Beyond the Office: Life Outside Therapy

“Just a fellow traveler helping others make sense of the journey.”

People often assume therapists spend all their time analyzing thoughts or reading psychology books. (Okay, maybe a little of that is true.)
But a good therapist is always a forever student, someone who keeps learning and growing to better understand people and the craft of helping them heal.

Outside of sessions, I’m simply a person with a curious mind and a few passions that keep me grounded, inspired, and moving forward.

When I’m not in session, you’ll probably find me catching a game of Magic: The Gathering with my childhood friends, listening to music, or spending time with my girlfriend, Selina, and our dogs: Cairo, Raven, and Runa.

Runa

Cairo and Ms. Raven

My greatest passion, though, is reading about therapy, philosophy, spirituality, and the healing process. I love exploring how people grow and create meaning, and I’m fascinated by what happens when we lose connection to that deeper sense of the sacred. I’m especially interested in how humans maintain spiritual connection and what happens when we become disconnected from that transcendent part of life.

One of my biggest influences is Carl Jung, whose work continues to shape how I understand healing. In simple terms, a Jungian approach views therapy as a journey toward wholeness. It invites us to recognize the hidden parts of ourselves and bring them into harmony. Jung believed that dreams, symbols, and stories rise from the unconscious to help us understand who we are and what we need.

Carl Jung

I’m also a practical person. After all, we live in this world, and we can’t always keep our heads in the heavens, so to speak. Practical skills are just as important as spiritual insight—they help us build structure, create change, and move forward in daily life. I’m passionate about both of these approaches: the practical and the profound, the grounded and the transcendent.

For me, therapy is about bridging that space between the individual and the universal, the everyday and the sacred. It’s about helping people reconnect with themselves and, through that, with something greater than themselves—whatever that may look like for them.

But why talk about my therapeutic approach in a post about life outside of therapy? The short answer is that I don’t teach anything I don’t practice myself. I try to walk this path every day—the same path of growth, meaning, and integration that I invite others to walk with me.

—Joseph Mounts M.Ed., AADC, LPC