“Language is what stops the heart exploding.”
Jeanette Winterson
Many of us grew up believing that difficult feelings weren’t to be spoken about openly and honestly. Anything painful, embarrassing or messy was often swept under the carpet.
We may have grown up without the vocabulary to articulate our internal experience. To ourselves, let alone anyone else.
Whatever the reason, not speaking about the things that matter most to us tends not to work out so well.
Therapy is, essentially, an antidote to that. A purposeful, ongoing conversation that gets to the heart of the matter. Somewhere to explore the truth of things, and have our truth heard and understood. However complicated and confusing. A safe place to find out how we feel and make sense of ourselves.
My approach is collaborative, compassionate and straightforward. If we decide to work together, I’ll provide a confidential space for you to bring whatever it is you feel needs time and attention. Together, we’ll reflect on what it feels like to be you. Get curious as to why you think, behave and feel the way you do. We can also explore and experiment with how you might hope to feel and live differently.
Before qualifying as a humanistic integrative counsellor and therapist, I spent many years working as a journalist and editor on magazines and national newspapers. I am also a mother of grown-up children.
Psychotherapy with Shoshana Goldberg
Who I work with
All kinds of people come to work with me for all sorts of reasons.
Making decisions and managing change:
I often work with people at some kind of crossroads. You might be at the end of a relationship or beginning a new one, mourning a loss or making a new start, rethinking your career or adapting to retirement. Life’s transitions can feel like hopeful, if rather terrifying, opportunities. Or they can sometimes feel too much, unbearable even. Perhaps reminiscent of a previously painful life event or crisis in which you felt unsupported, powerless and alone. Whether it’s change that’s imposed upon us, or a shift we know we need to initiate, therapy can support us to create the kind of change we would like for ourselves.
Wanting better relationships:
People often come to talk about relationships. You might be finding it difficult to have satisfying, healthy relationships with others. Wondering why, perhaps in dating or long-term partnerships, friendships or at work, you often seem to end up ‘back here again’. Perhaps you didn’t grow up knowing what mutual respect, true intimacy or healthy, harmonious relationships look and feel like. Or you might suspect it’s your history and the way you think about yourself that’s holding you back. Therapy is often about developing a less conflicted, more peaceful and supportive relationship with ourselves.
Hoping for a happier family:
You might be becoming a parent, having another child or adapting to a new, blended family. Maybe you’re adjusting to teenagers, kids leaving home or trying to forge new connections with your grown up children. Or making the shift to parenting your parents. The challenges come in ever-changing combinations and can make us doubt our abilities and capacity to cope. Our relationships, responsibilities, finances and resources can come under pressure just as our sense of who we are and what matters to us comes into question too. Therapy can be a nurturing place to explore how to create a different culture from the one you grew up in. It’s never too early or too late to think through what might create the conditions for healthier relationships and a happier family life.
Finding feelings overwhelming or unmanageable:
Therapy can help us find our way through feelings that we get stuck in. You might be experiencing what is often referred to as anxiety, depression, stress or burnout. Or you might feel the time is right to address painful unprocessed trauma or loss. Sometimes it’s about feeling confused, inauthentic, lost or joyless. Or you might feel as if you’re on a treadmill, ‘going through the motions’, rather than living a life you’d want for yourself.
Feeling like an outsider:
I often work with people who have a sense of being outside the cultural mainstream. For all manner of reasons. I welcome difference and diversity in my practice and work with adults of all ages from a broad range of social and cultural backgrounds.
Knowing there’s a better way to live:
I also work with people who are not in crisis but know they want something different for themselves. There doesn’t need to be a clearly defined issue. Therapy can help develop greater resourcefulness and resilience, new ways of thinking and responding. To live a satisfying life that feels more meaningful, joyful and aligned with your true values and passions.
“The only normal people are the ones you don’t know very well.”
Alfred Adler
Finding the right therapist for you
Therapy is a collaborative process, so finding the right person to work with really matters. The relationship needs to feel right. I strive to create an environment that feels safe, respectful and allied. To build a relationship that nurtures your courage and curiosity. To make sense of your experiences, along with the familial, cultural, societal, and geographic factors that have informed who you are. A place to rethink responses, processes and patterns. Somewhere you feel able to talk freely. To increase your tolerance to feel difficult, uncomfortable feelings and move through them.
Whatever prompts us to come to therapy, the greatest benefit is often a more secure and nurturing relationship with ourselves. Developing this, our most precious resource, allows all sorts of other meaningful and lasting change to begin.
If, reading this, you think I might be the right therapist for you, get in touch. An informal chat is a good way to find out. You can talk through what you might hope to get from therapy, ask any questions and we can get a sense of each other. On the phone (or online) for 15 minutes or so, which I don’t charge for. If it feels like a good fit, we can then arrange an introductory session. And if that feels like the beginning of a helpful conversation, we can book a set of sessions to explore together what’s working and what’s not, make sense of why and experiment with something new.
“The past influences everything and dictates nothing.”
Adam Phillips
A bit more about how I work, my training and qualifications
Before starting therapy, it’s important to know your therapist is fully qualified to help.
I completed a four-year training at Spectrum, a UKCP-accredited organisation and leading London centre for the teaching and practice of Humanistic Psychotherapy. I remained in Spectrum’s post-graduate psychotherapy training programme for several years. I also hold an Advanced Diploma in Humanistic and Integrative Counselling from CPPD Counselling School (BACP Accredited).
I am committed to my personal and professional development and am an ardent advocate of life-long learning. Ongoing supervision supports me in my clinical practice. I am a registered member of the BACP and am bound by its Ethical Framework for Good Practice in Counselling and Psychotherapy.
No two people are the same and there is no standard formula for good therapy. Working integratively gives me flexibility to respond to the specific needs of each person in each session. My client-led, existential and humanistic approach draws on psychoanalytic object relations and attachment theories. I also incorporate Gestalt, somatic (body) work and psychoeducation into my practice when that feels helpful.
My approach is relational, LGBTQ+ affirmative and trauma-informed. Some of the issues I have extensive experience working with include: dealing with change; relationships and intimacy; sexuality; identity and culture; family; self-esteem and confidence; stress; anxiety; depression; work-related stress and career development; trauma; addiction; loneliness; anger; dissociation; loss and grief; suicidal ideation.
Contact:
You are welcome to get in touch via email, or leave a message on my voicemail of you prefer.
07816 600 171
shoshanagoldbergtherapy@gmail.com
Rates:
I charge from £95-130 for a 50-minute session, depending on ability to pay, whether that’s working face-to-face, online or on the phone. I offer a concessionary rate for those not working and on low income. My low-cost places are currently full but please inquire as this can change.
Sessions:
Psychotherapy sessions at Barnsbury Therapy Space:
Thursday
Directions to Barnsbury Therapy Space