Until thought is linked with purpose there is no intelligent accomplishment.
~ James Allen, As a Man Thinketh
Approach to Therapy & Supervision
Welcome to Mind Point Psychotherapy, PLLC! As a licensed psychotherapist and AAMFT Approved Supervisor, I integrate a process-focused existential-humanistic approach to therapy and clinical supervision. My approach couples systemic theories with existential-humanistic psychology to consider lifespan development, identity, cultural, relational, historical, and contextual influences. I emphasize the importance of thinking critically about the values and ethics our worldview comprises - with attention to how values and ethics show relationally.
My Embrace of Innovation
Thirty years ago, Mahoney (1991) detailed how more individuals reported novel ways of knowing and experiencing their lives, selves, and relationships as expressed through consciousness, affect, personal identity, and intentionality. What Mahoney described as an axial shift in human understanding has expanded exponentially in the last three decades - influencing the domains of experience, story, and action (Gilligan & Price, 1993) that comprise contemporary culture. This shift has significant implications for the advancement of theory and practice. Moreover, the contextual insights of Miller and Hubble (2017) suggest the psychotherapy profession is challenged to improve the quality of clinical work to keep pace with an increasingly inclusive and expanded collective worldview. An embrace of Innovation in praxis is at the forefront of my supervision and clinical work. I encourage innovative work as a contribution to the sustainability of clinical practice.
Systems Thinking as Conceptual Framework
Systems thinking is best summarized as: “Attention to organization, to the relationship between parts, to the concentration on patterned rather than on linear relationships, to a consideration of events in the context in which they are occurring rather than an isolation of events from their environmental context.” (Steinglass, 1978).
The systems lens requires a conceptual shift that goes against the linear, cause and effect, explanatory quest historically and culturally rooted in scientific thinking. Asking what and how interactional questions versus individually oriented why questions are easier said than done - yet the very practice of doing so (that is, a focus on mutual-causes interactions) is the cornerstone of systemic therapy.
Systemic thinking may be applied to diverse relationship systems and groups - including workplace groups, social groups, and larger associations - not just intimate and family relationship systems. Williamson (1982) describes how systems thinking has made a significant contribution to our understanding of how people function in groups (p. 54) - making systems thinkers especially adept at leading different kinds of groups as numerous and varied as the imagination (p. 10).
Process-Focused
The most important domains of human understanding and professional assistance lie not so much in the contents of personal realities as in their ongoing processes.
~Michael J. Mahoney, Human Change Processes
The starting point in a course of psychotherapy is always in the present (Ruesch, 1961). A process-focused approach respectfully examines relational experience evidenced behaviorally specific to what is happening in the here and now. Typically, a process-focused lens views what's currently happening as fodder for functional insight (Mahoney, 1991) to what may be happening similarly in multiple areas of a client's life, what happened in the past and what can be reasonably anticipated to happen again. Hofman, Hayes and Lorscheid (2021), define process as theory-based, dynamic, progressive, contextually bound, modifiable and occurring at multi-levels.
The Art of Therapeutic Assessment
An accepted disparity between the values we profess and the actions we take becomes embedded in our customs.
~John Gardner, Morale
A therapeutic assessment differs from a diagnostic assessment's aim to categorize experience. In a therapeutic assessment, the aim is to narrow dissonance between the client's described and lived experience.
The therapeutic assessment is focused on the client's initially reported presenting concern. According to Watzlawick, Weakland & Fisch (1975), in order to be solved, a problem, first of all, has to be a problem and the translation of a vaguely stated problem into concrete terms permits the crucial separation of problems from pseudo problems (p. 111). Additionally, a therapeutic assessment generates experience-anchored process-grounded functional insights (Mahoney, 1991) for the client - maximizing the outcome gains from the assessment phase. This approach assures clients connect to, and find value in, their respective lived experience (Satir, 1988). A focused assessment of the presenting concern is vital to the course of therapy, as we cannot know in which direction we need to grow, until we first know where we are (Chaleff, 2009, p.38).
Goal Development Prompts Growth Opportunities
Our wishes are only gratified and answered when they harmonize with our thoughts and actions.
~ James Allen, As a Man Thinketh
Change may be frightening for some clients—hence, the goal phase may initial the most therapeutically impactful phase in psychotherapy. Working to define and act on a goal may require clients to become vulnerable in a manner distinct from what's needed to share about a past or current problem. There may be a heightened vulnerability in stating a desire, need, want or long-standing dream - while taking action to fulfill a goal may be powerfully challenged by homeostasis. Whether naming or acting on a goal, there is more at risk than in discussing the initially reported presenting concerns. The good news is goal development offers growth opportunities.
Moving forward, the post-goal development action phase may be the therapeutically richest part, or the goldmine, of psychotherapy. Engaging daily activities toward a long-standing desire requires activating regenerative personal agency, congruence, ethics, hope, integrity, purpose, virtues, and vulnerability—particularly important for clients who have experienced frustrated needs, trauma, poverty, protracted marginalization, and/or perceive a foreshortened future.
Sequential Practice
The overarching framework I use for conceptualizing psychotherapy and clinical case consultation is based on the sequential practice of therapeutic Assessment, Goal development and Interventions (AGI). AGI has origins in a licensing exam preparation program that existed in 2005. The AGI acronym was offered as a simple strategy to determine best answers to licensing exam questions. Since 2005, I greatly expanded on this easy-to-recall acronym and developed a practical therapeutic approach engineered to scaffold client experience and therapeutic efforts in praxis. This means, therapeutic progress and case consults are focused, first and foremost, on a thorough assessment of the concerns that bring a client to therapy. A rich exploration of the presenting concern has favorable implications for therapeutic impact and, moreover, is necessary for establishing a transformative goal with the client. The client goal, likewise, has significant implications for the course of therapeutic interventions.
Exploring, Inquiring, Narrowing & Expanding
People are anxious to improve their circumstances but are unwilling to improve themselves; they therefore remain bound.
~James Allen, As a Man Thinketh
Ambiguities are common in everyday narratives and are often resolved without our explicit awareness (Mahoney, 1991). Engaging clients actively in exploring their lived experiences contributes to positive therapeutic outcomes and allows clinicians to make more accurate assessments (Gilligan & Price, 1993; Ruesch, 1961). This process is essential for understanding the presenting concerns that clients bring to therapy, especially when they feel confused or ambivalent about their experiences.
The primary goal of therapy is to help clients gain a better understanding of themselves. By exploring, inquiring, and clarifying a client's accounts—rather than imposing the therapist's perceptions or interpretations—meaningful discussions about the client's concerns can take place, ultimately helping to solidify their goals. It is vital to approach therapeutic inquiry with respect, as questioning can sometimes diminish the client's comfort level.
The Dilemma of Change
There are only two tragedies in life: not getting what you want—and getting it.
~ Oscar Wilde, Lady Windmere's Fan
A concretely defined and reachable goal safeguards the client against getting caught up in homeostasis and compounding/repeating rather than taking new actions (Watzlawick, Weakland & Fisch, 1974, p. 111). Once a single transformative client goal is established, there is additional therapeutic value in exploring the concerns that may keep clients from reaching their goal. Therapists who fail to explore the risks a client may face in reaching their goal, unwittingly facilitate their client's return to homeostasis - dynamic self-stabilizing processes.
H. Luis Vargas, PhD, MFT
A Relational Critical Consciousness
The concept of relational critical consciousness (Vargas & Taniguchi, 2014; Vargas, 2016) expands on the idea of conscientization (Freire, 2000) to cultivate an awareness of the judgments, expectations, and anticipations that relate to both oneself and others. This awareness is grounded in the myths of individualism, which can unintentionally reinforce dominant values and beliefs that marginalize relationships and pathologize dependence (Fineman, 2004). Relational critical consciousness enables individuals to recognize the impact of the values associated with individualism, addressing the relational injustices that emerge when the focus is limited to the self, often making relationships less visible. Additionally, adopting a relational critical consciousness requires a deliberate acknowledgment, integration, and prioritization of relationships, placing relationships at the center of one’s experiences rather than viewing relationships as peripheral.
Theories and Interventions
As a Clinician, I have extensive in-depth knowledge of a wide variety of theories - including the foundational systemic theories and evidence-based approaches. I value creativity and non-conventional approaches. I will work with creative/original and uniquely integrated models in progress. As a supervisor, this means I will work with your theory of choice, not my own.
References
Chaleff, I. (2009). The courageous follower; standing up to and for our leaders (3rd ed.). Berrett-Koehler Publishers, inc.
Fineman, M. A. (2004). The autonomy myth: A theory of dependency. New York, NY: The New Press.
Freire, P. (2000). Pedagogy of the oppressed. New York, NY: Continuum.
Gilligan, S., & Price, R. (Eds.). (1983). Therapeutic conversations (1st ed.). W.W. Norton & Company.
Hofman, S., Hayes, D., & Lorscheid, D.N. (2021). Learning process-based therapy. New Harbinger Publications.
Mahoney, M.J., (1991). Human change processes. Basic Books
Miller, S & Hubble. (2017). How Psychotherapy Lost Its Magic; The Art of Healing in an Age
of Science, in the Psychotherapy periodical, March/April 2017 issue.
Ruesch, J. (1961). Therapeutic communication. W.W. Norton & Company.
Satir, V. (1988). The new people making. Science and Behavior Books, Inc.
Steinglass, P. (1978). The conceptualization of marriage from a systems theory perspective. In Paolino T. J., McCrady B. S. (Eds.), Marriage and marital therapy:
Psychoanalytic, behavioral, and systems theory perspectives (pp. 298-306). New York, NY: Brunner/Mazel Publishers.
Vargas, H.L. (2016). Raising Relational Critical Consciousness to Enhance Empathy in Clinical Hypnosis, American Journal of Clinical Hypnosis.
Vargas, H. L., & Taniguchi, N. (2014). The myth of autonomy: Integrating relational critical consciousness in clinical supervision (Unpublished manuscript).
Watzlawick, P., Weakland, J. H. & Fisch, R. (1974). Change (1st ed.). W.W. Norton & Company.
Williamson, D.L. (1982). Group power. Prentice-Hall, Inc. Englewood Cliffs, NJ