I provide psychoanalytic psychotherapy and psychoanalysis in a private practice setting. The sort of psychoanalysis that I practice is based not on reconstructions of the past (i.e., attempts to explain symptoms by linking them with experiences in the past), but on contemporary understandings of how the mind perceives, represents, but also constructs inner and outer reality. In what follows I try to give the reader a frame of reference for this sort of therapy.

Each of us lives within a model of the world that the mind creates for us moment by moment. We look out from within it onto a 'world' it is representing. Our perceptions and experiences are structured by this model, and the limit of our ability to sustainably change ourselves is set by it. In other words, while we do perceive and interact with a world that does indeed exist outside of ourselves, we never have direct access to it. We reach it only through the representation we make of it, that our minds make of it for "us". But in bridging the gap between outside and an inside it is also charged with organizing, the mind leaves an uneven seam. Bits that really belong to "us" get mixed into the representation we make of the outside world. These facts are both widely accepted and ubiquitously under appreciated

Psychoanalysis, as a theory and a practice, is built on this understanding of things (e.g., link-1, link-2). It itself is a model which aims to make the mind’s component processes observable as such and in real time. These processes amount to the activity of meaning making. They are what the mind does when it organizes raw stimuli, i.e., when it constructs its representations. They are bits of "us", and "we" exist always in relationship with the surrounding world. The bits gotten hold of in analytic sessions are those uneven points in the seam (the points where our model of the world has, without our realizing it, ceased to faithfully reflect the world itself). Identifying this allows for a mechanism of action (a way of helping) based on something other than education (as in cognitive therapy), "exposure" (as in behavioral therapy), or reconstruction (i.e., as in "dynamic" therapy). To get hold of these processes is to be able to see how one's models of self, other, and world have come to distort more than reveal the realities they intend to represent. As a result, one comes to understand how, in an important sense, they have been creating their own version of the world as opposed to struggling with the one given to them.

Importantly, the power of psychoanalysis does not hinge on the external definition of Truth. The analyst does not act as an arbiter of Truth, but as an observer in the position to watch the mind construct it's version of reality from a perspective inaccessible to the patient themself (we are all bounded in this way). In a way that's difficult to describe but straightforward to show, what gets talked about in psychoanalytic sessions is how this process of construction happens and why. Speaking to these processes as they occur has a powerfully sobering effect. These are moments when we know ourselves more completely and therefore see the world around us more clearly. It's the state of mind restored in these moments that implies the abatement of symptoms and increased ability to productively engage the world and people around us. These are moments when one learns that how the world looks and feels to us has a lot to do with how the line between self and other gets drawn, and when the opportunity to understand why the line gets drawn like that in the first place opens up. Helping the mind to draw the line between self and other more accurately greatly improves its efficiency. Our ability to think gets a lot better. Importantly, this does not eliminate suffering but makes it more meaningful and hence productive.

All patients who chose psychoanalysis sense a need for a particular sort of help. This is often experienced an awareness that time is passing but growth isn't occurring. Each, though, comes to it from a different direction. Some have their interest piqued through intellectual exposure to psychoanalytic ideas, some have stumbled unwittingly into my office and found to their surprise that I seemed capable of understanding something about them, some hunger for a treatment with a higher than average degree of intellectual rigor, and others just hope for relief they had been unable to find elsewhere. Regardless, patients in psychoanalysis experience something interesting, unique, and quite often helpful.

The credentials that support my practice are as follows: I hold a doctorate in clinical psychology from the California School of Professional Psychology in San Diego which, in addition to my state granted license, qualifies me for the title of psychologist. I’m also a graduate of the five year psychoanalytic training program at the San Diego Psychoanalytic Center which grants me the title of psychoanalyst. Perhaps most importantly, though, I present my cases weekly (and confidentially) to senior scholar/practitioners who each have demonstrable expertise in a particular psychoanalytic tradition. I partake in monthly seminars led by these same scholar/practitioners along side a cohort of my peers located in different metropolitan areas across the country. I am a full member of the International Psychoanalytical Association, the American Psychoanalytic Association, and the San Diego Psychoanalytic Center.

To the prospective patient: The process starts with a phone call. If it makes sense, we'll set up a consultation. This involves two meetings inside of a week. During the consultation I'll listen to your hopes for treatment and try to get to know you some. If I think I can help you, I'll make a recommendation for treatment and answer any questions you may have. I care about the affordability of therapy. If I don't accept your insurance, we'll discuss fees and settle on one that's fair to us both. The financial aspect of treatment is important, but so too is our ability to work together and your interest and motivation to experience this sort of therapy.

I offer clinical consultations and supervision for mental health clinicians working with patients in once or twice weekly psychotherapy. Some of those who find such services helpful are interested in learning more about psychoanalytic thought and practice, while others are more concerned with an immediate clinical difficulty or impasse they happen to be facing. Depending on your needs, we can meet a few times or more regularly.

I strongly believe in the importance of consistently presenting our work to peers and mentors. At its best, supervision should be disturbing in a productive and enlivening way. It should remind us again and again of our uncanny ability to fool ourselves, of the difficulty of learning to see and interpret sophisticated intra- and interpersonal dynamics, and of the amazing complexity of the mind and relationships.

I follow the supervisory practices and philosophy built into a number of psychoanalytic traditions. This involves the use of process notes prepared by the supervisee ahead of time. Having such notes allows for clearer, more powerful demonstrations of various dynamics alive in the treatment than tends to be possible with less formal supervisory structures.

Fees are set on case by case basis relative to a variety of factors which I will make clear in our initial conversation.