My Work
Conferences, presentations and projects that have come out of my clinical work and my interest in existential and psychoanalytic thinking.
These are, in a sense, what I do with the questions my patients leave me with. One talks to colleagues partly to find out what one thinks.
Conferences & Presentations
Being With Addiction: An Experiential Exploration of Therapeutic Presence
4th World Congress of Existential Therapy · Denver, USA · 5 June 2026
Experiential workshop with Raquel Glória
With Raquel Glória I ran a workshop on what working with addiction does to the therapist. The usual assumption is that the therapist’s reactions, the boredom, the irritation, the wish to rescue, are in the way. We wondered what would happen if they were treated as information instead. Through attention to the body, reflective exercises and discussion, we looked at how staying with discomfort might be a way of staying with the patient.
An Existential Approach to Addiction: The Role of the Unconscious
Wisdom in Practice · International Symposium & 6th European Conference for Existential Therapy
Rome, Italy · May 2025
I presented an existential and phenomenological account of addiction, drawing on Alice Holzhey-Kunz. The suggestion was that an addiction is not simply a problem but also, unconsciously, a solution: an attempt to manage an anxiety about existing at all. If that is right, the clinical question changes. It is no longer only how to stop, but what the stopping would leave someone with.
Active projects
Translating Alice Holzhey-Kunz
Alice Holzhey-Kunz is a Swiss philosopher and psychotherapist who brings existential philosophy to the understanding of suffering. What I value in her is that she takes the patient to be someone who has seen something true about life, and is suffering from it.
With a colleague I am translating into English and Turkish those of her books not yet available in these languages. There is more about her on my Daseinsanalyse page.
Developing support for addiction
I am working with a team on an application to support people struggling with addiction. It is still in development, so there is, as yet, not much to say.
If any of this interests you, or you would like to work together, write to me.