PHILOSOPHY & APPROACH In everyday life we are faced with multiple situations that can affect our mood, how we think, and how we behave. No one is entirely responsible for creating a negative situation and everyone makes a contribution to the problem. How we perceive situations is based in our basic attitudes toward life. Our life experiences have shaped these attitudes and we continue to find ourselves in current situations that have given us so much difficulty in the past. Counseling and therapy can assist you in taking control of how these situations affect your mood, thinking, and behavior. The philosophy and approach at Snow Clinical and Educational Services are based on a humanistic and holistic theory called Symbolic Interactionism (SI). SI holds holds the basic principle that all problems originate, and are maintained, within interpersonal relationships. Thus, problem resolution is possible through the development of insight into and awareness of the dynamcis operating within our significant interpersonal relationships.

Our definition of self, and self-related-to-others, is formed through interactions with others and we are particularly influenced by our family of origin. It is through the interactive process that we develop definitions of reality, expectations of other, coping mechanisms, personality styles, and patterns of behavior. All of these processes may change over the course of a lifetime due to on-going interactions with others inour society who are important to our survival and definition of self. Dysfunctional or problematic patterns of emotions, thought, or behavior may be altered through positive experiences in counseling or psychotherapy. Insight and awareness will lead to the development and learning of functional strategies to ameliorate dysfunctional interpersonal dynamics.