Who I Work With

Over the years, I've come to see that there are as many ways into therapy as there are people. And it's very often the case that the thing someone names as the problem in the first session turns out to be part of something far larger.

Sometimes we notice a pattern that keeps repeating, or that our body has started carrying what the mind has been trying to manage. Sometimes it's an event, like a loss, an ending, an experience that rearranged how you understood your life. And sometimes there's no single thing, just the felt sense that the life you've been living no longer fits who you are.

This is part of why I chose to work as an existential-humanistic therapist. This way of meeting people allows me to hold the whole range of what people carry in, rather than only the part that has a name.

Anxiety, Stress, and Overthinking

The most common reason people contact me circles some version of anxiety. This might look like being on edge when nothing is immediately wrong, or a mind that keeps drifting toward what might happen, what's unresolved, or what can't be known in advance. For many it shows up as overthinking or rumination, a set of looping thoughts in search of a certainty or relief that never arrives. For others, anxiety can look more like chronic stress, or even trouble with attention and focus.

Depression, Burnout, and Feeling Stuck

Sometimes it isn't tension that pulls and pushes on us but something more like pressure or weight. We often call this depression, but that label can miss the complexity underneath the experience. You might feel like life is flat and hard to live within. This heaviness might also show up as burnout and exhaustion that doesn't seem to respond to rest or recovery, almost as if you're stuck inside something with no way out.

Grief and Loss

Grief flows through much of what I've written above. Sometimes it follows a death, but just as often it follows the end of a relationship, a change in health, an identity that no longer holds, or a future that has passed you by. Grief is one of the most universal human experiences, and yet for many of us it remains the least processed or understood.

Anger and Substance Use

Sometimes the tension within our lives shows up as anger or irritability. This might look like a felt edge to ordinary interactions that catches you or others off guard, or the sense of anger or pressure within the body that you can't seem to control.

Patterns of substance use might also play a role in how you make it through the day. Drugs and alcohol are often attempts to manage something that feels unmanageable, whether because of overwhelm, isolation, or the experience of pain or difficulty without a clear source.

Relationships, Couples, and Breakups

I work with couples and individuals navigating relational difficulty. Recurring conflict, eroded trust, or trouble with boundaries are common themes. These relational difficulties are among the most painful experiences we face, and some of the hardest to change alone.

In couples therapy, the focus is on honest dialogue, emotional attunement, and a clearer understanding of how each person's inner world shapes the relationship. What tends to emerge is that the patterns between partners mirror patterns within each individual's life, and that shifting one begins to shift the other.

Sometimes the relationship has already ended. This might be a separation or divorce, a partnership that fell apart, or the loss of a person you depended on who is no longer there. What often follows is not just grief but something more like a felt disorientation. Endings like these tend to send us back to reflect deeply on our own sense of self, and to come to terms with a new identity that is already taking shape.

Therapy for Men

A significant part of my practice is working with men who are examining their lives. Many arrive because something has stopped working: a relationship, a career, a sense of self that once felt stable but has fallen apart. Some men arrive with a deepening awareness that achievement or performance hasn't delivered what they thought it would. For others, an event or a choice has caused them to reflect deeply on their existence and reach out to understand how to navigate life more skillfully.

Identity, Life Transitions, and Existential Questions

Much of my work sits outside any easily described diagnostic category. This might include a life transition, a difficult choice, or a question that is existential in nature. Questions that at their root are often phrased like: What is this life for? Who am I beyond the stories I've lived? What is truly important?

I work with people across the spectrum of identity and experience, including those navigating questions of identity itself. What connects identity-based work to the existential frame is the view that who we are is not fixed but something we are always in the process of becoming.

Creativity, Spirituality, and Psychedelic Integration

For some, the path into therapy is through creativity. Sometimes that looks like a creative block or a crisis of purpose. Sometimes it's the philosophical questions under the work itself that call us into contact with something deeper.

For others, the way in is a spiritual pursuit or a spiritual realization. This can be something that surfaces slowly in therapy, sitting in the background. Or it can be front and center, such as a realization you're trying to make sense of, or a practice you're trying to actually live by. These are some of the oldest and most honest questions we can ask, and they reach into the center of what existential therapy is designed to support.

And some people find me because of a psychedelic experience. Perhaps something opened a door that isn't easy to close, and you're left curious — or unsettled — about what it revealed regarding consciousness, the self, or the world around you, and how to integrate that into the life you're living now.

An Open Invitation

Therapy with me doesn't require a clear label or a crisis. What I've written above are some rough guideposts, but by no means the full map. Sometimes the most important step is recognizing that something within is asking to be seen.

If something here resonates, you're welcome to reach out. I offer therapy for individuals and couples in Eugene, Oregon, with in-person sessions at my South Eugene office and telehealth available anywhere in the state. If you'd like to explore my work further, The Existential Lens is where I write and record.