De-mys-ti-fy: to make a difficult subject clearer or easier to understand.

In this case, the subject is you.  Who are you?  What really makes you tick?  How is it that you can consciously intend one thing, but end up doing another?  Maybe you're "done being a people-pleaser" but you continue to find yourself doing just that.  Or you set the intention to re-work your problematic relationship with food/money/drugs/porn/alcohol/internet, but find yourself unable to sustain it.  Perhaps you're "totally over" unavailable love interests, yet you continue to attract them. You might even find that available, romantic candidates (suspiciously) lack in the passion or aliveness you desire. 

How can it be?  Well, so much of what we will do involves making the unconscious conscious.  What lies out of our awareness quietly manifests in our everyday lives.  We unknowingly run these patterns, repeating them in an unconscious hope for a reparative experience--or, simply put, something new and healing.  Yet, without awareness the likelihood of your same old patterns resulting in something new and healing is very low.  We can change that.  You can change that. 

In my practice, I work with everything from creative blocks and relationship issues to severe trauma and deep, existential unrest.  I have a dynamic toolbox for us with all kinds of techniques, theories and methods.  At the end of the day, my hope is that I can help you grow into a more whole, integrated, insightful and loving relationship with yourself and the world.  

about you

Since birth, you have done your absolute best to make sense of and adapt to this life on earth.  You have wrestled with those enormous questions:  Who am I?  Why am I here?  Is there a purpose?  You’ve adapted to the spoken and unspoken rules of your family, just as you’ve learned to compensate for certain needs that went unmet. The external world with its judgments and expectations also had a powerful effect on you, not to mention any trauma you may have suffered along the way.

In strategic response to all of this, you developed coping mechanisms, defenses and beliefs about reality all of which helped you navigate the most challenging aspects of life.  As a child, those beliefs and defenses were the best you could come up with and, in many respects, they did their job well.  However, you have come a long way and it will be helpful for the adult you to distinguish between which of these patterned responses and behaviors are supportive and which are limiting.

In a similar sense, you have unconsciously created a somewhat cohesive life story.  This narrative is comprised of various memories, wishes, fears, thoughts and beliefs about who you are and how you do.  If you feel into this narrative a bit deeper, you may find that it’s laced with fear-based distortions like:  “If I open my heart, then I will get hurt,”  "People aren't to be trusted," “I don’t try that because I was never good at it,” “Either my needs or the needs of the other can be satisfied; never both,” “No one is ever going to understand me,” or “Conflict is not to be trusted.”  What you think is linked to what shows up around the bend.  By increasing your awareness of these distortions (and allowing that awareness to impact the way you live your life),  you can make the conscious choice to edit them and, in turn, release self-imposed constrictions.  Then, you can re-script your life story accordingly making room for more optimism, confidence, aliveness and—in essence—more of your self.

Life is beautiful yet it entails some amount of suffering.  Our wounds hold gems.  Paradoxically, the places we struggle hold the most potential for growth and healing.  The challenge, then, is to reframe our suffering as an opportunity for transformation.  I don’t mean this in a vague, figurative sort of way.  In my own life, I have noticed the most challenging times offer more than pain and contraction.  They provide an opportunity to heal and to move deeper into relationship with others, as well as with myself.  By re-activating old pain and trauma that I couldn’t manage as a child, suffering sets the stage for the adult me to dress those wounds with care, to recover those aspects of myself previously lost in the struggle and, alas, to become more whole.

About me

Hi, I am an MFT with a background in Holistic Medicine.   I did not grow up with psychotherapy around me; it was my career as a holistic health practitioner that led me to the field.  During the seven years practicing Ayurveda, Traditional Chinese Medicine, Deep Tissue and Nutritional Counseling, I was continually struck by the connection between physical and psychological issues.  I would be working on someone’s physical ailments and they would begin to speak to me with great emotion and insight.  From common anxiety stuck in one’s shoulders to deep-seated trauma stored in their lower back, it became obvious that I was only working on the physical manifestations of a deeper imbalance.  In this way, my work with the body led to my current work with the heart and mind. 

I start with the assumption that my clients are dynamic beings with mental, emotional, physical and spiritual aspects all of which require attention.  I work with various populations from an approach best described as warm and empathic, yet intersubjective and straightforward.  I have studied various modalities and theories from Attachment Theory, Jungian Psychoanalysis and Object Relations to Transpersonal, Quantum Physics, Gestalt and Hakomi.  I’m not one to subscribe to one category; I study schools of technique and thought and I use what feels intuitive in the moment.  Years ago, I did my Undergrad work in Philosophy (Comparative Religion/Spirituality and Symbolic Logic) and, philosophically, I'm a Reflexive Monist--which basically means that I believe we are all connected. 

Colleagues in consultation groups have jokingly said that my style is very east coast.  That would make sense, as I grew up on the east coast.  I will say that I have a strong commitment to not just sympathizing for the sake of staying comfortable.  This type of treatment could easily lead to enabling.  Hence, I try my best to lovingly call my clients on their blind spots regardless of the temporary waves it might create.  I trust that the therapeutic relationship we co-create will sustain our bond--even through the most challenging conversations.  As for ethnicity, my father is from the island of Sri Lanka and mother (1/2 first generation Italian and 1/2 second generation Ukranian in heritage) is from the island of New York City. 

In addition to my career as a psychotherapist, I enjoy surfing Ocean Beach and playing basketball.  I am also a musician and writer of fiction.  I encourage clients to create a healthy lifestyle and to find creative outlets so they may give the inexpressible an outlet for expression.