Welcome to Arete Psychotherapy
Does your life feel out of control? Do you feel anxious, hopeless, or too demoralized to get through what used to feel like normal days?
Is a relationship you cherish falling apart despite your best efforts? Do you feel misunderstood, betrayed by, or alienated from those you love?
Do you feel disillusioned and aimless, like you're watching someone else’s life on a screen, merely going through the motions of a pointless existence?
Do you find yourself in the throes of a destructive habit you cannot break, whether with alcohol, drugs, sex, food, gambling, media technology, or something else?
Recovery and change are possible, and my professional guidance can help you find the insight, willpower, and clarity of purpose within yourself you may doubt you are capable of right now.
About Me
Brendan Tucker, LMFT
Arete: excellence or virtue; the fulfillment of one’s purpose to the highest degree; the realization of one's nature.
At Arete Psychotherapy, I am dedicated to using evidence-based methods drawn from cognitive-behavioral, psychodynamic, and philosophical counseling approaches to help individuals and couples find relief from psychological distress, build resilience and regulation skills, and find meaning and purpose in daily living.
Theory of Psychological Change
How does psychotherapy actually work? A number of factors are involved in contributing to the cognitive, emotional, and behavioral changes of effective psychotherapy, including but not limited to:
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Developing practical skills, such as identifying and challenging cognitive distortions or learning distress tolerance tactics to use in place of harmful coping habits.
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Cultivating habits of mindful attention and reflection, allowing us both to be more aware of our automatic thoughts, reflexive emotions, and habits of behavior as well as less likely to be overwhelmed or controlled by them.
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Gaining insight into the unconscious processes that can influence us and, by bringing them into conscious awareness, gaining more control over them. Often these processes are our defense mechanisms and pre-rational ‘strategies for how people/relationships really work’; they are formed both by our genetic endowment and our earliest relationships as adaptive templates that may have helped us in the past, but which no longer serve us in the present.
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Engaging with a professional in the self-discovery of Socratic Method: exploring unrealized ideas and unfocused desires; detecting and refuting false and limiting views; gaining clarity of purpose and the drive to pursue virtuous goals in place of self-defeating ones; potentially expanding one’s worldview and sense of ‘the good life.’
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Experiencing the benefits of a supportive, yet challenging, therapeutic relationship: a space to disclose difficult feelings and the aspects of ourselves we may believe are deeply flawed in an environment that combines unconditional acceptance with honest feedback and critical questioning.
Brendan James Tucker License #: LMFT163892
Masters of Arts in Marriage and Family Therapy, Department of Applied Psychology at Antioch University of New England
Bachelor of Arts in Biology and Philosophy, Oberlin College
Member of the California Association of Marriage and Family Therapists
Member of the National Philosophical Counseling Association
Member of the Eckhart Society
Education & Credentials
I live in Aptos with my wife, son, and cat, where we have a garden and small, young orchard. Besides psychotherapy, I have an abiding interest in philosophy, metaphysics, religious mystical traditions, and political theory and history. I believe my own meandering path through life — working at different times as a tutor, a bartender, a prep cook and dishwasher, a masseur, a farm apprentice, and more; and having lived in the American Midwest and East Coast in addition to South Asia, as well as in and among various unconventional subcultures — has given me an appreciation of the range of human lifeways and worldviews.
A Bit More About Me
As Terence quipped, “I am human, and nothing human is alien to me.”