How I Think Therapy Works
A space to feel safe, seen, and real.
If you’re considering therapy—or already in it—you may wonder: How does this actually help?
I believe therapy works because it creates a safe enough space for people to be their real selves, sometimes for the first time in their lives. And I believe that our real selves are also our best selves: not angry or fearful, but curious, trusting, and hopeful.
When we don’t feel safe, we fall into familiar patterns:
Fight – anger or defensiveness
Flight – anxiety, avoidance, overworking
Freeze – shutdown, numbness, hopelessness
Therapy offers an alternative: a space where you don’t have to react or defend. You can just be.
In that safety, your nervous system begins to relax. You may start to see that the strategies you’ve used to survive, while once necessary, no longer serve you in the way they used to. And gradually, you begin to replace them with new, healthier ways of coping, relating, and living.
Sometimes those changes happen naturally. Other times, therapy helps you learn and practice them with structure, support, and compassionate guidance.
What Makes Therapy Effective: Insights from Research
While therapy is a deeply personal experience, it’s also one that’s been widely studied. Decades of research consistently show that therapy helps people feel less anxious and depressed, more connected to themselves and others, and better able to navigate life’s challenges.
But when researchers look closer at why therapy works, they often find that it’s not just about the specific techniques—it’s about something more human.
Different Approaches, Shared Goals
Therapy can look different depending on the modality, each offering a unique path toward growth:
Psychodynamic Therapy explores unconscious patterns and early relational experiences to help you understand how your past affects your present.
Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT) focuses on identifying and changing unhelpful thoughts and behaviors to improve emotional well-being.
Humanistic/Client-Centered Therapy emphasizes empathy, authenticity, and unconditional positive regard to foster self-awareness and healing.
Each approach offers useful tools—but across all modalities, research highlights a core truth: It’s the quality of the relationship—not just the type of therapy—that makes the biggest difference.
Common Factors That Predict Success
Studies show that the strongest predictors of positive therapy outcomes include:
A strong therapeutic alliance—a sense of connection, trust, and shared purpose
The therapist’s empathy, presence, and ability to create a safe, nonjudgmental space
The client’s readiness and engagement
These “common factors” are the foundation of meaningful change —across all kinds of therapy.
What I Aim to Offer
Hope, trust, and a space for growth.
To me, the purpose of therapy is twofold:
To offer a relationship where you feel safe, seen, and supported
And to help you build the tools to translate that sense of safety into meaningful change in your everyday life
Therapy isn’t about fixing you. It’s about helping you reconnect with the part of you that isn’t shaped by fear, shame, or survival mode.
It’s about remembering—and trusting—that you were never broken.
When you feel safe enough to let go of old patterns, you may find that you already have what you need to grow. Or you may begin to see, clearly, what growth would look like—and how to move toward it.
Healing takes time. But it begins with a space where you feel safe, supported, and truly understood.
That’s what I aim to offer in every session.