Mainspring Approach

Every provider brings a unique approach to the therapeutic process. Mainspring is committed to creating a group of providers who share a professional and personal belief system. We pride ourselves in having a shared vision that we are better therapists when we have the freedom to experience each other and learn from each other without shame, guilt and judgement. 

This belief allows us to approach therapy 

compassionately........in a real and active way

We believe that "life happens" causing dis-ease in the mind. 

This impacts our feelings, thoughts and ideas about self and our relationships with others. Sometimes people experience this as going through life without a direction. 

In other words --"I just feel stuck." 

Therapy is a way to better understand personal narratives--stories we communicate internally about who we are, where we come from, and how we present to others. This is huge because it informs how we feel and deal when life starts to happen. 

Fractures in our narratives cause us to show up disjointed. In other words, the inability to use kindness, as a tool, to bring all parts of self together. Just for a moment, let's imagine that kindness could speak. Kindness might say, let's create a space for the parts and experiences that we want to hide or do away with--shame, guilt, anger, sorrow, grief. Kindness believes that in order to understand you and your experiences, you must be willing to acknowledge all of you. 

If you think about it, we all want to experience kindness because it creates a pathway to love and forgiveness even when we have done nothing to deserve it. 

Imagine, if we were able to experience kindness towards self. It would compel you, it would propel you to bring all parts of self into harmony to deal with emotional pain and discomfort; and answer the question What do I want for my life? 

The term paideia best captures the use of kindness, which is the cornerstone of the Mainspring Approach. Cornel West explains paideia in his memoir Living and Loving Out Loud as: 

"Paideia concerns the cultivation of self, the ways you engage your own history, your own memories, your own mortality, your own sense of what it means to be alive as a critical, loving, aware human being."