Trash Talk is counselling in Stanley Park. The same clinical work as a session in my office, done outdoors, side by side, while we pick up litter. I bring the buckets and the pickers. You bring whatever you actually want to work on.
If a closed office makes you go quiet, if you think more clearly when you are moving, or if you want your hands busy while you talk, this is for you. A lot of the people who ask about it are adults navigating ADHD or other neurodivergence. Some are men who are functioning on paper and still stuck. Some are just tired of performing insight under fluorescent lights.
We meet at an agreed spot. I have the gear. We walk a loop, we talk, and we pick up what people have left on the trails and the shoreline. Side by side, not across a desk. Nobody has to make eye contact on command.
The clinical part is not a metaphor. Same attention, same pacing, same work I would do in a chair. What changes is that your body is moving and your eyes are on the path, which is often what makes the tight part sayable.
This is not a volunteer shift with a counsellor tagged on, and it is not a hike. If the cleanup is not the draw, Walk & Talk is the better fit. Same park, same side-by-side format, no buckets.
No direct billing. I provide a receipt for extended health.
If you are in the second column, say so on the consult and I will point you somewhere better.
The usual start is the stone bridge where Rawlings Trail meets North Lagoon Drive, at the stream running from Lost Lagoon toward Second Beach. There is parking along North Lagoon Drive. If Second Beach or Prospect Point is easier for you, say so before the session so we are not hunting for each other.
It is a public park. There is no office door, and yes, you can pass someone you know. I keep the conversation to the quieter stretches of the loop and I stop talking when people are close. If you would rather have four walls, my office at 1160 Burrard St. #605 D is the right setting for that.
I am not going to tell you that picking up litter heals you. That would be a slogan. What I will say is that therapy goes sideways when it only circles the story. Doing something concrete, in a real place, with another person walking next to you, changes the hour. You are in the world. The world has trash in it. We pick some of it up.
The litter is not you. The litter is the thing left behind and then treated as scenery.
Book a free short consult and we will see if this is a fit. There are therapists who fit and therapists who don’t. This is a zero-pressure way to find out which I am.
Byron Elton, M.A., RCC · BCACC #20378 · Stanley Park Counselling · Vancouver, BC
