Counseling Services
Our counselors are highly experienced and therefore able to effectively employ an Integrative Therapy or Eclectic Therapy approach to counseling: This means that they are not limited to one specific modality or school of thought, but are able to draw upon their education in a number of different modalities across many years of experience to determine how to best address the unique needs of each client.
You can read about our counselors and their certifications & specializations here.
Below is a brief summary of some of the major modalities we incorporate in our practice. You are also welcome to call or email us for more information about how we can begin creating an individualized approach for your own unique life situation and counseling goals.
We are trained in the following approaches:
Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT) is a form of psychotherapy that focuses on the effects of the individual’s thoughts on their emotions and behavior. By learning how to improve the way one thinks about problems and their potential solutions, the individual is able to better cope with challenges and more clearly and effectively work on improving their quality of life.
This form of therapy does not focus as much on what happened in the past, (such as challenges from childhood), but instead emphasizes how to make the most of the present situation to begin living a better life. Everyone has issues from their past experiences, but CBT is a way of coping and adapting to one’s issues in the present so that they can focus on developing a better future.
Dialectical Behavioral Therapy (DBT) is a form of psychotherapy similar to CBT, but with a greater emphasis on regulating emotions and improving interpersonal relationships with others. Dialectical Behavioral Therapy is especially effective for learning how to deal with intense negative emotions, which are often contributing to one’s anxiety, bipolar disorder, eating disorders, substance abuse, and so on. Instead of trying to fight these negative emotions or run away from them through unwanted behaviors, the individual instead learns strategies for coping with their negative emotions and minimizing or eliminating them over time, (such as through mindfulness, distress tolerance, etc.)
Mindfulness-Based Cognitive Therapy (MBCT) uses mindfulness practices to improve mental and emotional health and overall well-being. It has been shown through neuroimaging that mindfulness or meditation actually changes the physical structure and function of the brain and the way that it processes information, regulates emotions, and experiences life from moment to moment. By combining the benefits of mindfulness with more traditional aspects of Cognitive Behavioral Therapy, the individual can learn to replace unwanted patterns of thought and behavior with more positive ones.
Solution-Focused Brief Therapy (SFBT) offers a quick and pragmatic approach to addressing one’s current challenges and taking concrete steps toward improving their quality of life. It is an interview-style therapy designed to identify and solve current problems, rather than revisit issues from the past. The practical, efficient, and future-oriented nature of SFBT is a great match for people who respond best to this style of approach.
Compassion-Focused Therapy (CFT) is designed to help individuals dealing with shame, anger, or self-criticism who might benefit from learning how to be less hard on themselves in order to be less hard on others or vice-versa. These issues often arise from the ways in which people perceive situations and interpersonal relationships, especially if they have been harmed or neglected in the past.
CFT pays special attention to the different emotional-regulation systems that humans use to navigate life, which are oriented toward threats (protecting oneself from danger), drive (seeking resources and improving), and soothing (allowing the body to rest, digest, and release stress). Many people who seek counseling are overexposed to the former two body systems, which can be the source of much hostility, frustration, shame, self-criticism, and other negative emotions. For this reason, progress can often be made by learning how to enter into the soothing stage of emotional regulation, where the body and mind no longer feel subconsciously threatened or motivated to compete with others and pursue resources.
Applied Positive Psychology aims to identify and clarify the factors most related to one’s well-being and quality of life. While it’s easy to become preoccupied with avoiding negative thoughts and situations, or seeking less fulfilling forms of short-term happiness, Positive Psychology is about focusing on what truly brings value to the individual’s life and working to create more fulfilling and enduring happiness.
Somatic Tracking & Pain Reprocessing Therapy (PRT) are highly effective treatments for chronic pain, which work by teaching the brain to reinterpret the signals it receives from the body. The sensation of pain is designed to function as a warning signal that something in the body might need to be addressed, but chronic pain is not helpful to us because it is not alerting us to any new problems that we were not previously aware of. Somatic Tracking and Pain Reprocessing Therapy are used to change the way the brain perceives these signals by reinterpreting them through the lens of safety and associating them with positive sensations and emotions. In the same way that fear and excitement are the same physiological process in the brain but are experienced in very different ways depending on the context, the physical underpinnings of pain can also be reprocessed into an experience that is neutral or positive by changing the context in which the brain receives these signals.