My interest in psychotherapy is not purely academic or professional. I have also experienced periods of difficulty, uncertainty, suffering and feeling very misunderstood.

I grew up in Glasgow and have travelled extensively, encountering people from very different cultures, backgrounds, beliefs and circumstances. Some of my understanding of human distress has come from these local and more global experiences, as well as from difficulties and adversity in my own life, both as an adult and as a child.

Like many people who seek psychotherapy, I have experienced times of feeling overwhelmed, anxious, uncertain, alone, ashamed, angry, depressed, or simply unable to make sense of what was happening to me.

I have also experienced what it is like to seek help and not feel properly understood. These experiences have contributed to my belief that people need to be met, respected, and understood as individuals rather than reduced to labels or problems.

They have also influenced the kind of therapist I have become: direct but respectful, interested in what is actually happening rather than simply applying a predetermined explanation or fitting people into intellectual boxes.

Alongside psychotherapy, I have longstanding interests and experience in yoga, meditation, photography and the fine arts. I have also worked in the judicial system and with people affected by serious crime, bereavement, mental health difficulties, homelessness, abuse and neglect.

I am a qualified yoga and meditation teacher and have studied Buddhist meditation, including Zen. My experience of these practices has influenced my understanding of attention, embodiment, emotional experience and awareness.

My background in fine art and photography has also influenced the way I think about creativity and expression in therapy. Where appropriate, creative approaches can sometimes help people explore experiences that are difficult to express entirely through words.

These interests are not substitutes for psychotherapy. They are part of the wider experience and perspective I bring to my particular way of working.

Authenticity is a core value in my approach to psychotherapy.

By authenticity, I don’t mean the performance of a particular identity or the idea that we simply have to “be ourselves”. I mean developing a more honest relationship with ourselves, recognising what genuinely matters to us, and distinguishing this from what we may have absorbed from other people, relationships, culture and social expectations.

Existential psychotherapy is concerned not only with how we adapt to our circumstances, but also with whether the life we are living is genuinely our own.

For me, this makes authenticity an important part of individual development and the paths we make for ourselves in life. Am I doing what truly matters to me in this short life? Or am I living a life that reflects what has been expected of me by others? These questions of authenticity can prompt us to become more aware of our choices, values, relationships and assumptions, and gradually taking greater responsibility for how we live.

This does not necessarily mean rejecting the society in which we live. But it may mean reassessing its positive and negative influences upon us. We are shaped, after all, by relationships, culture and society, and none of us exists in isolation. Authenticity means developing a more conscious relationship with the world while becoming more fully ourselves.

A genuine therapeutic relationship is central to this kind of work. I try to work in a transparent, unguarded and plain-speaking way, and I encourage the same honesty from my patients.

In the service of helping you be more true to yourself, I may sometimes challenge self-defeating patterns, assumptions or ways of relating when I believe this may be useful. The purpose is not to judge or impose my own values, but to help us understand what may be maintaining unnecessary struggles or suffering, and to consider whether something different is possible.

I do not claim to have a universal method or a solution to every problem. What I can offer is substantial clinical and life experience, broad training, a natural willingness to try to understand things beyond mainstream ways of thinking, an interest in understanding people at depth, and a willingness to think carefully and creatively about what may actually be useful.

Sometimes that can mean focused therapeutic work. Sometimes it can involve sustained psychotherapy. Sometimes another form of help may be more appropriate.

My aim is to understand enough of your situation to arrive ar that judgement responsibly.