It was a late spring afternoon. I was playing badminton with a friend when, almost as a joke, I blurted out my desire. After I said that I wanted to be a psychoanalyst, I was forced to reconsider many things in my life, including abandoning the research and academic career prospects that were beginning to open up at the end of my Master’s degree in Literary Theory. Further suppressing my desire was no longer a possibility. I knew it was too precious, the result of years of working on myself in psychoanalysis. I instinctively felt that the time had come to lose something I had considered foundational to myself and my personality.

The driving force behind my work as a counselor and psychologist is rooted in the memory of that afternoon. In line with the psychoanalytic slant of my approach, I seek to question the reasons for suffering and to understand what it is trying to tell us about our desires, even when it can be difficult to see. Sometimes, suffering even touches our bodies, refusing to be ignored. This approach transcends the form of the symptom. For me, it is of the utmost importance to consider patients as people carrying unique stories, not as walking diagnostic labels.