Episode 228: Spiritual and Energy Practices in Therapy: Law and Ethics [featuring Tina Vitolo]

In this episode, Patrick Casale and Dr. Tina Vitolo, founder of The Black Sheep Therapist® movement, talk about bringing non-traditional modalities and spiritual practices into clinical therapy settings and the service side of therapy. This conversation tackles the gray areas, legal myths, and shame therapists face when paving their own path to offer services like tarot card readings, crystal work, and past-life regression.

3 key takeaways:

1. You Can Integrate Spiritual/Energy Practices Ethically: Dr. Tina Vitolo shares her nationwide research into actual state laws and ethics codes—there is rarely black-and-white language forbidding innovative approaches. If you use clinical competence, appropriate training, and client consent, your practice can be both ethical and innovative.
2. Stop Letting Shame and Fear Lead Your Decisions: Therapists often get shamed online for using things like tarot or other unconventional methods. As Dr. Tina Vitolo says, "Shame doesn’t create change." If you’re transparent, informed, and focused on client values, there’s room to break the mold.
3. Your Authenticity is Your Niche: Patrick Casale and Dr. Tina Vitolo both emphasize that our niches are often versions of ourselves. By owning your background and therapeutic style—even if it’s unconventional—you’ll attract the clients who truly need you.

Dr. Tina Vitolo’s “The Black Sheep Therapist” movement is providing real support and proof that you can be both ethical and innovative. Whether you’re chasing integration or just tired of rigidity in the profession, this episode is your permission slip to show up as your whole self and try a new approach to therapy.

More about Tina:

Dr. Tina Vitolo is a Licensed Clinical Social Worker, published researcher, and founder of The Black Sheep Therapist® movement—an online community of over 5,000 therapists redefining what ethical and innovative clinical practice looks like. Holding a Doctorate in Social Work from Florida Atlantic University and a Master’s from NYU, Dr. Vitolo is recognized as one of the only thought leaders in the mental health field developing tangible, legally grounded frameworks for integrating spiritual, energy-based, and unconventional practices into therapy.

Through her Black Sheep Therapist Academy, Tina provides nontraditional, CEU-approved trainings that translate complementary and alternative interventions into clinically compliant, theory-aligned practice. As the creator of the Innovative Practitioner Accelerator®, she helps therapists navigate the gray areas of law, regulation, and ethics with confidence and clarity—transforming fear and confusion into empowerment and informed innovation.

Dr. Vitolo’s work is built on the foundation of her doctoral research on the intersection of innovation, regulation, and ethical practice. She is the only clinician to have developed a comprehensive framework for ethical integration—rooted in a deep reading of state regulations, ethical codes, and informed consent standards—to support therapists in incorporating any and all nontraditional modalities into legitimate clinical work. Her mission is to dismantle outdated myths, elevate the profession, and prove that spirituality, intuition, and science can not only coexist—but thrive—within clinical practice.

Check out The Innovative Practitioner Accelerator®: Dr. Vitolo’s flagship program, The Innovative Practitioner Accelerator®, helps therapists confidently merge traditional clinical practice with their spiritual, intuitive, or energy-based approaches—without fear of crossing ethical or legal lines. The program includes personalized guidance, templates for informed...