Existential Therapy

One of the greatest joys for me as a therapist is helping clients walk through the maze of finding and sustaining purpose and meaning in life. What are your needs and desires? How have you been experiencing this human life, and how do you want to experience it? What are the ways you want to show up for yourself, your loved ones, and the world? What does it all mean? Well, that of course depends on the day or mood, but I can support you in finding ways to navigate all of the big questions.

Existential Humanistic Psychotherapy has its roots in Existential Philosophy and is concerned with mortality, freedom & responsibility, isolation and meaning. Much of my work is focused on the meaning that my clients create in their lives, their relationship with that for which they are responsible and how this relates to the power and freedom they experience in their lives.

Existential Therapy focuses on free will, self-determination, and the search for meaning. This approach often centers on you rather than on the symptom you are experiencing. The approach emphasizes your capacity to make rational choices and to develop to your maximum potential.

Underneath it all I see myself as a human- one who struggles and has struggled with the same fears that all humans have struggled with- mortality, isolation, our freedom to make choices, and our ultimate meaninglessness in a universe that is indifferent. I believe then that it is critical as a therapist to support people in finding their own meaning and purpose; and that they can trust themselves to make that decision.

Life is about finding your individual meaning, purpose, and direction. This is the only defense we have against the random horrible things that happen to us. Perhaps the best way to describe this type of therapy is to give you the name of two books to read: "Man's Search for Meaning" by Viktor Frankl and "The Gift of Therapy: An Open Letter to a New Generation of Therapists and Their Patients" by Irvin D. Yalom.

I practice existential therapy by focusing on areas of your life in which you can promote a greater sense of meaning and purpose, interpersonal connection, freedom, and fearlessness. I embrace the discomfort of not knowing the answer to all of life's questions, and strive to help my clients ease their anxiety about the great unknowns. Realizing that life's decisions can not always be put into boxes of "right" or "wrong" helps clients become more confident and assertive about making choices.

The existential components of my therapeutic approach involve facilitating self-exploration of how each client understands the world around them and their place in it, allowing them to identify what it looks like to them to live meaningfully and intentionally.

When clients first begin therapy, one of the questions that often comes up is what it means to work through emotions or traumas. From the perspective of Existential Therapy, we address the meaning that these experiences hold for you, which comes from our ability to build context foresight around them. If the past still hurts, or if the future holds too many mysteries, it is worth exploring the meaning that we derive from our life's story as a whole.

It is not easy to discuss meaning making and the concepts of life and death with our social circle or friend group. I am here to provide the space for you to evaluate the human condition, your place within it and what it all means to you.

Existential therapy asks deep questions about the nature of being human. Why am I here? What do I want from life? What gives me purpose? What matters to me? It simultaneously asks us to consider our unique experience in this world while also helping us to see that everything we're going through is also connected to a universal human experience.

So much of what we encounter in our world challenges our beliefs about ourselves, our world, and the meaning of being alive. I think that discussing these big topics in therapy is a great way for us to better connect with our deepest values and bring meaning and purpose to our lives.

"What is the meaning of life?" is an eternally joked about question, but when we do not have our own personal answer to this question based on our values and beliefs, it often leads to mental health challenges such as depression, anxiety, and interpersonal conflict. I support clients to ask the deep questions, seek and understand their core values, and find meaning in their life as a way to reduce negative symptoms and bring about positive mental health.

My training includes an existential therapy bent, which focuses on the eternal dilemmas of being human: choice, responsibility, mortality, and ambiguity. Just because we can't change it doesn't mean we can't address it! I can help you wrestle authentically with life's big questions in a safe, secure setting.

At the core of human experience are fundamental questions about responsibility, freedom, life and death, and meaning. My approach connects client experiences to these questions.