About me

Thalia Tikka, LCSW & MA

Values based narrative therapist providing care work, counseling, and transformative approaches to conflict mediation remotely for Illinois residents

Therapy can be a radically liberating process, and I believe our personal and inner healing work is part of the larger social justice movements we participate in for our mutual liberation. As a queer person myself, I tend to work with other LGBTQ+ people exploring and expanding their sexualities and gender identities. As someone involved in radical politics, I offer validation and therapeutic solidarity to abolitionists and activists across the spectrum of liberation movements. And as a person with mental illness, I offer a dignified and person-centered approach to caring for our most sensitive personal issues and life challenges.

I typically practice narrative therapy, a form of trauma therapy developed to empower people to have more agency and autonomy over their lives. Narrative therapy involves identifying narratives that shape our sense of self and society, developing skills to feel more confident and competent, and learning how to mediate our inner conflicts and contradictions.

Feel free to reach out for a free consultation if you (as an individual, or in your relationship) feel you might benefit from a liberation psychology approach to narrative therapy and a transformative justice approach to conflict mediation! I accept most major insurances and accept sliding scale appointments starting at $35 per hour.

Why the name ‘Cicada’?

For the music mostly. And for a poem.

I grew up in Illinois, and some of my fondest childhood memories are of summer time on the prairie paths listening to the music of cicadas in the trees. I was born in 1990, one of the great periodical cicada emergence years for northern Illinois, when countless cicadas emerged from a 17 year hibernation. The first summer of my life was filled with the droning melodies of these ancient songs, who the first of Greek musicians modeled their vocal harmonies off.

A line from the Greek, Nobel-winning poet Odysseus Elytis’ classic, To Axion Esti (“Worthy it is”) has a line that inspired my naming this practice after cicadas:
“[Worthy is]
The cicada who convinced a thousand others;
Consciousness radiant as the summer”

So another name for this therapy practice could be “Worthy is / are.” Because I believe you are worthy. Worthy of consciousness, of radiance, of song, of belonging, of being in community, of healing, of being ancient, of napping for 17 years, of making art, of screeching into the abyss, of migrating, of rooting, of emerging, and of simply being. It is my hope and intention that in the course of therapy work together, you believe and know yourself to be more and more worthy, like the little cicada who sings to us “radiant as the summer.”

With much buzzing,

-Thalia

All visual art, logo, and designs by Jam Doughty
(@WormyOrchids on most social media)
All photographs and text by me.