On a scale of one to ten (with ten being the best), I lived at a zero for a long time. I was just trying to survive.
I had been diagnosed with severe chronic depression, mood swing disorder, ADHD, and PTSD. Years on medication that wasn’t helping. Around 2006 I took myself off the meds — they weren’t doing anything, and I was tired of waiting for them to.
Underneath all of it ran a quieter belief, the kind that runs the show whether you can name it or not: I believed that I wasn’t enough. And I felt unworthy of love.
Most days I lived between a 2 and a negative 2. The math averages to zero. Some days I didn’t want to be alive.
Then in 2009, I started working with an NLP practitioner. By the sixth session of his eight-session program, something shifted.
I went from a zero to an eight. Overnight.
The internal pattern that had been running my life for as long as I could remember collapsed in a single session. And it stayed collapsed.
I knew two things immediately: that I’d been given a gift, and that the rest of my life would be spent paying it forward.
How I Got Here
What happened next set the path for the next 15 years.
The practitioner who worked with me was also a trainer. He had spent nine years working for Tony Robbins. I ended up studying with him for the next five years.
I didn’t even know, at the time, what he had done with me in that sixth session was hypnosis. I thought it was “an NLP technique.” It was five months later, when I was deep into studying the work, that I realized he’d used a hypnosis protocol on me — and that the shift I’d experienced was the predictable result of a method, not a one-time accident.
From there, I went deeper. I studied directly with Dr. Richard Bandler — the co-creator of NLP — and with John La Valle. I earned my Master Practitioner license. I added certifications in Ericksonian hypnosis and language patterns, became a board-certified clinical hypnotherapist, got certified in Neuro-Hypnotic Repatterning, and trained as a certified firewalk instructor.
I studied all of this so I could truly help people change their lives — quickly and dramatically.
How I Work with Anxiety In West Chester
In my practice, I approach anxiety and depression as patterns the mind has learned — patterns that meet specific subconscious needs. Working at the level where those patterns live, not just where they show up, is what makes change possible.
Bandler identified four needs the human nervous system has to meet, whether you’re aware of them or not: certainty, uncertainty, significance, and love/connection. When those needs aren’t being met directly, the mind finds indirect ways to meet them. Sometimes those indirect ways look like anxiety. Sometimes they look like depression. Sometimes they look like patterns of self-criticism, perfectionism, avoidance, or numbness.
My work with clients is about two things.
First, I teach you new ways to meet those needs — ways that actually work, instead of ways that quietly drain you and keep you stuck.
Second, I do the same hypnosis with every client that took me from a zero to an eight. It’s specifically designed to dissolve the physical feeling of “I’m not good enough” — and the fear of being judged that comes with it — out of the body. I’ve heard dozens of iterations of that belief: “I’m a fraud,” “I’m broken,” “I don’t deserve this.” They all live in the same place in the nervous system. The hypnosis goes there.
The transformation itself usually takes about four sessions. The remaining four sessions of the program are about making it sustainable — installing it deep enough that it holds when life gets hard.
I work with high school students, college students, recent graduates, high-achieving professionals, and parents — most often the ones holding everything together for everyone else.
A note on what this work is and isn’t: I am not a licensed medical professional, and my work is not therapy or psychiatric treatment. Nothing here is medical advice. The methods I use — NLP, hypnosis, and coaching — are not a substitute for medical or psychiatric care. If you are currently on medication or under the care of a physician or psychiatrist, decisions about that care are between you and your doctor.
Ready to Talk?
If any of this sounds like the thing you’ve been looking for, the first session is free. It’s 60 to 90 minutes, no obligation. You’ll leave knowing exactly whether this is right for you. Learn more about Premier Life Therapy or call 484-889-7706 to schedule.