Meredith Julian Mahaney
Hello! My name is Meredith, and I am a Licensed Professional Counselor and Mental Health Services Provider with 12 years of experience working in this field. I believe in a collaborative approach to therapy that rejects rigid, one-size-fits-all treatment plans and completely bypasses cold clinical checklists.
My greatest strengths are building trust, allowing others to feel safe, seen and heard, and assisting people in finding solutions that are most helpful for them.
Instead, I view us as co-collaborators working side-by-side through the circumstances that led you to the courageous decision to seek therapy. While I take my job incredibly seriously, I also believe there is a time and place for laughter and lightheartedness, just as there is a time to allow ourselves to weep. We are all souls having a unique, human experience. It is profoundly important to me that we show up as authentically ourselves as we can be as we walk this road together.
First session
In our first session, it's important to me for us to establish a level of trust. I want to hear more about what brought you to therapy, and I want you to feel safe, seen and heard. It's important to me that we build a strong therapeutic alliance, and once we have done that, we will collaborate together to reach your goals through attainable and sustainable steps. Additionally, it's important to me to know what you would like most to achieve through our work together.
Strengths
What sets my approach apart is the seamless bridge I build between deep psychological safety and collaborative action. My core strength lies in cultivating an environment where clients feel entirely safe, seen, and heard. However, I combine this supportive presence with a strictly non-directive, collaborative framework. I don't believe therapists are here to prescribe advice. Instead, I partner with my clients as a co-collaborator—working together to deconstruct issues that feel insurmountable and discover tailored, sustainable steps to cope.
Ideal clients
My ideal client is not defined by a single quality or diagnostic checklist, but rather I am seeking clients who have a strong desire to be seen, heard and valued. Having worked with a diverse tapestry of individuals backgrounds and mental health issues, it is most important to me that we collaborate together and that it is understood healing doesn't come in a box or a perfect formula. Whether you are struggling with a challenging diagnosis or simply trying to make sense of your current circumstances, I hope we can work together on sustainable steps to help you grow and heal.
Treatment methods
Humanistic
At its core, Humanistic Therapy is a deeply compassionate approach that focuses on your personal growth, your free will, and your capacity to become the strongest, healthiest version of yourself.Rather than viewing you through a cold "clinical checklist" or getting hung up on past flaws and diagnostic labels, this framework treats you as the ultimate expert on your own life history. It is rooted in the belief that human beings possess an innate, natural drive toward healing and self-actualization when given the right environment. What this looks like in our sessions: Radical Acceptance: You will enter a completely judgment-free space where you are accepted exactly as you are, allowing you to show up as your absolute authentic self. A True Partnership: We work as co-collaborators on a level playing field. I do not play the role of the top-down "expert" who tells you what to do; instead, I walk alongside you. Focusing on Potential, Not Pathologies: While we acknowledge your struggles, our primary focus will be on uncovering your unique, inherent strengths and resources so you can discover your own answers and chart your own path forward.
Acceptance and commitment (ACT)
Acceptance and commitment therapy (ACT) is an action-oriented approach to psychotherapy that stems from traditional behavior therapy and cognitive behavioral therapy. Clients begin to learn to stop avoiding and struggling with their inner emotions and begin accepting that these deeper feelings are appropriate responses to certain situations. Regardless of what is going on in a client's life, ACT allows the client to move forward with the understanding that we must accept whatever life throws and expect some idealized version we often wish we had.
Cognitive Behavioral (CBT)
CBT is a short-term, action-based approach to therapy in which we begin to see how our thinking and our actions affect our daily existence. This type of therapy focuses on the present rather than past events. Together, we can break down bigger issues into smaller, more manageable challenges.
Attachment-based
Attachment-based therapy is a brief, process-oriented form of counseling. The therapeutic relationship is based on developing or rebuilding trust and centers on expressing emotions. Therapy with an attachment-based approach looks back on the individual's life beginning with the time they were an infant and all the way through adulthood. It examines the way a person's earliest experiences with a primary caregiver (usually a parent or parents) has led the client to development relationships throughout life. Attachment-based therapy aims to build or rebuild a trusting, supportive relationship that will help prevent or treat mental health conditions such as anxiety and depression.
Dialectical Behavior (DBT)
DBT is an excellent modality for a multitude of mental health challenges, and is especially useful for anxiety and depression. Through DBT, we learn to slow down, breathe through challenging moments, and use mindfulness to alter our minds and bodies to a calmer state.
Location
Virtual sessions
Identifies as
Top specialties
Other specialties
Doesn't specialize in
Licensed in
- TennesseeLicense 7317