When I was looking for a name for the practice, I thought about all the “catch words” I might use as a therapist. Words like “wellness”, “healing”, “growth” – we always try to describe behavioral health and therapy in positive ways that make people think about moving forward in life to better places. I tried to imagine what a logo would be…what do other people use? I saw images of trees, hands, hearts – again, things that are nice, that make us think about moving forward.

How do I design an image to the community that stands out, says what we do, and most important – is authentic to who we are and what we stand for as we serve the community? I thought about what I would want to get out of therapy if I was looking for a therapist myself.

We can’t live without hope – no matter how bad things are today, we can get through it if we are sure that things will get better soon. And when I think about the reasons why I see people coming to therapy – depression, anxiety, trauma – a lot of the problems in life that are hurting us lead us to lose hope to some degree.

Therapy should help us find hope again; we should be able to come to a place where hope is visible and tangible – we can really see and believe in a positive outcome for ourselves.

We also need meaning. How many times have we looked at things that have happened in life and wonder – why did this happen? What am I supposed to do with this situation? Things didn’t go the way I thought they would, what do I do now? I think we all ask ourselves these questions sometimes, and they aren’t easy ones to answer – but we need to answer these questions in order to move forward. Our lives have to have meaning – all the good things and the bad things too, they all have to have meaning so that we can get to a point where we can close the door on the pain, anger and confusion – meaning and acceptance go hand-in-hand. Ultimately, acceptance leads to contentment and peace – and isn’t that what we all want in the end? We want peace in our lives. We get it when our lives have meaning, when we see that we have meaning exactly as we are, given all that we have been through and all that we have become as a result.

So, hope and meaning. Therapy should help us find hope and meaning – and this is how Hope & Meaning Counseling came to be. It’s our focus, it’s what we work towards, it’s a common need that all of us have. It makes sense to put the emphasis hope and meaning directly and to reinforce these two principles in everything that we do.