Experiential individual, couples and group therapy toward inner freedom and fuller contact with your life
In-person in Atwater Village, Los Angeles
The work within and between
Individual and group therapy together in Los Angeles
I work with some people both individually and in the process groups I lead. I've lived the combination from the other side too, as a client in individual therapy and a member of a group, and I've felt firsthand how each one stimulates the other.
Seen by others, without performing, fixing or hiding
In a group, you find out what it's like to be with other people without the usual masks: what gets stirred when someone comes close, what you keep hidden, what you long for or fear once you let someone affect you. It's a practice room for honest contact, where you can try new ways of relating with the people right in front of you.
You can bring your whole self - conflicted, unsure, yearning - and notice what happens when it's met. Other members will tell you how you land with them, and you'll have feelings about them too. When something goes wrong between you, there's room to come back to it and work it through with the person involved, something individual therapy can't always offer on its own.
How one relationship opens another
Say we've noticed, individually, how quickly you wave off affection. Then a group member tells you they missed you last week. You feel the familiar pull to make a joke or change the subject, and this time you let the words reach you. In our next session we can stay with what that was like: the warmth, the exposure, and perhaps some grief about how rarely you've allowed it.
Or, you may speak freely with me about anger being stirred by a member of the group, then abandon yourself and rescue the same person. Perhaps you can be messy with me but present competence with the group. Both are you. Each relationship brings out something different and provides avenues to know oneself further.
The movement runs the other way too. Something stirred in group can open what we haven't reached individually, and what you find with me can change what you're able to risk with the others.
How I hold both roles
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Other members' private disclosures stay private, including in your individual sessions
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What you share with me individually stays between us. I won't bring it into the group, though I may encourage you to.
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Sometimes the better fit is individual therapy alone, group alone, or a group led by someone else. We decide together and keep reviewing it