Dr Paul Garden
Painful life events, challenging relationships, and personal issues often lead to putting difficult thoughts and feelings to the back of the mind. This results in only temporary relief from emotional pain as the difficulties remain unresolved and therefore keep reappearing and growing. Talking this through with a psychologist can help you to understand the origins of your problems, and the way in which they are reinforced and maintained. The process of therapy is aimed at developing understanding of your distress through examining the present situation and exploring how various factors- including past experiences- might be influencing the way you feel. These insights can then be used by you to develop a sense of empowerment and control over the difficult thoughts, feelings and emotions that underpin your distress.
I am a HCPC registered psychologist, chartered by the British Psychological Society (BPS), and a registered member of the British Association of Counsellors and Psychotherapists (MBACP).
Equipped with prestigious degrees from various London universities, I have spent several years working in the NHS in a number of services, providing psychological treatment for mental health issues ranging from relatively moderate emotional challenges to more complex psychological interventions (primary, secondary and tertiary services).
While personality, anxiety, depression, and emotional trauma are areas of expertise, I am interested and experienced in working with people who want to engage in therapy to think about themselves more deeply, and to understand and relate to themselves better. As a psychologist, I am trained and experienced with a range of psychological models, though I mainly use psychoanalytic, existential-humanistic and compassion-focused models for therapy.
Over the past decade, I have worked in the NHS and a range of mental health charities, as well as my private practice, which I operate from the Harley Street district of central London, and from Shoreditch in the City.
