PATRICK RAFFERTY, PhD

I’ve come to see psychotherapy as an inherently creative process. It is co-created moment by moment by the patient and the analyst collaborating together. Each new therapy is a reinvention of the process. No therapy like it has existed before and no therapy will ever be like it again. As a therapist I see myself as along-side my patients as we co-create a treatment customized for the patient’s unique psychology. It is like two musicians who are tasked to make an album but have never met before and do not know what instrument the other plays. They both arrive to each jam session in a beginner’s mind to play, create, and to learn the other’s play style, developing layers and layers of intricate music, which, if they can find an alliance, will lead to a beautifully unique album that has never been heard before and elevates the musicians and listeners to a higher plane. Instead of music, we use metaphor, imagery, symbolic language, and emotional attunement.

A Blind Man Wrestling a Blue Dog for Some Reason
(Oil on canvas, 30” High x 24” Wide) 

This painting entitled “A Blind Man Wrestling a Blue Dog for Some Reason” expresses the strangeness, solitude, and conflict that often feels like masculinity.

drpatrickrafferty@gmail.com
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www.patrickrafferty.art