Counseling Aspen PLLC

FINDING MEANING IN THE DEPTHS We all carry stories within us — patterns of thought, feeling, and behavior that were shaped long before we had the words to describe them. Some of these patterns once served us well, helping us navigate difficult circumstances, protect ourselves from pain, or earn the love and safety we needed. But over time, what once protected us can begin to constrain us. The very strategies that helped us survive can quietly become the walls that keep us from living fully. This is the territory that depth psychology explores. A DIFFERENT KIND OF THERAPY Rooted in the analytical psychology of Carl Jung, depth psychotherapy moves beneath the surface of symptoms and toward the deeper architecture of the psyche. Rather than focusing solely on managing behavior or reframing thoughts, this approach takes seriously the inner world — dreams, symbols, images, and the recurring patterns that show up across your relationships, your fears, and your longings. Jung understood the psyche as far larger than the conscious mind. Beneath our everyday awareness lives the unconscious — a vast interior landscape that communicates not in logic, but in metaphor, symbol, and feeling. When we learn to listen to this language, something profound becomes possible: not just relief from suffering, but a genuine encounter with who we are beneath the roles we play and the defenses we carry. THE WISDOM HIDDEN IN YOUR PATTERNS Many of the struggles that bring people to therapy —trauma, anxiety, depression, relationship difficulties, a persistent sense of being stuck — are not simply problems to be eliminated. They are often the psyche's way of signaling that something deeper is asking for attention. Take the coping mechanisms we develop in childhood. A child who learns that expressing anger leads to rejection may become an adult who suppresses conflict at any cost — and wonders why they feel invisible in their relationships. A child who earns love through achievement may become an adult who cannot rest, always driving toward the next goal while a quiet emptiness follows them. These adaptations were intelligent responses to real circumstances. They deserve to be understood, not simply discarded. In depth work, we approach these patterns with curiosity rather than judgment. We ask not what is wrong with you but what happened to you, and what did you learn from it? Through this lens, even our most entrenched defenses begin to reveal their logic — and once understood, they begin to loosen their grip. SYMBOL, MYTH AND THE LANGUAGE OF THE UNCONSCIOUS One of the most distinctive aspects of Jungian analytical psychology is its engagement with symbolism. Dreams, recurring images, the stories and myths that have always moved you, these are not decorations on the surface of your life. They are dispatches from the deeper self, carrying meaning that purely rational analysis often cannot access. Jung identified universal patterns he called archetypes — the Wise Elder, the Shadow, the Hero, the Self — that appear across cultures, mythologies, and individual psyches alike. When these energies are active in your life, you can feel it: in the figures that appear in your dreams, in the themes that repeat in your relationships, in the sense that something larger than your ordinary self is moving through you. Working with this symbolic layer doesn't require you to believe anything in particular. It simply requires a willingness to take your inner life seriously — to sit with an image, a feeling, or a dream and ask what it might be trying to say. ABOUT MY PRACTICE I am Max Mancini, a Registered Psychotherapist with over 10 years of clinical experience. I hold a Master's degree from Pacifica Graduate Institute with an emphasis in Depth Psychology rooted in Jungian analytical psychology — one of the few graduate programs in the country dedicated entirely to the study of the deep aspects of psyche. My work is grounded in the conviction that healing is not simply the removal of symptoms, but the gradual recovery of a more authentic and integrated self. I work with children, adolescents, and adults navigating trauma, depression, anxiety, life transitions, relational struggles, and a deeper sense of searching for meaning — bringing both clinical rigor and genuine respect for the mystery of the inner life to every session. If something here resonates with you, I'd welcome the conversation.