My Approach
I believe the heart of effective therapy is my relationship with my clients. A strong relationship features authenticity, trust, and honesty. It is only within such a relationship that lasting therapeutic change happens.
While techniques and modalities matter, without a strong, trusting relationship, they are ineffective. I have seen time and time again with my clients that it is not only my knowledge and skills in therapy that help them, but also what I bring to the table as a person, a fellow human being.
Therapy sessions with me will feel nonjudgmental, curious, inclusive, and authentic. My priority is to ensure that my clients are talking to a real human, not a collage of professional opinions and judgments disguised in human skin.
Then, and only then, can the therapy work begin.
Meet Your Therapist
Hi, my name is Bill. I’m a Registered Psychotherapist based in Ontario, providing therapy to clients all across Canada. As a therapist, I combine psychodynamic and existential therapies, where I help my clients identify, understand, and work with their unconscious patterns. By making the unconscious patterns conscious, we collaboratively clear up a pathway to healing and growth. When suitable to my clients, I incorporate other therapies to provide them the best care I can, such as CBT, DBT, ACT, EFT and narrative therapy.
When I’m not being a therapist, I write short stories and novels, play tennis, read a lot of books, and enjoy deep conversations with my friends.
Struggling with mental health?
Reach out for a FREE 30-min consultation phone call today!
A Personal Touch in Therapy
The existential psychologist Irvin Yalom once said that what makes a therapist’s approach special is like a secret ingredient thrown into a standard recipe by a chef. A personal touch that no other chef has thought to add to the same dish.
For me, this personal touch comes from my deep belief in the healing power of the therapeutic encounter between one human story and another. Clients are often expected to be honest and authentic during their sessions, while therapists remain neutral, revealing little about themselves. I do things a little differently. (Read more about the therapeutic encounter here.)
I try to model the kind of honesty and authenticity I ask of my clients. If you make a joke, I’ll laugh; if your story touches me, I’ll cry; if you ask me a personal question, I will answer them directly; if your question is too personal, I’ll tell you so directly instead of deflecting with a question of my own. And if I feel like we share similar experiences, I will share my story (appropriately without TMI) as well.
I believe it is through our shared humanness, shared human stories, that we connect and heal. Ready to take your first step in therapy? Reach out today, and let’s chat!
First Time to Therapy?
You are not alone – I have been in your shoes. Doing therapy for the first time as a client can really bring on the nerves. While I would like to say the stigma around therapy and mental health has disappeared, that is unfortunately not the reality we live in.
Although many people, especially the younger ones, have come to accept mental health challenges as something normal everyone goes through, there is still the stubborn stigma that if you go to therapy, there must be something wrong with you.
As a therapist and a former client myself, I know for a fact that some problems in life simply require an outsider’s perspective because we are too close to it. And then there are the problems too difficult to hack on your own, such as trauma, depression, identity crisis, major life transitions (e.g. mid-life crisis, or more recently, quarter-life crisis, new parenthood, major losses), addictions, just to name a few.
To get a sense of the scope of problems my clients typically bring to our sessions, here’s a non-exhaustive list of therapy services I provide.
Point is, therapy is a safe, nonjudgmental space that is dedicated to help you unblock the blockages in your life and flourish.
Are you dealing with a difficult issue and thinking that therapy might help? Reach out today, let’s talk!