Culturally Sensitive Therapy

I use a culturally sensitive lens to allow clients to be the experts in their own lives, as coming from a place of non-judgement and understanding.

Culture plays a large role in how we express ourselves, how we are viewed by others, and how we experience our every day life.

I work with clients in a collaborative relationship to identify goals for therapy and treatment or growth plan. Together, we will identify what will be helpful, to explore how you relate to yourself (your thoughts, feelings, body, identity), the context within which you live, and how the heck to manage the societal structures we have to navigate. As a therapist I aim to practice with cultural humility, and will educate myself on topics important to you.

I have not only education and training but lived life experiences.

To paraphrase Ignacio Martin-Boro, for psychology to be truly emancipatory it must first sever itself from its own idealogical chains, from psychology itself. Dominant psychologies implicitly serve the status quo by defining health as adjustment to white, middle class, heteronormative, colonialist social norms, without interrogating the structural and systemic forms of oppression embedded in those norms. I aim to support you in a deep integration of heart, body, spirit, story, & culture.

I think this is a key foundation to any therapy.

My life experiences as an Asian-American who has lived abroad in various socio-economic settings has helped me see and understand people as unique individuals in their own communities.

I have experience working with individuals from a wide variety of backgrounds and their families, and I am always eager to learn more about others.

Culture informs how we view and understand our values and others around us. It's important to integrate that into therapy, as well as for your therapist to respect and understand your perspective.

Much of my graduate school training was in cross-cultural psychology, including understanding how culture is important in helping clients who struggle with various mental health problems. I use a cultural lens to view each of my clients and consider how culture has shaped them over time.

Sociocultural and identity factors (gender, race, sexuality, etc. ) shape how we experience the world and how the world interacts with us. My training emphasizes the importance of understanding how these factors impact our mental health.

Since most of my clients are BIPOC, being culturally sensitive and utilizing culturally sensitive thearpy is important in helping my clients feel safe, heard, and build trust with me. A large part of my practice is explaining the processes of therapy to my clients as it is their first time becoming vulnerable with a mental healthcare provide and trusting them.

Having worked with diverse client groups over the year has given me a strong understanding and appreciation of how important it is to attend to all aspects of a person's background and identities to understand your worldview and values.

Culturally Sensitive Therapy emphasizes the importance of cultural and societal factors in shaping individual and family dynamics. It aims to address cultural conflicts and promote understanding and acceptance.

I work with couples experiencing conflict due to cultural differences lean how to celebrate and enjoy these differences using a unique combination of psycho education and intimacy based communication skills that takes on average 6 months. Learning how to focus on the real cause of your conflict is liberating, and is based in learning how to be selfish by paying attention to your inner cues and identifying needs. I work to help you set healthy adult boundaries that create intimacy.

I believe strongly that our culture(s) play a huge role in our happiness as well as our dysfunction. I take social, cultural, family, and systems level factors into account when working with clients and believe that healing our relationships to our cultures is a major part of overall mental health.

I am a queer, feminist therapist and coming from a systems background, believe that the environments and systems we are surviving within impact our sense of safety and our sense of self. I work hard to deconstruct and unpack the ways our shitty cultural norms negatively impact my clients and connect them back to an internalized sense of self-worth, self-esteem, self-validation, and safety.