“Compassion is not a relationship between the healer and the wounded. It is a relationship between equals. Only when we know our own darkness well can we be present with the darkness of others. Compassion becomes real when we recognize our shared humanity.” ~ Pema Chodron.
Hi there! My name is Mary Szenasi. I am a transformational wellness coach and Shadow integration coach, as well as a member of both the "National Association of Holistic Aromatherapy" and the "International Alliance of Holistic Therapists" and published author. As the founder and coach here at The 6th House, I welcome you!
For many years I worked as an assistant to great physicians of conventional medicine. While doing so I gained a deep love for seeing people heal and a huge respect for the courage it takes to get there!
But one day I started to look at the mind, body and spirit as one system, and I felt as though there were something truly missing. I was used to considering how health effected the state of mind, but I started to ask questions such as “How does the state of mind effect health and overall wellness?” and "How much of the state of dis-ease is psychosomatic?".
I stopped taking what I had learned about the general state of wellness as the only option and I started asking "Why"? A lot!
This led me to start thinking about what it might mean to take the things I had learned along my personal path to healing, and sharing that path with others.
A little about that path…
I was a victim of childhood sexual abuse and spiritual neglect. I had lost such substantial pieces of myself during the early years of my life that as a teenager and young adult I was not functioning at my fullest potential. This left me an explosively angry young woman with issues surrounding trust, self-control, alcohol, self-loathing and such a large range of intimacy issues that I was unable to make meaningful and steadfast connections. Although I was well into my 20's when my path to healing began, I was 16 when I discovered the first of many tools that I'd use to transform my life.
That was about 22 years ago and well before I even knew there was a name for what I was doing.
I was extremely intrigued with astrology and decided I had to know more than what the Sunday paper had to say. After a lot of digging and tearing away at the surface of modern western astrology, I found and felt a deep connection to esoteric astrology.
After feeling this connection with the myths and architypes that saturate esoteric astrology, I fell down the rabbit hole of depth psychology.
Particularly the writings of Carl Jung, the great psychologist and mystic.
It was Carl Jung who gave a name to an architype that has a long history outside of common knowledge, the Shadow. This architype was the one that piqued my interest the most. The architype that represents darkness, repressed memories, fears, wounds, great desires and golden nuggets of our innate selves.
From that point forward I became a student of mystic philosophy, alchemy, depth psychology, astrology and many branches of the healing arts, including crystal healing, aromatherapy and herbalism.
I utilized my knowledge in all of these realms of healing arts to recover from the traumas I experienced in childhood. It was through deep self-analysis, mindfulness, radical honesty, breaking patterns and Shadow integration that I slowly began the process of soul retrieval; and through the healing arts of herbalism, yoga, aromatherapy and a deepening spiritual practice that I was able to smooth away the rough edges of the healing process!
With all of the bits and pieces of information, philosophies and techniques I picked up over the years, I finally decided to hunker down and conceptualize “The 6th House”. A wellness practice that primarily uses Shadow work and natal chart referencing to guide my clients to the greatest alchemic task of all, radical wholeness. One soul retrieval at a time.
"You can not surrender the quality of your wellness or life to chance, you must surrender it to change." ~M Szenasi