I work with individuals seeking to re-pattern painful ways of being through an embodied, creative, relational, and purpose-driven process.

Issues that I work with include:

• Trauma

• Grief

• Depression

• Anxiety

• Illness, injury, and chronic pain

• Relationship issues - including queer and non-monogamous

• Sexuality

• Highly sensitive people

• Addiction recovery

• Eating disorders and disordered eating

• Anxiety about ecological crisis

• Impacts of oppression

• Seeking greater purpose in life

I am most interested in helping folks who:

• Would like an embodied and creative approach to therapy. Maybe you already have an embodiment practice (yoga, dance, meditation, martial arts, time in nature, etc) or maybe you have a sincere desire to begin working in this way. Whether or not you consider yourself an “artist” you want to lean into expressive, creative, and poetic forms of inquiry.

• Are seeking a way to make meaning and thrive in a time of cultural and environmental challenges. You get that your personal challenged are situated in a much bigger picture and are looking for your way of moving through these times in a meaningful way.

• Are willing to see and accept things as they are and to feel deeply. Or at least to work on these things! It’s not about “getting rid of” painful feelings, but about being in relationship to them in a new way.

• Are moving through a transition of some type. It could be a slow transition, a sudden loss, career or relationship change, or letting go of a behavior or substance. We can look for and create the poetry and beauty in the changes.

More on my Methodology: Co-Creating the Conditions for Change

Being alive as a human being/body/animal is a precious gift and also incredibly challenging and complex. Everyone gets “stuck” in harmful patterns of thought, attention, behavior, and emotions sometimes. Working together can help you learn to slow down, see with more acceptance, curiosity, and compassion, and adopt new ways of being which support greater aliveness, connectedness, and flow. I approach therapy with a warm and collaborative attitude, holding a strong belief in your strengths, potential, and innate wisdom. It’s a joy and an honor to join clients in their journey of self-discovery and change.

Deciding to begin therapy with a new practitioner is a brave move! I hope that the following descriptions of my approach can help you in your discernment process. Depending on your interests and needs, we will lean into certain aspects of the approach and away from others.

Embodied: My work is deeply influenced by my background as a dancer and bodyworker. I have spend many years exploring how habits of perception, sensory awareness and movement impact mood, beliefs, behaviors, and relationships. Learning to experience and work with the interplay of sensation, perception, action, and belief in the moment can radically increase our range of choices. When we are talking, I’ll often direct your attention to bodily sensation and tension patterns. We might “try on” different postures, movements, and voices to expand your sense of self. It is possible to regulate symptoms like trauma responses and the physiological ups and downs of anxiety and depression using body awareness, movement, and perceptual shifts. Once there’s a bit more skill in regulating the body-mind, it becomes safer to feel deeply and lean into the visceral experience of moods and states of being, deepening our humanity and capacity for authenticity. Much of our experiences and memories are non-verbal in nature ~ combining insight with embodied skillfulness is a path towards deep and lasting change.

Influences include: Somatic Experiencing, Sensorimotor Psychotherapy, Focusing, Yoga, Somatic Coaching, the Feldenkrais Method

Creative: Creativity, play, and expression have always been at the heart of my process and I have shared these techniques with others as a therapist, choreographer, teacher, and community ritualist. We can make space in session for expressive movement, voice, writing, or mark-making in dialogue with emotional states and areas of inquiry. Most mental health issues are the result of too much rigidity in cognitive and behavioral function (being stuck in an unsatisfying, repetitive pattern). Simply trying new things in a lighthearted and experimental way is inherently healing in that it opens up new choices. Tracking the symbols and images that arise in creative expression, dreams, and throughout life supports transformative meaning-making. For those who are interested, I can support you in developing personal rituals to support your process ~ the language of symbolic and embodied action is a way of speaking our longings and questions directly to our own subconscious and the greater mystery.

Influences include: Authentic Movement, Dance and Art Therapy, the art of ritual

Relational: Our main source of shared data in therapy is what happens in the present moment ~ between us, between the parts of you, and in creative and embodied processes. By slowing down with kindness and curiosity, we can build awareness of habitual patterns and make new choices in the moment.  I seek to build warm, supportive, and honest relationships with my clients with plenty of space for feedback. We can trust that the dynamics that arise in session are similar to those which arise in other relationships and spaces of your life, and that by gaining greater awareness and agility around those dynamics in session, you will be able to bring change to your life outside of the session. As we get to know each other better over time, this bank of shared data will become a valuable source of illumination on issues that arise with friends, family, co-workers, and romantic partners. Over time it’s possible to build resilience by feeling ourselves as part of an expansive relational web of community, culture, family, friends, all the parts of ourselves, and the natural world.

Influences Include: Attachment Theory, Psychodynamic Therapy, Internal Family Systems, Non-Violent Communication

Purpose-Driven: It’s tough being a deep-feeling human living in this time of great ecological and social challenges. Our current cultural, historical, and ecological moment contains immense possibility and also a heavy weight of unprocessed trauma which can contribute to individuals’ distress.  We don’t choose when, where, or to whom we are born, but we do then have the responsibility (and gift!) of  finding meaning and wholeness throughout our lives. By facing the accumulated grief, rage, and trauma we can gain deeper self-compassion, free ourselves of internalized oppression, and more skillfully devote ourselves to purposeful living. There’s strength in accepting that we cannot do it all, in overcoming overwhelm and leaning into the good and the possible. I am passionate about helping folks find the poetry in their path ~ The beautiful and unique alignment of your gifts, values, personal history, and our collective moment.

Influences Include: Existential Therapy, Ancestral Lineage Healing, Bill Plotkin’s work on soul-centric living, Joanna Macy’s work on “The Great Turning,” Adrienne Maree Brown’s work on emergence and pleasure