Our Approach

We draw from Depth Psychology, relational, humanistic, and cognitive approaches to help you understand yourself — your personality, your psyche, and how your biography has shaped who you are — so you can loosen what holds you back and live a fuller life.

This means we are interested in more than symptom relief. We want to help you understand the deeper architecture of who you are: the patterns that formed early, the defenses that once protected you, and the parts of yourself that are still waiting to be lived. Drawing on thinkers like Jung, Winnicott, and contemporary relational theory, we work with dreams, imagery, the body, and the quality of contact between therapist and client.

The result is therapy that is both intellectually rigorous and deeply personal — grounded enough to address what is hurting now, and spacious enough to support genuine transformation over time.

Rooted in Claudio Naranjo's tradition, Gestalt Viva weaves present-moment awareness, mindfulness meditation, and work with the Enneagram of personality — inviting a Dionysian spirit of aliveness, spontaneity, and genuine self-expression.

Naranjo was a student of Fritz Perls and a pioneer in integrating Eastern contemplative practices with Western psychotherapy. His Gestalt Viva approach adds a dimension that classical Gestalt sometimes lacks: a systematic map of character structure through the Enneagram, combined with a genuine invitation to come alive — to move, to feel, to be present in the body, and to contact others without the mediation of habitual defenses.

Mindfulness is woven throughout — not as a separate practice, but as the quality of attention we bring to everything that arises in the room. The goal is not insight alone, but genuine transformation of character: becoming more free, more loving, more fully yourself.

Internal Family Systems (IFS) is a powerful, compassionate framework developed by Dr. Richard Schwartz. It recognizes that we are all made up of different "parts" — inner voices, emotions, and beliefs that sometimes conflict with each other or take over in unhelpful ways.

IFS helps you develop a relationship with these parts from a place of curiosity and care, rather than judgment. As the parts feel heard and understood, they relax — revealing your core Self, which is naturally calm, clear, and compassionate.

We take the therapeutic container outdoors — co-regulating with the natural world, finding stillness and perspective in nature, and supporting rites of passage work for those in the midst of meaningful life transitions.

There is growing evidence that immersion in natural environments reduces cortisol, down-regulates the nervous system, and opens channels of perception that are often closed in an office setting. Nature is not just a backdrop — it is an active participant. The wind, the light, the sound of water, the feel of ground underfoot all become part of the therapeutic field.

We work in the parks and open spaces of Santa Cruz, including Pogonip, Wilder Ranch, and the trails along the coast. Rites of passage work — marking thresholds, releasing old identities, stepping into new chapters — is particularly well-suited to the outdoors, where the landscape itself can hold and mirror what is happening inside.

Drawing on the foundational work of Bessel van der Kolk and Peter Levine, we help you resource your nervous system, identify triggers, release trauma held in the body, and step into a new sense of identity and possibility.

Van der Kolk's research shows that trauma is not just a story the mind tells — it lives in the body, shaping posture, breath, reactivity, and relationship. Levine's Somatic Experiencing adds a map for working with the incomplete survival responses that keep the nervous system locked in old patterns. Together, these approaches inform a trauma therapy that works below the level of narrative.

EMDR — Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing — is integrated as a core tool. Using bilateral stimulation (eye movements, tapping, or audio), EMDR helps the brain metabolize memories that have become frozen, allowing them to be integrated rather than relived. Our therapists hold advanced EMDR training and work with both single-incident and complex developmental trauma.

We invite skillful work with expanded states of consciousness — including breathwork, Ketamine-Assisted Psychotherapy (KAP), and integration sessions — to support deep healing that ordinary states sometimes cannot reach.

Expanded states have a long history in human healing across cultures, and contemporary research is confirming what many have always known: that carefully held non-ordinary experiences can catalyze profound shifts in depression, PTSD, end-of-life distress, and existential stuck-ness. We approach this work with both reverence and rigor.

Ketamine-Assisted Psychotherapy (KAP) is currently the only legal psychedelic-assisted therapy available in most of the US. We work in coordination with medical providers to offer preparation sessions, the KAP experience itself, and integration therapy afterward. We also offer preparation and integration support for those working with other medicines — including psilocybin, MDMA, and plant medicines — in contexts where that is legally permissible.

Sebastian is also the Executive Director of the Santa Cruz Psychedelic Society and brings deep community roots and a wide network to this work.

Therapeutic work alongside horses — a powerful somatic modality that supports emotional regulation, connection, and healing in ways that words alone cannot reach.

Horses are exquisitely attuned to the emotional and nervous system states of those around them. They do not respond to what we say — they respond to what we are actually feeling and expressing through our body, breath, and presence. This makes them extraordinarily honest mirrors: there is no fooling a horse with a performance of okayness.

Sessions are ground-based and do not require any riding experience. The work happens through interaction, proximity, observation, and presence. A trained therapist facilitates throughout, helping you make meaning of what arises and connect it to the broader themes of your therapeutic work.

Equine therapy is particularly powerful for those who have struggled to access healing through talk alone, or who find relational trust difficult with humans. The horse offers a different kind of contact — non-judgmental, immediate, and deeply regulating.

Body-centered work rooted in Hakomi and related approaches — using breath, movement, sound, and emotional expression to help you access what the mind alone cannot reach and restore a sense of wholeness.

Hakomi, developed by Ron Kurtz, is a mindfulness-based somatic therapy that works gently with the body to surface deeply held beliefs and emotional patterns. Rather than talking about experience, Hakomi invites you to study it — to notice what happens in the body when a particular thought arises, when a memory surfaces, when a feeling wants to move.

We integrate somatic work throughout our practice: breath practices to regulate the nervous system, movement to unlock what has become frozen, sound and vocal expression to open emotional channels that words alone cannot access, and relational presence to provide the safe ground that allows the body to finally let go of what it has been holding.