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Individual Counseling
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Feeling heard, feeling seen, feeling “gotten”
Clients come in eager to tell your story. I’m eager to hear it! We start there. But I check in with you too, because I want to make sure I’m really, really getting it! Sometimes I want to be sure that you’re getting it too – because so often we say such powerful things and rush right past them. Things like, “I feel so alone right now,” Or, “I think I may want to be doing different work than my career right now allows,” or things like, “I wanted to reach out to her, but…”
I often get curious about the poignant words and phrases you say, the motions you make over and over again, the emotions that come to the surface but get replaced with words. Together we notice these things.
We tune into what’s beneath the words:
We might notice the tightening in your shoulders and that sense of burden you carry.
We might notice together the pace of your talking.
We might notice stillness or movement in your body as you speak.
We might notice a reach in your eyes or a fearfulness in your breath.
A client said in her first session, “I thought I needed to get the whole story out and I was so rushed! But the way we’re tuning into signals I wasn’t aware of……I feel so seen! Maybe this is what I’ve needed more than just the story.”
We might notice when you expand into yourself and your space and when you shrink into yourself –interesting thing about this: the more deeply we notice these things, the more they can begin to shift. Often, you don’t even have to work for it! Awareness and empathy are sometimes all it takes. (Don’t worry: if those two ingredients don’t happen to be all it takes for you, there’s more! 🙂
Helping you connect, moment by moment…
Lots of research has been done on what really works in counseling. And it’s quite simple: it’s the stuff that happens right here right now between us. So, I give you in-the-moment feedback. This is how we get better at being ourselves and being in relationships – being with someone who is genuine with us and helps us connect, helps us find out how and why and when we disconnect, and helps us come back.
Some people call this approach “experiential” — it’s a here-and-now focus that, far from shying away from your past, helps you understand how it influences things right now. And lets us shift that together.
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A Need to be Close
Cindy spoke at a rate that made it hard for me to keep up, for anyone to keep up! Her hands shook as her rate of speech increased. It was as if her words were crowding out contact! I wanted to find her, and to know something: Were the words intended to move me away or bring me closer? What could we learn together about this, while still listening compassionately to her story? I told her, “I want to hear every piece of this story! Seems to wrenchingly painful — I imagine you’ve been feeling quite alone in all this; it’s so much to take for one person! I’m feeling an impulse to move closer to you… I’m going to move my chair close, and let’s see if we can find out just where you want me to be.” She says, “I HAVE felt alone. SO alone! Could you be right here?” She gestures to a place pretty close to where she’s sitting. And then, she begins to cry. These are a different quality of tears from the hopeless-feeling ones she tells me she’s been shedding so often where no one can see them — tears that have escaped on work breaks in the confines of restroom stalls, tears that plague her at home alone. She says, “I think… I think this is what I’ve wanted, for someone to come closer, to hear me. I think my intensity gets the opposite, but what I want… what I’ve needed is this.” She looks at me, takes a deep breath, slows down, and continues the story, but with a new sense of connection.
A Need for Space
Bryan needed something a bit different, because he felt that people were always invading his space. His words were intellectual, and he wanted to discuss books. We traded recommendations and we together formed a bit of an intellectual framework for what might be going on for him. He said that his partner felt distant from him, but he felt so crowded by his partners’ seemingly bottomless pit of need. Over time, we worked with his need for space. First by me simply giving it to him — moving back in my chair a bit, meeting him at the level of his intellect, and discussing attachment styles a bit. He’d suspected he might have a dismissive style, and we talked about the heartache and fears of rejection that can underlie that style — and how it makes so much sense and also how it can shift. After having a shared cognitive understanding, Bryan felt comfortable with working to dip into feelings a bit, with learning more about himself in relationships. At one point of deepening emotional sharing, we notice that he’s beginning to shrink a little, to move back in his chair. I say, “It’s okay… You move back just as much as you want to. It’s okay. I’ll be right here. I’m not going anywhere.” His eyes widened as he said, “I find contact… startling! I can feel you giving me my space, and it makes me feel, welcome. Like…,” And he giggled, “I might be okay with you coming a bit closer now.”
Feeling met in your thoughts and your smarts
Lots of clients of mine come in with plenty of thoughts and theories. I meet you in your curiosity and your thinking. I think it’s important to be able to have understanding of what’s happening — to have curiosity together and to value your smarts and how much they’ve helped you thus far. Clients remark that they always feel welcomed and affirmed in their need to understand.
Finding your deeper emotions:
Sometimes we just don’t know what we feel. Feelings can be layered, mixed. We can believe we’re angry and feel quite sad underneath. We can believe we’re just hurt but actually feel furious!
I help you to find your feelings. Through listening not just to your words, but to your eyes. To the feelings that start to rise as you speak. These deep feelings are precious, offering us a compass to your world and to your deepest yearnings and needs. When we feel the same stuff over and over again, we’re stuck. But when we get to the authentic emotions beneath the circling, we get unstuck. Insights feel fresh and new. Connections feel more possible. It takes finding our genuine feelings to find our footing. I’ll help you find, express, and honor those.
“You’re not a blank slate!”
When you look into my eyes, you’ll see me right here, caring, responsive. You won’t have to guess if I’m here for you — you’ll see it, hear it, and sense it. Clients who worked with me years ago sometimes still write to say, “I still hear your voice” or “I still see the delight and care in your eyes,” or “I laughed, and I thought of how we’d laugh together.” I extend a compassion and delight in you that I hope will stay with you long after our work together ends.
Deep Shifts that Go Beyond Willpower
Martina rose to leave a session, put on her iPhone and headset, and suddenly looked a bit startled. I asked, “What’s happening?” And she said, “Um… I need a new playlist.” Bryan came forward in his chair after being habitually withdrawn, said, “Something about what we just did… I suddenly feel like it’s okay for me to take up space.
I feel for the first time like all of me….is okay.” We help you feel empowered in your body, feel connected to others, feel heard and seen. We help you have the experience that’s not what you’ve had over and over again.
When transformation happens, clients say things like: “My heart feels open.” “I feel more real somehow, more substantial.” “I can feel the love in my life.” “I WANT to connect now! It doesn’t feel so scary.” I know I can rest, and it will be okay. “I am okay.” “I am human.” “I am welcome.” “I am enough.” “I can be powerful.” “I can be authentic.” Einstein said, “We can’t solve our problem from the same state of consciousness that created the problem.”
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Let’s find a connective state that helps you to find something new.
We’ll do this together.
I’ll be here every step of the way.
Just book using the calendar below today to set up a 30-min consultation. The consultation gives us enough time to get to know each other and decide we want to work together, and from there, if you decide to work with me, we’ll schedule your first full-length session.
“I wish everyone had someone like you, someone kind and patient and who listens deeply and will reflect back the best of you and the truth of you in a way that is supportive and delightful.” – Client
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