LMFT, 4 years of experience
I am a licensed marriage and family therapist born and raised in San Diego, CA. I am a 2nd generation Korean American, which is a source of strength and pride for me. I see myself not just as a therapist, but as a helper. I believe helping people nourishes your soul, something I like helping my clients tapping into as they attend to their own psychological needs.
There won't be a lot of therapy happening in the first session. We'll just get to know each other and gather some pertinent information. I encourage you to treat it like I'm auditioning for the therapist role as well!
Normalizing the experience of seeing a therapist (or having to see one). Everyone who first comes into therapy comes with trepidation. Therapy is for everybody. I think you'll find the process is far different from everything you've been told it would be.
I feel uniquely competent working with people who feel stuck in parts of their lives that I felt stuck in, namely those in their teen and young adult years.
Our thoughts and emotions are necessary parts of our survival. However, if we have not learned the tools to manage them and gently put them in proper order, they become a great source of our suffering. By learning how our minds relate thoughts, emotions, and actions, we can locate where our suffering comes from, and devise effective means of returning our minds and bodies to their optimal functioning.
Our minds can appreciate great beauty and gratitude. But in very stressful circumstances we forget how to do so, and we even make circumstances harder on ourselves unknowingly. Using evidence-based techniques, we can help our minds notice when we are making things harder for ourselves, and implement individual and interpersonal techniques to return our minds and bodies to more relaxed, appreciative states of being.