Angela Maestas
MA, LPC
SACRED PATHS COUNSELING
You have no need to travel anywhere. Journey within yourself. Enter a mine of rubies and bathe in the splendor of your own light. -Rumi
HEALING
THROUGH RELATIONSHIP
My name is Angela and I am a licensed therapist in the state of Colorado. If you are looking at my website, you might be dealing with pain or confusion in your life that you are tired of managing alone.
I am passionate about helping my clients make sense of their emotions and reactions to their life experiences. Through careful examination of their stories, I enable my clients to learn about themselves on a deeper level. I truly believe in the inherent wisdom of my clients, and find it a great privilege to help clients access their own inner-knowing or wisdom, that can become blocked because of trauma and negative beliefs that are created over time. Becoming aware of the patterns we engage in is an important part of the process of being able to make different choices in our lives, especially when we are feeling stuck.
I pride myself in offering a safe and supportive environment with genuine acceptance for the person sitting in front of me. Through intentional listening and genuine empathy, my first priority is building an authentic relationship with my clients. I consider myself to be a highly relational therapist, with an understanding of the truly paradoxical situation we, as human-beings, often find ourselves in; we suffer relational wounds that can only be healed in the context of relationship.
Therapy is a unique opportunity to do this.
"Your wound is probably not your fault, but your healing is your responsibility"
-Shraddha
I provide counseling services for individual adults seeking help with grief and loss, codependency, life-transitions, relationship issues, and for those seeking deeper meaning in their lives.
Areas of Expertise
Humanistic
I believe in the Humanistic perspective that people behave the way they do based on the way they perceive their circumstances. The situations we find ourselves in do not have to define our behaviors. Through building a relationship with my clients, I understand their self-concept. Sometimes people tend to see themselves through a distorted lens. Together we can work to adjust a distorted self-concept to fit reality.
Existential
Most people experience internal conflict at times, struggling with the choices they have made in life and the consequences that follow. Integrating Existential Philosophy into the work I do, I challenge my clients to take responsibility for their choices. By fostering the possibility that, although we often feel confined by our circumstances, feelings, and beliefs, there are different choices we can make that can impact our personal wellbeing.
Jungian
When we respond to life in an unconscious manner, we feel confused about why we make the decisions we do, the relationships we engage in, and have trouble integrating aspects of ourselves that we do not understand (or wish did not exist.) I am skilled at working with dreams, projections, and shadow material- with the intention of bringing the unconscious to light in order for my clients to live from an empowered place of genuine self awareness.
Acceptance & Commitment Therapy
Sometimes our thoughts feel like reality and we lose the ability to recognize that what we are focusing on is unhelpful to our very wellbeing. Accepting life on life's terms can be challenging, as this includes all of our emotions- especially the ones people often try very hard to avoid, like sadness and anger. Using techniques found in (ACT) I help clients develop a different relationship with themselves and the events they struggle with. Change can feel impossible when we are not able to accept reality. One of the tenants of this modality of therapy is getting in touch with personal values, in order to live a more fulfilling life.