
Sarah Benkwitz
Psychotherapist, Supervisor & Associate
Sarah is an experienced CFT Therapist, offering Compassion Focused Supervision here at Balanced Minds. She supports CFT Therapists from around the world with model-specific consultancy, as well as therapists from backgrounds such as ACT/CBT/EMDR to integrate more compassion into their existing practice, and all therapists seeking supportive and empowering supervision to care for therapist wellbeing and prevent burnout.
Sarah believes that the CFT model is a ‘way of being’, which we can bring into the supervision process itself, to create an experiential and relational learning experience. She will support you to cultivate your ‘compassionate therapist self’, whilst developing your CFT competencies and giving you the practical support with your cases you need.
With a background working in community mental health and psychology research, she qualified as a therapist in 2014 (BABCP Accred.) and has been practicing CFT ever since – first in NHS IAPT and CMHT services, and now in private practice. In her own practice, she works with adults/adolescents with Trauma (inc C-PTSD), Anxiety/Depression/Stress, and Borderline PD. Her main model is CFT, which she integrates with ACT, CBT and EMDR. She has extensive advanced training in CFT (as well as ACT & EMDR), with a certificate in Supervision (2015) and has completed the Compassionate Mind Foundation’s first wave of specialist supervisor training.
As a person, Sarah is warm, down-to-earth, and has a sense of humour. She fell in love with CFT because it resonates with her personally, and she believes it’s a more profound way of working deeply and efficiently with clinical complexity. She works on practicing what she preaches, aiming to show up each day with courage and authenticity.
You’ll find that Sarah listens to what you need from the supervision space, offering you support, pushing you when needed, and celebrating your accomplishments.
MA Psychology with Philosophy, University of Oxford, 2009
PgD CBT, University of Cumbria, 2014
Certificate in Supervision, University of Birmingham, 2015
EMDR 1-4, University of Worcester, 2019
CFT Supervision, Compassionate Mind Foundation, 2022
BABCP Accredited 140509
Find out more about our CFT and Self-Compassion Courses here