The least of things with meaning is worth more in life than the greatest of things without it.
-Carl Jung.
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-Carl Jung.
Change will come from within because there is no limit to your depth.
My name is Erik Johnston, and I am a depth therapist. Being a depth therapist means I seek to explore your inner feelings, thoughts, sensations, and intuitions as a way of creating options and new ways of being in your outer life. I seek first to support and know you – as an individual or as a couple – so that I can reflect back to you who you are and who you want to be. In therapy with me you will be offered the opportunity to change yourself and your behavior towards health and growth. In some ways I do this like many therapists, through talk, body awareness, mindfulness: ultimately gaining a further understanding of the whole you. In other ways I am quite unique. People are often surprised at how flexible I am in my ability to work with both women’s and men’s issues – working with both the feminine and the masculine aspects of our nature. Further, my many years of working with parents and children as a play therapist have provided me a sense of the safety and sensitivity needed to support loss and trauma. Yet, our work will contain play, productive communication, and movement toward growth.
My Work with Children
For nearly a decade, I’ve worked with children and parents, as both a therapist and a parent coach.
It is important to note my approach to children’s therapy is that I prioritizes inner strength and resilience over behavioral fixes. Children’s behavior is much like a symptom of a deeper internal attempt at navigating difficult situations. Just like the saying it is better to teach a person to fish than to give them a fish. So also children are better served by finding the inner resources they can rely on throughout their developmental lives.
And how do I prioritize inner resources over “behaving”? Through Sand Tray therapy. This type of play therapy allows a child to work within their own language: the language of play! Play is where children try out and practice success. It is how they tell what is bothering them and what needs they cannot meet in themselves or their families. And this play allows them to, “get it right”; to feel the success of growing up through their natural language.
I know with each child has a story and each child comes in with their own unique self. Do not hesitate to call me even just to check in. I am always glad to answer questions and discuss what type of therapy might be best for your child.
My primary interest is using the depth of who you are to help you relate to the roles and relationships in your life. Your life is a story, and you are the most important character in your story. Together we can help you write a story that supports you, what you need and what type of story you are living.
In our pasts we learned to relate and love through the relationships, families, cultures, and religious institutions in which we were raised. It is the stickiness of past relationships that may have become the stuck you are in today. By looking at each partner’s family role, I will help you discover who you are today, and who you want to be together. By opening to your history, you can loosen and dispel the reactive patterns that drain your current relationship of intimacy, understanding, passion and compassion.
In family therapy I help family members relate by making clear the roles, rules, and expectations the family shares. As these family roles and values become clear, I will help the individuals work as a team — not as opponents — and support meaningful direction for each member. Everyone in a family should have a voice and everyone should have a positive role.
Sand Tray Therapy is an important type of play therapy. It is important because it uses the the internal world of symbols and play to transform trauma, support change, and to find growth from within. Sand Tray therapy has the ability to find what makes each individual unique and use their creative voice as the primary resource for growth. Although sand tray can be a helpful to anyone it is often one of the best therapies for those who are looking for a more creative approach to therapy or those who struggle to express verbally their feelings or emotions.