Gaining Insight into Your Inner Wisdom, Recognising Relational Patterns, and Connecting with Your Authentic Self

Alpha Ponce

Brisbane-based somatic Trauma – Informed Counselling and Psychotherapist and Counsellor, founder of Wise Beginning.

Alpha is a Clinical member of Psychotherapy and Counselling Federation of Australia (PACFA CLINICAL), Gestalt Australia and New Zealand (GANZ), a clinical member of Australian Centre for Emotionally Focused Therapy (ACEFT) and International Centre for Excellence in Emotionally Focused Therapy (ICEFT).

Alpha is committed to self-development and undertakes regular professional supervision to continue her development in psychotherapy, complying with the professional ethics of PACFA.

Compassionate Inquiry
Psychotherapy and Counselling Federationf of Australia
Registered Clinical Counsellor
Restoring Resilience
Somatic Experiencing International
Sensorimotor Psychotherapy Australia
Somatic Therapy Wise Beginning Alpha Ponce

Hi. I’m Alpha Ponce

Brisbane-based Psychotherapist and Counsellor, and founder of Wise Beginning

I work with clients both online via Zoom and in person in West End, Brisbane City. I graduated as a Psychologist in Mexico and hold a Master’s in Gestalt psychotherapy. My work focuses on helping adults and couples heal from complex or developmental trauma.

My approach is somatic, trauma-informed, relational, and client-centred. I recognize my clients as the experts in their lives and give them agency and autonomy throughout the therapeutic process. I draw from Gestalt therapy, Emotionally Focused Therapy(EFT), Family Constellations, Sensorimotor Therapy and Compassionate Inquiry, while integrating all of it with my knowledge in Internal Family Systems(IFS). All these approaches allow me to work holistically with the mind, body, emotions, and relational patterns that shape your experience.

I use supportive, trauma-informed frameworks to help you gently explore and release the layers of your childhood and recent trauma, triggers, tension and suppressed emotions held in the body.

These feelings are often at the root of emotional distress, rational difficulties, mental health challenges, and patterns such as addiction or disconnection from Self.

I create a safe, attuned, and compassionate therapeutic relationship where you can heal your emotional wounds and reconnect with your body’s wisdom.

Through our work together, you can explore and understand your experiences, and by reconnecting with your body, begin to heal from traumatic events from childhood or more recent years. Together, we will gently recognise the beliefs you have internalised and make space to feel emotions that may have been suppressed. This healing journey is a collaborative process, where we work side by side to deepen self-awareness of emotional patterns, triggers, and body memories, allowing your inner wisdom to emerge with greater compassion.

As we release ourselves from these past stories, a path towards a new one can emerge that allows for spontaneity, agency, growth, freedom and the capacity to build healthier and more authentic relationships.

Complex trauma (or developmental trauma) might develop when an unsupported child goes through difficult times with their caregiver. For example, when the caregiver is emotionally disconnected, anxious, depressed, neglectful, or loving one minute and extremely angry the next. This can lead to the child feeling constantly unsafe.

Trauma can influence the brain’s structure, function, and chemistry in development, shaping how we regulate emotions. How we were raised shapes our adulthood; our early experiences shape the foundation of our beliefs, attachment patterns, and nervous system responses in our adulthood. However, knowing that our brain is adaptable can help us forge new pathways conducive to healing and growth in wisdom. We have an inherent ability to overcome our wounds, especially if we find and receive proper professional support.

“We may not be responsible for the world that created our minds, but we can take responsibility for the mind with which we create our world”. Gabor Mate

I am open-minded and comfortable working with diversity. I prioritise developing a genuine and respectful therapeutic relationship with you, making sure you feel seen, heard, and supported. I deeply honour your lived experience and inner wisdom, and I believe meaningful change can only occur through awareness, compassion, and collaboration.

Somatic Therapy

“Trauma is not what happened to you, but what happens inside you as a result of what happened to you,”
Gabor Mate

Complex trauma (or developmental trauma) might develop when an unsupported child goes through difficult times with their caregiver. For example, when the caregiver is emotionally disconnected, neglectful, or loving one minute and extremely angry the next. This can lead to the child feeling constantly unsafe.

Trauma modifies the brain’s structure, function, and chemistry in development. How we were raised shapes our adulthood; our early experiences shape our beliefs about ourselves, others, and the world.

However, knowing that our brain possesses adaptability can help us forge fresh pathways conducive to healing and restoration. We have an inherent ability to overcome trauma, especially if we find and receive proper professional support.

Are you struggling with boundaries, low self-esteem, or self-doubt? Do you feel “stuck,” experience panic attacks, grief, relationship difficulties, anxiety, or a sense of disconnection from your body — or notice the lasting effects of trauma showing up in your life?

You don’t have to navigate this alone. Therapy can offer a supportive and compassionate space to explore what has shaped your emotional world and how these patterns continue to influence your life and relationships to this day.

I am a registered counsellor and clinical psychotherapist (PACFA), and a licensed psychologist in Mexico. I specialise in supporting individuals experiencing low self-esteem, relationship challenges, anxiety, depression, and the long-term impacts of childhood, relational, and developmental trauma, including PTSD.

My Therapeutic Approach

My approach is somatic, trauma-informed, and attachment-focused. This means we work with thoughts and emotions while also paying attention to the body and nervous system, where many experiences, particularly trauma and its effects, are held outside of conscious awareness.

Many external factors, like difficult early relationships, family dynamics, and intergenerational patterns, can contribute to emotional distress and a sense of disconnection from ourselves. With gentle attuned support, it is possible to develop greater safety, self-understanding, and connection to rebuild both inner compassion and outward relationships.

What This Looks Like in Therapy

Somatic and trauma-informed exploration
We gently explore beliefs, patterns that may be operating beneath awareness and where they began.

Body awareness and emotional insight
You learn to recognise and understand the memories and messages carried by emotions and physical sensations.

Restoring connection and self-trust
Together, we work toward healing old wounds, strengthening boundaries and agency, as well as developing a more compassionate and grounded relationship with yourself.

Why Emotions and the Body Matter

Trauma isn’t just something that happens in the mind. It happens in the body. When the nervous system doesn’t get the chance to complete its natural response to threat, the experience can linger, held in muscles, breath, posture, and sensation—expressing itself through dysregulation, pain, or persistent physical symptoms.Gentle trauma release techniques

Emotions, whether or not they’re pleasant or painful, carry important information. They can point to unmet needs, unresolved experiences, or areas that require care and attention. At times, physical symptoms without a clear medical explanation may reflect emotional stress held in the body.

With this in mind, it’s essential to understand that healing does not happen in isolation. In a safe therapeutic relationship, experiences can be explored with both curiosity and compassion, allowing for relational repair and reconnection to your authentic self.

In our sessions, you will learn to:

Understand the meaning behind emotions and bodily sensations

Recognise the roots and gently shift patterns shaped by early experiences and your nervous system. Gain insight, break free from their hold, and adopt new, empowering narratives. Develop self-compassion and self-empathy

Learn practical skills for emotional regulation, boundary-setting, and autonomy

Address the “stuck” survival energy of fight/flight/freeze responses, allowing the body to complete protective movements that were not possible during a traumatic event.

Better understand the influence of family dynamics, relational trauma, and past conditioning

Wise Beginning – West End Office
431 Montague Road
West End QLD 4101
Wise Beginning – Milton Office
Level 1, Unit 30, 1 Park Rd
Milton QLD 4064

Use these insights to support meaningful and lasting change that you can carry with renewed confidence and authenticity. Take the first step toward healing.

It hurts to feel your childhood pain, but it hurts even more to carry it silently, unfelt, shaping your life from the shadows.