WhAt Is the Best type of Therapy For me?
Everyone is unique and gravitates to different styles of therapy. Im my practice I have made it a priority to incorporate the approaches that are aligned with my values so that I can offer flexibility in the styles and approaches that best suit my clients needs.
Some approaches focus on your thoughts, some work with your emotions or your body, and some help you understand patterns from your past. Some people call this top down approaches (starting with your mind) or bottom up approaches (starting with your sensations). Here is a guide to the main therapeutic styles and interventions that I work with and how they can support your healing.
Client Centered
(also called humanistic was developed by Carl Rogers)
Top Down and Relational
What it is:
Meeting Clients where they are at from a place of respect and compassion.
My take on this approach is helping clients find their authenticity, and inner strengths. Providing an empethic non judgmental relationship to help support clients towards the life they want.
What it feels like:
Warm, validating, and empowering. Therapist are not an authoritative figure but rather a supportive presence to help you move toward your own authentic desires.
How it helps:
Builds confidence and self-worth
Encourages self understanding
Helps you trust yourself
Great for people who:
Need a safe space to explore who they are.
Neuroscience Informed Therapy
This means only using Therapeutic modalities that have shown to support change. I am interested and always looking for therapeutic methods that have been tested and supported by research.
I also enjoy sharing knowledge of why these approaches might be helpful and believe education and understanding in therapy can be empowering for clients.
What it is:
An approach based on what modern brain science tells us about healing, memory, emotion, trauma, and stress.
What it feels like:
Down-to-earth explanations that help you understand what's happening in your brain, paired with practical tools.
How it helps:
Reduces shame by explaining your reactions
Helps you understand your nervous system
Provides tools that match how your brain actually works
Great for people who:
Appreciate science and like understanding “the why.”
Trauma Therapy
Integrative
What it is:
A combination of approaches (often EMDR, somatic work, IFS, grounding, and stabilization) focused on healing trauma safely and at your pace.
What it feels like:
Slow, gentle, and grounding. Trauma work does not mean re-living trauma—it means helping your brain and body release it.
How it helps:
Reduces triggers
Restores a sense of safety
Helps you feel present again
Repairs nervous-system dysregulation
Great for people who:
Have had overwhelming experiences, big or small.
Bottom Up Interventions
These therapeutic styles are often blended and work well together. You may notice overlap and similarities in their descriptions.
Somatic Experiencing
(somatic healing practice have existed for centuries accross cultures but this approahc was popularized in western psychology by Peter Levine)
Bottom Up
What it is:
Somatic therapy works with your body’s sensations, posture, breath, and nervous system because we know that trauma affects the whole body not just the mind. Our bodies can hold traumatic experiences long after we believe we’ve healed from them mentally.
What it feels like:
Simple awareness practices, gentle movement, grounding, noticing tension, and releasing stored emotion safely.
How it helps:
Releases “stuck” stress or trauma
Helps with chronic anxiety or numbness
Builds resilience in your nervous system
Helps you feel more in your body
Great for people who:
Say things like “Logically I know that’s the past and I’m safe but I can’t seem to let it go.”
Nervous-System Informed Therapy
(developed with research by Stephen Porges called the Polyvagal Theory)
Bottom Up
What it is:
An approach rooted in understanding your body’s stress responses. Understanding and feeling into automatic responses to stress that we call fight, flight, freeze, fawn, shutdown.
What it feels like:
Learning to interpret your body’s cues and respond with regulation tools. You build a sense of safety from the inside out.
How it helps:
Reduces overwhelm and burnout
Helps with anxiety and trauma
Builds emotional stability and grounding
Great for people who:
Want more control over how they feel in daily life.
Emotion-Focused Therapy (EFT)
Bottom Up & Relational
What it is:
A therapy that helps you understand emotions as signals and guides, not problems.
What it feels like:
Focused on emotional experience. Helps clients learn to name and understand feelings to help shift core emotions in a safe, guided way.
How it helps:
Softens emotional reactivity
Helps you understand your needs
Strengthens emotional connection in relationships
Great for people who:
People who feel disconnected or often overwhelmed by their emotions.
Clinical Hypnotherapy
(Eriksonian Style)
Bottom Up
What it is:
My approach to Hypnotherapy evokes a gentle focused state (similar to a guided meditation) to help your brain access subconscious beliefs and create change. This style is called permissive and clinical and different to stage hypnosis. Your subconscious is invited into an altered state where your usual conscious limiting beliefs are not present. In this state clients can process the past and access a different iteration of their future in a compassionate and supportive environment.
What it feels like:
You’re aware, in control, and at ease. Although you may be in a different altered state, you are all the while in control. It can feels like drifting inward to a deeper self while a therapist guides you.
How it helps:
Quickly reduces anxiety or phobias
Helps shift habits and emotional reactions
Bypasses overthinking to reach deeper material
Works well for trauma when talking feels too sharp
Great for people who:
Are stuck in loops they can’t “think” their way out of. Good to help alleviate emotional responses to memories, it will not erase a memory but can help the intensity of the emotion surround it. Also helpful for improving focus in sports, in goal setting and working with life transitions or phobias.
Internal Family Systems Therapy (IFS)
Parts Work
(IFS was Developed by Richard Swartz but Parts Work exists in different healing modalities)
Top-Down & Bottom Up
What it is:
IFS sees the mind as having different “parts” (like the anxious part, the caretaker part, the angry part). Each part has a reason for being there and developed at a different time in your life as a strategy to help with coping with difficult situations. The idea is to help understand the strategy behind your behaviour to help shift it to be more helpful or appropriate. Your strategy may feel out of place now in this stage of life but it may have had a reason to exist in a previous time.
What it feels like:
Gentle, reflective, and surprisingly intuitive. Instead of fighting your inner critic, you learn to understand it and care for the wounded parts underneath.
How it helps:
Heals long-standing inner conflicts
Builds self-compassion
Reduces shame
Helps with trauma, anxiety, and harsh self-talk
Great for people who:
Feel torn inside, overwhelmed by emotions, or stuck in old patterns.
EMDR - Bilateral Stimulation
(EMDR is trademarked by Dr. Francine Shapiro)
(Bilateral Stimulation is a similar technique)
Bottom-Up
What it is:
EMDR or bilateral stimulation (eye movements, tapping, or sounds) help the brain reprocess trauma and emotional blocks. By stimulating both sides of the brain via taping, sound, vibration or eye movement clients find processing traumatic memories less distressing and find relief from the here and now emotional responses to past events.
What it feels like:
A structured process where you focus on a specific memory while doing back and forth movements. The benefit is that you don’t have to explain detail of the memory but rather focus on the sensations present while thinking about the memory.
Client do not relive upsetting or traumatic memories but to process and release the emotional attachment to them it in a safe space.
How it helps:
Heals trauma and PTSD
Reduces triggers and flashbacks
Helps the brain file away old experiences
Replaces distress with a sense of completion or calm
Great for people who:
Have trauma, intense memories, or patterns rooted in the past. Also helpful for people who often feel dysregulated, anxious, or shut down.
Observed & Experiential Integration (OEI)
(Developed by Audrey Cook and Dr Richard Bradshaw)
Bottom Up
What it is:
OEI is similar to EMDR but uses specific eye movements and physical techniques to help the brain process difficult memories or emotional intensity.
What it feels like:
You follow certain eye movement patterns or cover one eye at a time while talking about feelings. It can feel surprisingly calming or releasing.
How it helps:
Provides relief from overwhelming emotions
Reduces panic responses
Helps integrate trauma without going into detail
Soothes the nervous system
Great for people who:
Feel “stuck on high alert” or easily triggered. Also helpful to contemplate how you might feel about yourself or a situation. Helps with creating more emotional and mental flexibility.
Top Down Approaches | Positive Psychology
Cognitive Behavioural Therapy (CBT)
(Developed by Aaron Beck)
Top Down
What it is:
CBT teaches you to recognize patterns in your thinking and behaviour that may be keeping you stuck. It helps you challenge old beliefs and experiment with new ways of responding to life challenges.
What it feels like:
Practical, structured, and very tool-based. You might learn specific skills, worksheets, or exercises. Many people like it because it gives clear steps.
How it helps:
Reduces anxiety and overthinking
Interrupts negative thought spirals
Helps with depression and low self-worth
Gives you immediate coping strategies
Great for people who want:
Clarity, tools, and a sense of direction.
Aim Approach to CBT: I generally use CBT in a conversational manner although I can recommend work books to practice skills between sessions. I help clients notice unhelpful thinking and find more balanced ways to looking at thought patterns and how they are impacting them. These tools help clients become more flexible in their thinking which then translates to a more peaceful approach to life’s challenges and less rigidity.
CBT has been the gold standard in therapy as it’s the most well studied and replicated. My personal belief is that CBT works best when physiological responses are first addressed and clients feel emotionally regulated before they begin to change their automatic thinking. This is why I offer CBT in conjunction with other bottom up approaches.
Solution-Oriented Therapy
Top Down
What it is:
A future-focused approach that looks at identifying what’s you’ve already done in your life that is supporting you and how to create more opportunities for positive change.
What it feels like:
Structured, hopeful, and practical. You identify goals and steps toward them.
How it helps:
Clarifies next steps
Builds motivation
Reduces overwhelm
Great for people who:
Prefer action and clarity over deep exploration. Helpful for those who would benefit from accountability and coaching.
Strength Based Therapy
Top Down & Relational
What it is:
A therapy that focuses on your abilities and resilience and not just on processing problems.
What it feels like:
Hopeful and empowering. Instead of “What’s wrong with me?” it asks, “What strengths have helped me survive?”
How it helps:
Builds confidence
Supports recovery from self-doubt
Helps you see what’s already working
Great for people who:
Feel defeated or overly self-critical.
Motivational Interviewing (MI)
Top-Down
What it is:
A collaborative conversation style that helps you uncover your own reasons for change.
What it feels like:
Supportive, non-judgmental, and empowering.
You won’t be pushed but rather you’ll be guided by your own answers.
How it helps:
Reduces ambivalence
Supports habit change
Helps with motivation, recovery, or lifestyle shifts
Great for people who:
Feel stuck, resistant, or unsure.
RELATIONSHIP COUNSELLING Approaches
Gottman Method Couples Therapy
Relational
What it is:
A research-based approach that teaches couples how to attune to one another in order to promote deeper connection.
What it feels like:
Practical, concrete tools. You learn how to communicate better, repair conflict, and strengthen your friendship and intimacy.
How it helps:
Reduces conflict patterns
Creates emotional closeness
Supports rebuilding trust
Improves communication and connection
Great for couples who:
Feel distant, stuck in cycles, or want to deepen their bond.
Attachment-Based Therapy
Top Down & Relational
What it is:
A therapy based on how early relationships shape your patterns of closeness, trust, and connection.
What it feels like:
Supportive and relational. You explore how past relationships impact current ones.
How it helps:
Healing previous experiences of abandonment or misatunement in a safe and supportive therapeutic relationship
Improves relationship patterns
Supports deeper intimacy and trust
Great for people who:
Struggle with bonding, boundaries, or relationship insecurity.
IDENTITY AFFIRMING CARE + GLobal AWARENESS
Neurodivergent-Affirming Therapy
Integrative
What it is:
A therapy that honours and supports neurodivergent (ADHD, AuDHD, Autistic) minds rather than trying to change them to better fit a neurotypical majority.
What it feels like:
Inclusive, curious, and collaborative. You learn what works for your brain without judgment.
How it helps:
Reduces masking and shame
Supports executive functioning struggles
Builds personalized coping systems
Validates your sensory and emotional world
Great for people who:
Have ADHD, autism, or other neurotypes or those who might simply wonder if they might.
Anti-Oppression Counselling/ Feminist Therapy
System Aware
What it is:
An Anti-oppression or feminist approach to counselling recognizes that many struggles are not just personal but are structural and shaped by systems like racism, sexism, ableism, queerphobia, classism, colonialism, and other forms of discrimination.
Instead of pretending we exist outside these systems, this approach acknowledges their real impacts on your mental health, safety, and sense of belonging.
What it feels like:
Grounded, validating, and empowering. You’re not asked to “rise above” oppressive experiences or adapt to harmful environments. Instead, we explore how your lived experience intersects with societal forces and how to reclaim power, agency, and self-worth inside (and outside) those systems.
How it helps:
Validates experiences of discrimination and marginalization
Reduces internalized shame, guilt, or self-blame
Helps you name and understand the systemic forces affecting your wellbeing
Supports boundary-setting and self-advocacy
Strengthens your sense of identity, power, and agency
Offers coping strategies that honour the realities you face
Great for people who:
Have experienced oppression, trauma connected to identity, workplace discrimination, cultural or generational expectations, or feel misunderstood by traditional therapy models.
Why it matters:
This approach ensures therapy does not reinforce the very systems causing harm but instead offers a space where you feel seen, believed, and supported.
Gender- and Sexuality Affirming Counselling
Relational, Identity-Affirming, Trauma-Informed
What it is:
A supportive, nonjudgmental space where your gender identity and sexual orientation are respected, believed, and celebrated. This approach honours the diversity and fluidity of gender and sexuality.
What it feels like:
Safe, welcoming, and validating. You don’t have to hide parts of yourself or educate your therapist. You can explore identity, relationships, dysphoria, coming out, transition, or uncertainty at your own pace.
How it helps:
Reduces shame and internalized stigma
Supports coming out or exploring identity
Helps with dysphoria, rejection, or invalidation
Strengthens confidence, authenticity, and self-trust
Navigates relationship or family challenges
Offers practical and emotional support for transition (social or medical)
Why it matters:
Your identity is not questioned or pathologized. You are seen as the expert of your own experience, and every part of who you are is treated as valid and worthy.
How Do I know What’s right for me?
All of this information can feel overwhelming.
Luckily you don’t have to choose a therapy style on your own.
My approach to therapy is a blend of these appraoches and I only utilize the therapeutic styles and interventions that are aligned with clients values and needs.
Together we’ll find an interventions and styles that best supports you and your goals.