General Information to Help You in Your Search
I’m writing this for you with the assumption that you are here because you are looking for a therapist, and I would like to assist you in whatever way I can in your process of finding the best fit for you. The first thing I’d like you to know is that recent research indicates that it is the nature of the therapeutic relationship, rather than the therapeutic modality used, that most influences the success of a therapy.[1] So, as you look for the right therapist for you, you can place your focus on finding someone with whom you feel comfortable, who you feel will listen carefully to you, and who you can imagine in time feeling more and more free to speak openly to. Finally, do you feel excited and hopeful, even though maybe a little scared, to take the journey of “growing you” with this person?
And I do mean growing you quite literally. Advances in research on interpersonal neurobiology are offering insight into what long-term therapists know from having had the experience of their own therapy and from working with their clients – brains are physically reconfigured within a healing and helping relationship.[2]. This is how change happens.
My Approach
All of this said, each therapist has their own background, training and philosophy. The bulk of my own training was in the field of psychodynamic psychotherapy; that is, the understanding that we are vastly more complex than our conscious thoughts, and that our unconscious, along with being a storehouse of our troubles and things we don’t understand about ourselves, is also the fount of untold wisdom about us, including what we need in order to grow. The training and experience that I have acquired to listen for the unconscious is what I consider to be my most valuable “tool” as a therapist.
I am also trained and experienced in the use of coaching modalities, mindfulness, and brief therapies such as cognitive behavioural and rational emotive therapy, and I draw upon what I feel will best help you in any given moment. I am always with whatever you are grappling with in your life, present or past; even a concern about the future, and I am always listening for clues and help from your unconscious. Over time you will find that you grow your own trust of, and respect for, your unconscious. I believe that part of the role of therapy is training you to have greater access to, and understanding of, these deeper, vastly informative, and helpful parts of yourself.
What the Therapy Would be Like
How all of this works in a therapy is that all you are required to do is to try to say what you are thinking and feeling in the moment. Try not to edit or judge what you feel drawn to speak about. Maybe what’s pressing for you right now is a problem with a co-worker, or you had a dream that puzzles you. We work together with what is here right now; maybe we need to build a strategy for how to best deal with this coworker, maybe we need to wonder together about what your dreamer is saying. Our work is a flow, a creative process that we can both trust is moving you towards a fuller, richer, more integrated, and more authentic life.
While most clients visit me in my office in downtown Toronto, I do work by Skype or telephone with clients who live outside of Toronto.
[1] Louis Cozolino, The Neuroscience of Psychotherapy 2nd Edition (New York: W.W. Norton & Company, 2010), 30. This is very accessible book for the lay reader.
See also “Resolution on the Recognition of Psychotherapy Effectiveness” published by the American Psychological Association http://www.apa.org/about/policy/resolution-psychotherapy.aspx
[2] Allan Schore and Daniel Siegel are two of the key contemporary researchers and writers in this field.