Mike Johnson

Every person's experience involves normal frustrations that really hurt and for some, life has included incidents causing intense distress, many more of us have experienced an upbringing characterised by myriad painful disappointments.

It is clear that both 'life-threatening incidents' and 'habitual lack of attunement from those we love' are traumatic.  Such experiences disrupt the course of our lives and unconsciously we develop defensive strategies to minimise anxiety and emotional pain.  Insidiously, these character defences comprise rigid constraints that undermine us.

Short-Term Psychodynamic Psychotherapy effectively provides a person with insight into these processes and allows access to underlying feelings in a safe and healthy way.  Choice and resilience can replace the defensive strategies.

I value highly the focus and clarity that this approach gives to my work at The Hope Street Centre.