Approach.

I provide therapy to help people feel better and address their specific reasons for coming to therapy whether its brief therapy focused on a single issue or longer-term work. I strive to listen attentively and provide a safe environment to share what’s on one’s mind and to decide together how to address one’s concerns in therapy.

My thinking as a therapist is flexible while often steeped in our relationships both with ourselves and others.

Working together may provide:

• The opportunity to better understand one’s emotional life, including needs, longings, feelings, conflicts and motivations

• The chance for thoughts that may have been taboo in early relationships or other contexts to emerge, be understood, and integrated in an expanded sense of self

• The practice of feeling and tolerating these emotions in therapy so that one may have a greater capacity to handle them outside of therapy

• The chance for painful experiences to be discussed, tended to, and understood to lessen their burden and hold

• The opportunity to further reflect on one’s relationships and gently bring tendencies into awareness so change and a greater sense of closeness with others feels possible

• The chance (if desired) to explore issues of race, ethnicity, sexuality, gender identity, pertinent political issues as well as any other aspects of one’s culture or self one wishes to clarify or procress in therapy

Over time, these processes can support a more consolidated sense of self that is less at war with one’s internal world. This can lend to feeling less stressed and anxious as well as more grounded and clearer about what matters. This can in turn provide a foundation to make self-aligned choices, have greater emotional resilience to handle life’s challenges, and more freedom to live one’s life fully.

This approach to therapy is called psychodynamic. In my approach, I incorporate principles from AEDP and have also been trained in other modalities such as ACT, CBT, and DBT. I sometimes draw from them when they’re preferred, may address a specific treatment goal, or help someone cope with life’s ups and downs.