Depth-oriented, relational, and individualized care
Understanding the patterns beneath what you feel, do, and repeat
You may understand a problem logically and still find yourself returning to the same emotional reaction, relationship dynamic, or way of protecting yourself. Psychodynamic therapy creates space to explore what may be happening beneath the surface—including feelings, earlier experiences, attachment patterns, and internal conflicts that are not always fully conscious.
At Mindful Guides Therapy Center, psychodynamic therapy is collaborative, relational, and adapted to the person. The aim is not simply to explain your past. It is to understand how your history continues to shape the present so you can respond with greater awareness, freedom, and choice.
People often begin psychodynamic therapy because they are tired of managing the same difficulty without understanding why it keeps returning. Therapy can help you notice the emotional and relational patterns involved, understand how they developed, and begin relating to yourself and others differently.
Psychodynamic therapy is a form of talk therapy that explores how emotions, earlier relationships, life experiences, and less conscious patterns can influence present-day thoughts, choices, symptoms, and relationships. It is based on the understanding that people are shaped by experiences they remember clearly as well as by emotional learning that may operate outside immediate awareness.
The work may include exploring the meaning of recurring situations, noticing feelings that are difficult to express, becoming curious about protective strategies, and understanding how expectations formed in earlier relationships appear in current ones. The therapeutic relationship can also provide useful information about how you experience closeness, trust, conflict, disappointment, or vulnerability.
Psychodynamic therapy does not assume that every present difficulty is caused by childhood, and it is not about blaming family members or endlessly analyzing the past. The purpose is to understand the connections that are relevant so you have more choice in the present.
You and your therapist may become curious about situations that repeatedly evoke the same feelings, conflicts, expectations, or reactions. Recognizing a pattern is often the first step toward responding differently.
Avoidance, emotional withdrawal, intellectualizing, perfectionism, humor, caretaking, or staying constantly busy can all serve understandable protective functions. Therapy can help you explore what these strategies protect you from and whether they still serve you.
Past experiences may shape what feels safe, what you expect from other people, and how you interpret closeness, conflict, success, failure, or uncertainty. Making these connections can bring greater compassion and clarity to reactions that once felt confusing.
As difficult feelings and conflicts become easier to recognize and tolerate, you may have more room to reflect before reacting. Over time, insight can support more flexible choices, stronger relationships, and a more integrated sense of self.
Anxiety or depression can sometimes persist even when you understand the symptoms and have tried practical coping strategies. Psychodynamic therapy may explore the emotional conflicts, losses, expectations, relationship experiences, or self-beliefs that contribute to ongoing distress.
You may long for closeness while also expecting rejection, avoid conflict until resentment builds, feel responsible for other people’s emotions, or repeatedly choose relationships that recreate familiar dynamics. Therapy can help make these patterns more visible and support new ways of relating.
Loss can include the death of someone important as well as changes in health, identity, relationships, family roles, work, or imagined futures. Psychodynamic therapy offers room to understand the meanings attached to a loss and the feelings that may be difficult to acknowledge.
Harsh self-judgment, shame, uncertainty about who you are, or a sense that your worth depends on achievement can have deep emotional and relational roots. Therapy can help you understand these internal expectations and develop a more compassionate, stable relationship with yourself.
Some people enter therapy not because they feel too much, but because they feel cut off from emotion, creativity, desire, or meaning. Exploring how disconnection developed can help you reconnect at a pace that feels manageable.
Psychodynamic sessions are conversational and collaborative. Your therapist may invite you to speak about what is happening in your life, what you have been feeling, memories or associations that arise, and patterns you have noticed in relationships. There is no requirement to arrive with a perfectly organized topic or to disclose more than you are ready to explore.
The first sessions generally focus on understanding what brings you to therapy, your relevant history, what you hope will change, and whether the therapist’s approach feels like a good fit. The pace and focus develop collaboratively rather than following one fixed protocol.
Psychodynamic therapy may be especially useful if you want to understand yourself more deeply rather than focusing only on immediate symptom relief. You may be a good fit if you notice recurring emotional or relationship patterns, feel that insight has not yet translated into change, or want space to explore identity, attachment, loss, meaning, and the influence of earlier experiences.
Some people prefer a highly structured, skills-based, or short-term approach. Others benefit from combining psychodynamic exploration with cognitive, mindfulness-based, somatic, or behavioral strategies. A consultation can help clarify what kind of therapy and which clinician may fit your needs.
Mindful Guides offers several approaches that can overlap while emphasizing different aspects of change. Your therapist may draw from more than one approach when clinically appropriate.
CBT focuses more explicitly on the relationships among thoughts, emotions, and behavior and often includes practical strategies or between-session practice. Psychodynamic therapy places greater emphasis on recurring emotional and relational patterns, less conscious processes, and the influence of earlier experiences.
Somatic approaches pay close attention to bodily experience, nervous-system activation, and the effects of trauma and stress. Psychodynamic therapy is primarily conversational but may be integrated with body awareness when helpful.
Mindfulness-based therapy develops present-moment awareness and a different relationship with thoughts and feelings. Psychodynamic therapy may also attend closely to present experience while exploring the history and meaning of recurring patterns.
Relational and attachment perspectives examine how connection, trust, safety, and earlier relationships shape present experience. These perspectives often complement psychodynamic work and are incorporated by many Mindful Guides clinicians.
At Mindful Guides Therapy Center in La Jolla, psychodynamic therapy is tailored to the person rather than applied as a one-size-fits-all method. Our clinicians work from integrative and relational perspectives and may incorporate attachment work, mindfulness, somatic awareness, cognitive or behavioral strategies, and trauma-informed care according to the client’s needs.
The goal is not to interpret you from a distance. It is to create a thoughtful therapeutic relationship in which patterns can be understood with curiosity, honesty, and compassion—and where new ways of relating can gradually become possible.
Founder & Clinical Director, Licensed Marriage & Family Therapist
Nicole’s work is grounded in somatic, psychodynamic, relational, attachment-oriented, mindfulness-based, and mind-body perspectives. She helps clients explore how earlier experiences and less conscious emotional patterns continue to shape relationships, self-understanding, and present-day choices.
In person & virtual
Learn more about Nicole
Licensed Marriage & Family Therapist, Clinical Supervisor
Lisa works from grounded relational, somatic and integrative perspectives with clients navigating anxiety, depression, grief, life transitions, emotional patterns, relationship concerns, and disconnection. Her approach is individualized to each client’s history, goals, and preferred pace.
In person & virtual
Learn more about Lisa
Licensed Marriage & Family Therapist
Drisana works from a holistic and integrative framework that may include attachment-based therapy, depth psychology, existential exploration, mindfulness, Somatic Experiencing®, and person-centered approaches. She helps clients explore the emotional and relational patterns shaping their current experience.
Virtual only
Learn more about Drisana
Licensed Marriage & Family Therapist
Rebecca works from a client-centered and integrative foundation and may incorporate attachment work, Internal Family Systems-informed therapy, Narrative Therapy, cognitive and behavioral strategies, and somatic interventions according to the client’s needs.
In person & virtual
Learn more about Rebecca
Licensed Marriage & Family Therapist
Crystal works from relational and somatic-informed perspectives with clients navigating grief, trauma, relationship difficulties, emotional awareness, stress, and life transitions. Her approach may include mindfulness, emotional regulation, and body-based awareness.
In person & virtual
Learn more about Crystal
Registered Associate Marriage & Family Therapist, supervised by Lisa Marks, LMFT #107491
Jenny works from a trauma-informed and person-centered foundation. Her approach is informed by attachment theory, Narrative Therapy, and psychodynamic methods, with additional training in mindfulness-based therapy, Emotionally Focused Therapy, ACT, DBT, CBT, and mind-body awareness.
In person & virtual
Learn more about JennyMindful Guides Therapy Center offers in-person therapy from our La Jolla office, with virtual therapy available across California depending on the clinician. A free 15-minute consultation can help you discuss what you are experiencing and determine which therapist or therapy approach may be the best fit.
Psychodynamic therapy is a form of talk therapy that explores how emotions, earlier experiences, relationships, and less conscious patterns influence present-day life. The aim is to develop greater self-awareness and flexibility rather than continuing to react automatically from patterns that may no longer serve you.
Sessions are generally conversational and collaborative. You may discuss current concerns, relationships, emotions, memories, recurring situations, or whatever feels most present. Your therapist may help you notice connections, patterns, protective strategies, and feelings that have been difficult to understand or express.
CBT tends to focus more directly on present thoughts, behaviors, symptoms, and practical strategies. Psychodynamic therapy places greater emphasis on emotional and relational patterns, less conscious processes, and how earlier experiences shape the present. The approaches can also be combined when clinically appropriate.
Psychodynamic therapy may help when anxiety or depression is connected with recurring emotional conflicts, relationship experiences, grief, self-criticism, shame, or patterns that are difficult to understand. The appropriate approach depends on the person’s symptoms, needs, preferences, and clinical circumstances.
Psychodynamic therapy can provide space to understand how overwhelming or painful experiences continue to affect emotions, relationships, identity, and expectations of safety. Trauma work should be paced carefully and may also incorporate somatic, mindfulness-based, or other trauma-informed approaches according to the client’s needs.
No. Psychodynamic therapy focuses on the connections that are relevant to your present concerns. Earlier experiences may be explored when they help clarify a current pattern, but you and your therapist can decide together what feels useful and appropriate.
The length of therapy varies. Some people focus on a specific concern for a more limited period, while others choose longer-term work because they want to understand broader emotional, relational, or identity patterns. Your goals and progress can be discussed throughout therapy.
Yes. Mindful Guides offers virtual therapy across California, depending on clinician availability, as well as in-person sessions in La Jolla. A consultation can help identify the available options.
Look for a skilled clinician whose experience fits your concerns and whose way of working feels safe, collaborative, and understandable. A free consultation with Mindful Guides can help you discuss what you are seeking and determine which therapist may be the best fit.
You do not have to understand the pattern completely before beginning therapy. If you are living with recurring anxiety, depression, relationship difficulties, emotional disconnection, or a sense that the same concerns keep returning, a conversation can help clarify what kind of support may fit.
Schedule a free 15-minute consultation with Mindful Guides Therapy Center to talk about what you are experiencing and whether psychodynamic therapy or another approach may be appropriate.
To schedule a free 15 minute phone consultation call (858) 568-7803 or fill out the form