My Philosophy

As a relational therapist, my conception of healing first begins with connection. Our advancement as human beings relied on our ability to congregate and communicate. However, we live in a society that now celebrates self-sufficiency, leaving us more lost and lonelier than ever before. In the transition from tribal mentality to complete independence, we began to slowly lose our ability to be intimate beings. Not only have we lost intimacy with others, but with ourselves as well. We have lost the capacity to be intimate with our souls; on top of that, many of us have become fearful of this intimacy, worried it might leave us feeling even more exposed and alone.

What would happen if we gave our soul, our psyche, our divine self, the stage for once? What would it say? Many times, once we begin to listen to the internal whispers of ourselves, we meet unique parts within who have played distinct roles throughout our lives. 

The work that we do together is to compassionately explore these parts, their roles, and reasons why they may be preventing us from purpose and connection. We notice the emotions that these parts bring out in us by providing a non-judgmental space to speak their needs. My approach is not to regulate emotions by providing a handful of cognitive tools, but to come to peace with emotions and their ability to lead us to what our soul craves. 

The sacred time in the therapy room is a safe haven to show up as the perfectly imperfect human being that you are. Once we can begin to have compassion towards the many parts that make us who we are, we become unafraid to shine our light. We begin to cultivate compassion for others around us and use our spark of light to illuminate the world. This organically leads to more intimate and fulfilling connections with our loved ones as we feel safe enough to introduce our authentic selves out into the world. 

This approach to healing is based in theories of Attachment, Emotionally Focused Therapy (EFT), as well as Internal Family Systems (IFS). However, Humanistic theory (positive unconditional regard) is the foundation of my work. 

Specialties

While being a helper and healer is my greatest calling in life, there are areas in this work in which I feel deeply connected to and therefore have focused on expanding my knowledge of these specialities. 

Couples Therapy:

Relational work has always been a passion of mine since I began to comprehend the profound intricacies of connection at a young age. The catalyst to pursuing my work in couples therapy was bearing witness to my own healing of old wounds through safe and loving connection. 

I hold faith that we all have good intentions when it comes to the way we treat our partners. In my experience as a relational therapist, I have witnessed time and time again maladaptive behaviors that are not nourishing intimacy. These behaviors tend to originate from deep seated desires to be loved in a way we can comprehend. I have many couples stating that they have the tools to reach their goals but are stuck at the doing of them. Many therapeutic approaches start at the “how,” as in how to fix the problem right away.  In our work together, healing requires exploration of the “where and why” these behaviors came to be. This technique elicits compassion not only for our partner but for ourselves and tends to be the foundation for movement to growth and intimacy.

Purposeful Living:

Innately, we are incredibly creative and ambitious beings. However, sometimes we experience blocks to our many talents. These blocks can manifest into symptoms of depression and anxiety if not met by compassionate exploration. In our work together we will come face to face with the ancestral blueprints and internal dialogues that interfere with living your most authentic life.

Religious Trauma / Spiritual Depression:

Whether we are religious or not, I believe attunement to our own spirituality is a crucial component in healing. However, past belief systems or religious trauma has made us detach from and disown this part of our identity. In our work together, we will deconstruct narratives that no longer serve our most important relationship, the relationship with ourselves. Many times the blocks preventing us from being our authentic selves is wrapped up in dogmatic messages. These messages of conditional love, or that we are inherently bad, lead us to sever vulnerable parts of ourselves. Within healing, we uncover our own values and beliefs and gain connection to our knowing, our purpose and the source of our divinity. 

Grief & Loss:

To grieve is to love, but in our western society we aim to speed up the process by distracting ourselves from our mourning. Many of us find that speaking of our loss with our support system seems to have an expiration date. This makes us feel even more alone as we begin to think we are burdening others by talking about our grief. In the therapy room, we honor your loss by greeting the grief with empathy and compassion. We explore and tear down any of society’s expectations of what this process is supposed to look like and instead will honor the emotions as they come. If you have experienced loss before, you may find that grief is something that does not go away; however, that does not mean you have to stay trapped in the suffering.

Premenstrual Dysphoric Disorder (PMDD):

Navigating our healing can be difficult enough; however, PMDD can make us feel like it will always be one step forward, two steps back. My own journey with PMDD left me feeling isolated and unable to trust myself or my emotions which only led me to spiral more. PMDD can make us feel like our deepest wounds are fresh in the here and now. In our work together, we will map out your cycle and employ tools for each phase.  We will also make space for those deep wounds when needed in order for you to reclaim some of your power and control when dealing with the treacherous stages of the menstrual cycle.