Who I work with
Outer success, inner emptiness
Below are experiences I often see in the people I work with. You don’t need to fit every line — but if this resonates, you’re not alone.
Outer success, inner emptiness
Many people I work with are high-functioning, capable, and outwardly successful.
From the outside, life may look stable or even impressive. Yet internally there is often a sense of disconnection, flatness, or quiet dissatisfaction. Achievements don’t land. Motivation feels forced. Life can begin to feel performative rather than lived.
This emptiness is rarely a lack of gratitude or effort.
More often, it reflects a life shaped by adaptation — where one part of the psyche has carried responsibility for a long time, while other parts have been sidelined or silenced.
When coping stops working
Some people come because the strategies that once worked no longer do.
You may have relied on competence, self-control, independence, or achievement to get through life. These strategies may still function — but at a growing cost. Burnout, anxiety, or low mood may creep in. Rest doesn’t restore. Meaning thins.
Often this is not a breakdown, but a threshold:
a moment when the psyche is asking for a different way of living.
Inner conflict and self-criticism
Many clients describe feeling divided inside.
Part of you may want change, openness, or rest — while another part pushes for productivity, certainty, or control. A harsh inner critic may dominate decision-making. Imposter syndrome can persist even alongside competence or success.
This inner conflict is not a flaw.
It reflects different parts of the psyche pulling in different directions — often shaped by early responsibility, cultural expectation, or survival needs.
Difficulty speaking up or staying open in relationships
For some, these inner dynamics show up most clearly in relationships.
You may find it hard to express needs, hold boundaries, or speak honestly — especially when there is a risk of disappointment, conflict, or rejection. Others describe a tendency toward emotional distance, hyper-independence, or withdrawal, even while longing for closeness.
These patterns are often protective.
Therapy becomes a space to explore them without pressure to perform or expose.
Career and identity transitions
You may be navigating a period of professional or personal transition.
A role, career, or identity that once made sense may no longer fit. The question is not simply what to do next, but who am I becoming? Decision-making can feel fraught when past success was built on adaptation rather than alignment.
This work focuses less on finding the “right answer” and more on developing the capacity to choose in complexity.
Anxiety, low mood, and burnout — when they point to something deeper
Some people come because they are experiencing anxiety, depression, or chronic stress.
These experiences matter and are taken seriously here. At the same time, they are often understood as surface expressions of deeper inner conflict, misalignment, or unintegrated experience — rather than problems to be removed in isolation.
The work is not only about relief, but about listening to what these states may be signalling about how life is currently organised.
When experience opens faster than life can hold
Some people arrive after experiences that altered their sense of self, reality, or meaning — and are unsure how to live in their aftermath.
This may include spiritual openings, non-ordinary states, or psychedelic experiences that felt significant, unsettling, or difficult to integrate. While such experiences can bring insight or expansion, they can also leave people feeling destabilised, disoriented, or quietly changed.
Often the question is not what did this mean?
But how do I live now?
This work is not about amplifying or interpreting such experiences.
It is about helping them find a place within a life that remains grounded, relational, and responsibly lived.
Cultural complexity and belonging
As a first-generation British Asian woman, I’m particularly attuned to the psychological tensions that can arise when navigating multiple cultural worlds.
Clients from Asian, South Asian, and other collectivist or migrant backgrounds often describe feeling caught between loyalty and autonomy, responsibility and self-expression, belonging and difference. These tensions can shape identity, relationships, and the ability to claim one’s own voice.
While my work is not limited to any one background, cultural context is welcomed and held as part of the therapeutic process.
Who this work may not be for
This work may not be the right fit if you are looking for quick fixes, symptom elimination alone, or answers delivered from the outside.
It is better suited to those willing to engage with complexity, uncertainty, and gradual change — and to take responsibility for how insight is lived over time.