Please Note: Due to the current situation with COVID-19, I am offering Telehealth video therapy sessions via a HIPAA-compliant videoconferencing service. If interested, please let me know.
Why Psychodynamic Psychotherapy?
If you’ve been in psychodynamic therapy before, you may know what a positive, life-changing experience it can be.
You may even be looking for a psychodynamic psychotherapist to work with … or perhaps you’d just like to better understand how I work and help clients every day, which is great!
As a psychodynamic psychotherapist, the focus of my work is the healing dynamic of the therapeutic relationship you and I will create together.
What does this mean?
Well, we’re all relational beings. It’s part of what makes us human. Our perceptions, interpretations, beliefs, and behaviors are formed in our earliest years, and throughout our lives, in the context of the relationships we have with others and with ourselves.
We also all face challenges in our lives from time to time. It’s another part of being human.
However, what many people don’t realize is that the problems we struggle with are often caused, or aggravated, by our own thoughts and behaviors. And those unhelpful, “maladaptive” thoughts and behaviors are often rooted in erroneous beliefs we hold about ourselves, our relationships with others, and the world around us … beliefs that are typically formed in our earliest relationships with our parents, siblings, friends, and other family members.
Accordingly, just as emotional wounds and maladaptive beliefs and behaviors are formed in the context of our relationships, healing and growth also need to take place in the same context … in relationship.
This is what psychodynamic psychotherapy is all about: creating healing through relationship.
This is why the focus of my work is on relationships, and why I approach my work from an integrative, attachment-focused, psychodynamic perspective.
How Is Psychodynamic Psychotherapy Different from Other Approaches?
Unlike many forms of counseling and psychotherapy that focus on treating specific symptoms, psychodynamic therapy is designed to help you dig deeper, understand and relieve the often unconscious beliefs and conflicts that are causing or aggravating your relational issues and emotional suffering.
Specifically, psychodynamic therapy can help you:
- Effectively cope with a wide range of challenges and circumstances (including anxiety, stress, depression, and burnout).
- Better understand yourself and others.
- Recognize, tolerate, and more effectively express a wider range of emotions.
- Build more satisfying relationships.
- Work through and resolve any childhood traumas (including being bullied by siblings or peers, or being the child of parents who divorced, who were critical or shaming, or whom you had to take care of emotionally or physically).
- Improve your sense of self-worth and increase your self-esteem.
- Understand your wants and needs, as well as how to express them to others, and create an authentic, purpose-driven, and joyous life!
When all is said and done, my goal is to do much more than simply help you “cope” with the symptoms and issues you’re experiencing …
I’m here to help you uncover, explore, and change the unconscious perceptions, beliefs, defense mechanisms, and other internal tensions that are actually causing the problems you’re facing, so you can develop the inner strengths and resources necessary to create happier, healthier relationships and a more rewarding life.
How Will We Work Together?
During your first session or two, we’ll discuss what’s brought you to therapy, and we’ll lay out a course for our work together that will guide us towards achieving your goals.
I’ll also spend some time teaching you specific tools and skills you can use to relieve any symptoms or discomfort you’re currently struggling with.
As your therapy progresses, through the use of insight, free association, and the dynamics that occur in the relationship we build together, you’ll learn to acknowledge, question, and evaluate the beliefs you have about yourself, your relationships, and the world in general, so you can then work towards disconfirming and transforming any erroneous thoughts and beliefs that are holding you back from achieving your goals.
In other words, we’re not going to spend a lot of time talking about “what” you’re doing “wrong.”
Instead, we’ll look at “why” you’re doing what you’re doing, in order to make sure your “why” is in alignment with reality and whatever it is you’re trying to achieve.
I’m also not one of those therapists that is just going to sit and listen to your problems …
Yes, I’ll listen non-judgmentally, attentively, and intentionally to everything you have to say. But I’m also interactive and I’ll provide guidance and direction.
I’m here to sit with you, be here for you, see you for who you are, and help you become who you want to be. I’m also here to “hold your hand” when you need it, as well as lead you by the hand in the direction you want to go.
Change is rarely easy, and creating the kind of positive, lasting change that is possible with psychodynamic therapy will require your time, commitment, and hard work.
But, if you’re ready and willing to try new things, to do the work and put in the energy and effort required to take a deeper journey and explore what you really need to create a fulfilling and rewarding life, then the psychodynamic therapy services I offer can help you not only gain perspective about your true purpose/reason for being here, but create a life you truly love living!
Ready to get started? You can either keep doing the same things that aren’t working, or you can contact me today at 503-961-9200 or by email me at julie@juliewilliamspsyd.com. I look forward to speaking with you.