, and gives a variety of examples for each band. Please consider it fairly for you, for others and for me.
While I am in training, until approximately September 2026, I am offering a limited number of supervision slots at 2/3 the usual fee. I do currently have a spot available with this discount. Please get in touch if you would like it.
Limited Reduced Fee Spaces while I am a supervisor-in-training:
Band A full price: £53 per hour / £79.50 for 1.5 hours / £106 for 2 hours
Band B Concession price: £46 per hour / £69 for 1.5 hours / £92 for 2 hours
Band C Concession price: £40 per hour / £60 for 1.5 hours / £80 for 2 hours
Usual Fee
Band A full price: £70 per hour / £105 for 1.5 hours / £140 for 2 hours
Band B Concession price: £60 per hour / £90 for 1.5 hours / £120 for 2 hours
Band C Concession price: £55 per hour / £82.50 for 1.5 hours / £110 for 2 hours
Clinical Supervision FAQs
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Trauma-informed supervision is supervision that places safety, choice, and regulation at the centre of our work together. It is informed by Babette Rothschild’s principles of safe trauma therapy and draws on somatic, relational and creative approaches to help you stay within your own window of tolerance as we explore your clinical work.
It doesn’t require you to “push through” what feels overwhelming. Instead, we work at a pace that feels steady and supportive, building on the resources you already have. The aim is to strengthen your confidence, clarity, and grounding so that you can meet your clients with more spaciousness and ease. -
Yes. If outdoor work feels supportive for you, I offer supervision sessions in nature around Staveley. Working outdoors can bring a sense of steadiness, creativity, and perspective, and some supervisees find it helps them regulate more easily.
We will always consider together what feels safe, appropriate, and ethically aligned for the type of work you want to bring. -
Yes. I am a UKCP-registered Integrative Child & Adolescent Psychotherapist with extensive experience supporting practitioners who work with children, adolescents, families, and schools.
Whether your work is creative, relational, somatic, or systemic, supervision can offer a steady base from which to think about developmental needs, safeguarding, risk, attachment, and the complexities of working within multi-agency contexts.
You are welcome to bring any aspect of your work with CYP into our sessions. -
Yes. I offer supervision for therapists and counsellors in training, including students completing placement hours.
My approach is gentle, collaborative, and grounded in safety, helping you build confidence, develop your clinical thinking, and navigate the emotional impact of client work. I meet you where you are, offering structure, encouragement and space to grow your own therapeutic voice.
Training-level supervisees often find the mix of creative, embodied and reflective approaches particularly supportive as they discover who they are as practitioners. -
Embodied supervision helps you stay connected to your own body, boundaries and nervous system while you work. We pay attention to signs of activation, overwhelm, fatigue or over-empathy, and we use gentle grounding strategies to help you return to a place of steadiness.
This kind of supervision can reduce the risk of vicarious trauma, compassion fatigue and burnout. It can also deepen your confidence in pacing, containment and co-regulation with clients. Somatic awareness becomes a resource — something that supports you rather than something you have to manage alone. -
Yes. I offer online supervision for therapists across the UK. Depending on availability, I can also offer a blended approach — some sessions outdoors or in-person in Staveley, and others online when it suits their week better.
Online sessions are held with the same care, presence and steadiness as in-person work, and can be a flexible way to stay resourced and supported wherever you are based. -
Yes, if you want it to. Supervision with me is always individualised and shaped around what feels most supportive for you at that moment in your work. Some supervisees enjoy integrating creative methods such as drawing, image-work, sand tray, or reflective writing; others prefer embodied approaches, including grounding, posture awareness, or gentle somatic tracking.
And some people prefer a purely talking-based, reflective space. All of these are welcome.
There is no expectation to be creative or embodied, everything is an invitation. You choose what feels useful, accessible and safe on the day, and together we adapt the session to meet the needs of the work you are bringing.
Supervision offered:
In-person, online, and outdoors
In-person locations:
Staveley, near Kendal, South Lake District, Cumbria
Lancaster