Psychoanalysis

I can think of few other experiences that offer such intensely personal transformation than psychoanalysis. With an emphasis towards accessing and integrating one’s unconscious, analysis helps with understanding how one’s mind works. Or in some cases, brings sectors of one’s mind that aren’t working well up to more usable speed.

The psychoanalytic process I try to facilitate between a patient and myself functions as a dynamic conduit connecting as many emotional and psychological circuits as possible. That may look like introductions, or reintroductions, to versions of one’s self they once knew or perhaps never knew. Feelings buried. Motivations conflicting. Internal experiences sketched out, given shape and form so details may be added and life subsequently expanded.

Psychoanalysis typically includes three or more meetings per week. Increased frequency lends itself to a more intimate encounter and enables use of the therapeutic relationship itself as a unique agent of change. It’s not for everyone, and understandably so. The demand on resources (time, money, emotional investment) is real and diving so deeply inward is intimidating. I do apply similar psychoanalytic principles to psychotherapy. The difference is mostly a matter of intensity and cumulative effect.