Jennifer Edlin, Psychotherapist in Oakland, 94618

Jennifer Edlin, MA, JD

Profession(s):
Psychotherapy, Counseling Psychology, Marriage & Family Therapy
License Status:
I'm a licensed professional.
Primary License:
MFC - 50731

My Approach to Helping

Do you struggle to find meaning in your work or your life? Have you experienced depression, low-grade unhappiness or anxiety for extended periods of time? Are you having a hard time finding or keeping a romantic relationship? Do you struggle with self-worth? I invite you to heal, connect and transform through a mindful,client-centered therapeutic relationship.

I hold an undergraduate degree from Princeton University, a JD from NYU and a masters in counseling psychology from CIIS. My work is firmly grounded in psychodynamic theory and is often informed by mindfulness techniques, work within the therapeutic relationship, somatics and attachment theory. I also serve as the Associate Director of the UC Berkeley Law Initiatve for Mindfulness in Law. My many years of work as a lawyer and business professional, my long-term relationship with my partner, and parenting two children also inform my work. Please see my website for further information, including articles addressing how to get more out of good psychotherapy.

More Info About My Practice

The relationship between you and your therapist is the key determinant of a successful outcome in therapy. Please call me and we can spend up to 20 minutes talking at no charge to help you determine if we would work well together.

How Psychotherapy Can Help

It takes great courage to reach out to another for help. Help from psychotherapy can begin with this new and courageous effort, precisely because it is something new. As individuals, we reach out to therapists to help change patterns in our lives and in relationship and again find ourselves in yet another relationship - this time with our therapist. Even in therapy we cannot escape our patterns - how we have come to view the world and interact with those in our lives. We are often vulnerable with our therapist, and we may unconsciously constrain ourselves in the same way we constrain ourselves with others. Right there in the room, with a therapist, is the possibility to work on how we limit ourselves in relationship and in the world. In a good therapeutic relationship, slowly, over time, with continued courage and effort from you and continued support from your therapist, you will risk new ways of being, both in relationship and in the world. New neural pathways will form, and take precedence over the old ones, and your template for how you relate to yourself, others and the world around you can shift to be more flexible and more adaptive to your present life.

My View on the Purpose of Psychotherapy

We are born vulnerable and needing connection to survive. Our limbic (emotional) brain develops to attune to our parents, however they may be with us. Through this early attunement, we learn one way of being in relationship. As we move through life, our hearts recognize this familiar pattern and repeat it. In addition, each significant relationship we experience can nuance this pattern, or lay down one of its own. Therapy is a chance to engage in a significant relationship with yourself and with your therapist. Through this new relationship, you can lay down new patterns and ways of being in the world and in relationship. These new patterns can be more flexible and more applicable to your present life than those developed at earlier times which served a purpose then but may now get in the way. In many ways the relational structure of our brains works like flowing water. Water carves channels that get deeper and deeper over time, and neural networks get stronger and stronger the more they are reinforced. However, it is always possible for water to run down a new path, and for our way of relating to ourselves, others and the world around us to change.

Importance of the Client-Therapist Alliance

The client-therapist relationship is the bedrock of all that is to come in therapy. Forming a relationship of trust and respect is at the forefront of the beginning of my work with each and every client. In therapy, you will expose and explore difficult terrain, it is important that such exploration be undertaken with a partner and guide that you feel deeply secure with. This relationship enables deeper, more expansive exploration because there is a trusted other to turn to. In therapy I rely on THRESHOLD elements as a way of checking in on the relationship. I ask my clients to think about the following:(T)Trust between us, (H)Hopes for therapy, (R) Respect that they feel from me, (E) Emotion and how comfortable they are moving into it with me, (S) Safety and how they experience me as adding to or detracting from such safety, (H) Holding Space and how much interaction they want from me versus how much space they need to be with their experience, (O) Ownership and my client's sense of whether I own up to my reactions and missteps in a way that feels authentic to them, (L) Let downs, and what happens when I dissapoint them or we are misattuned and finally (D) Discussion, how we can come together to talk about all of the above if any of the elements needs attention or repair. I invite you into a relationship of trust and respect and invite you to call me to help you determine if you feel we would work well together to bring the change you desire to your life.

Services I Provide

Individual Therapy & Counseling
Marriage, Couples, or Relationship Counseling
Group Therapy

Ages I Work With

Adults

Languages I Speak

English

Groups I Work With

As a therapist, I support and empower individuals and couples to bring deeper meaning to their inner worlds, their work and their relationships. I help people to break free from painful, recurring, unconscious patterns and beliefs so that they can lead more fulfilling lives.

I draw from a variety of therapeutic techniques and tailor my style to each client's needs. I work with clients from a broad range of cultural, economic, and ethnic backgrounds.