Hakomi somatic Therapy for individuals & relationships in Portland, OR

MY APPROACH

Drawing from extensive training in Hakomi META (Mindful Experiential Therapy Approaches), my primary goal is to support people along their paths of re-finding home within themselves and within their relationships.

My therapeutic approach is organized by a belief that our bodies hold the secrets of our wounds as well as the intrinsic wisdom to heal them. At this site of embodiment, profound transformation naturally occurs: of wounding into self-knowing, of constriction into aliveness, of pain into resource.

With adults, I practice trauma-informed, mindfulness-based and attachment-focused somatic therapy which invites you to slow way down and bring curious attention to the fabric of your inner world. Practicing non-judgmental attention to your moment-to-moment experience within the context of a safe and supportive relationship allows us to collaboratively study how your particular system organizes experience and to become aware of the patterns in operation and their origins. Throughout this map-making process, the body will organically show us what it needs in order to process and repair places of pain and stuckness.

With kiddos, sand tray and expressive arts therapies allow them to communicate through their first and primary language - play. I have a special interest in assisting families in interrupting intergenerational transmissions of trauma, through working with children who need extra support, and by supporting new or soon-to-be parents in their transition to parenthood.

My therapeutic style is deep, warm, collaborative, sometimes directive, and often imbued with a gentle playfulness. We might, depending on your interests and needs, integrate aspects of expressive arts therapy, Internal Family Systems (parts work), dream work, Dialectical Behavioral Therapy, focused attachment work, or Strategic Family therapy. The time I spent living and practicing at Zen monasteries also informs how I show up to this work, and I follow a systems perspective that recognizes the effects of marginalization and oppression. I am affirming of all relationship structures, the LGTBQIA+ rainbow, kink, and am actively (and forever more) learning anti-racism.

Fundamentally, my hope as a therapist is to be a supportive presence along that oh-so meandering path of deepening inner-knowing, holding steady as you follow its unwinding towards an unshakeable home within.