My Approach to Helping
The main thing I try to do is empathize with the people who come to me for help. If therapists can’t do that, all the techniques they have learned and try to apply will fail. It is the emotional connection between the psychotherapist and the client that fosters the cure. Psychoanalytic therapy emphasizes this connection and uses it to bring about real change. When I empathize with a client, that fosters trust. When a client trusts me, he or she is more likely to listen to what I say. The emotional connection causes deeper insights and deeper change. Secondly, I try to be completely neutral; I don’t allow my own religious views, politics, gender identity or anything else infect the psychotherapy relationship. If I do, the therapy may become a form of brainwashing, collusion, or in other ways go astray. Third, I have found my own individual peace (through my own psychotherapy) and am therefore able to tolerate a client’s negative as well as positive feelings and to handle them in a constructive way, rather than becoming defensive. When psychotherapists have all these personal qualities, they will have the right skills and psychotherapy is more likely to advance.
I also think that a psychotherapist should be well-rounded. In addition to practicing therapy for 37 years, I’ve written some books on psychology, novels, a book of poetry and drawings, and some journal articles. The psychology books include The Dictionary of Dream Interpretation, The Couple Who Fell in Hate, Psychotherapy with People in the Arts, 111 Common Therapeutic Blunders, and Turning Points in Analytic Therapy. I have also been an adjunct professor for 15 years, and more recently I’ve branched out into movies and videos. I’ve writing and directing some feature films, winning awards for my screenplays, and creating a collection of video poems. I live in the Pocono Mountains with my wife, Julia, and my parrot, Max, who has learned to say, “Whoopie!” I enjoy tennis, golf, fishing and just being in nature.
Finally, I think it’s important for a psychotherapist to do his own psychotherapy. Therapy has helped me to understand my own flaws and to be more empathetic, less reactive, and less defensive with my clients. To me psychotherapy is not just an intellectual idea I believe in; it’s something I have experienced deeply, something that has in some respects saved me, and therefore something I now embrace with my heart as well as my head.
More Info About My Practice
I currently take Aetna, Cigna Humana and Healthfirst health insurance, or any insurance plan that has an out-of-network contingency. For the uninsured, I have a sliding scale fee plan. I am good with children and I’m also good with adults, couples and families. I am very open-minded and there is no issue that I won’t take on in a nonjudgmental way.
