Hanyuan “Hans” Zhang

What was your path to becoming a therapist?

My journey into mental health counseling was ignited by my father’s battle with colon cancer, a pivotal experience that steered me towards specializing in grief counseling, particularly for those facing terminal illnesses. Since my father’s death, I have been passionate about helping individuals lead fulfilling lives while bravely facing their constraints. I believe in integrating an existential approach, focusing on the utmost freedom one has when embracing their fate. This philosophy allows me to bring compassion and resonance to those bearing similar burdens, helping them gain insights into death, meaning, love, and freedom. Thereafter, I am in the process of becoming an advanced grief counseling specialist.

What should someone know about working with you?

- What you want to say is more important than what I need to know

- My intake session would briefly go through the policies, introduce myself, and collect essential demographic information, which would take about 10 minutes. I will give the next 30 minutes to you to talk about your main concern, but I will ask guiding questions to shift our direction in order to know you better and collect further information. We will leave the last 5 minutes to review and consider future arrangements - If there’s no emergency, every 8th session (8th, 16th, 24th…) will be a review session to talk about our progress and adjust future direction. We will also talk about our relationship, what is fostering/hindering your expression, how you think of me, and how do you think I think of you.

- At the end of every session, I will take the last 8 minutes to review the session and talk about what happened here between you and me.

Who is your ideal client?

A client who just experienced a significant loss of their loved ones, cared things, or themselves. They are asking for relief from regrets, ruminations, yearnings, or loneliness. They might own a sense of guilt or remorse, that is so strong that permeates everywhere of their lives. They might have intrusive thoughts that make them restless, not being able to concentrate, sleep, work, or experience joy. They are fragile, confused, and tired, yet standing.

Are there any aspects of your personal self, therapeutic approach, or viewpoints that might be slightly controversial or challenge norms?

I would not believe those who claim they know exactly how a client is cured through psychotherapy. Most of the time, we work in a black box, holding a single torch, carefully walking in a dark night, searching forward with our arms, hoping to touch and grab something solid.

The entire psychotherapy industry is based on inductive reasoning, meaning the knowledge we have is a summary of experiences, and we attach reasoning to the phenomena later to help us comprehend. Therefore, we can never guarantee the effect of treatment, nor can we be certain about which therapeutic factor will be effective for a client. All we know are probabilities. We share the confusion as much as you do, but we know how to bear it, to get along with it, and we believe the light is ahead somewhere if we keep walking.

Without the help of professionals, clients will recover and grow by themselves over time. There are times when you are paying us to do the job yourself, and that is the most important part of your growth. The ultimate purpose of treatment is to help clients become independent of us.