JIAYI SHAO Psychotherapy
Welcome to my Bontanical Garden.
Each pairing holds two stories: click the plant name to trace its roots, or the approach name below to explore the healing path.
Relational
“We come into being through others,
and through others,
we come back to ourselves.”
Relational therapy echoes this worldview in its foundational belief: we become who we are through relationship — and we heal the same way.
In session, this means we’re not just talking about relationships—we're exploring how they live inside you, and how they come alive between us. We might notice moments of distance, closeness, tension, or longing. We may pay attention to how your body responds when you feel seen, or when you fear being too much. In this way, therapy itself becomes a site of re-connection, where unconscious relational patterns can rise into awareness, and something new can emerge between client and therapist.
This work can be especially powerful if you:
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Often feel stuck in familiar relationship patterns
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Long for closeness but fear being hurt or misunderstood
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Carry attachment wounds, complex trauma, or relational grief
- Are exploring how culture, power, and belonging shape your emotional life
If you're reading this, maybe it's not by accident. Maybe this, too, is a kind of 缘.
Eastern Wisdom
As someone born and raised in Chinese language and culture, I often draw on folklore, poetry, proverbs, etymology (such as the pictographic roots of Chinese characters), and the contemplative wisdom of Buddhism and Taoism to inform my work. These aren’t fixed beliefs, but lenses—ways of seeing that bring softness, spaciousness and creativity rooted in ancient texts and ancestral guidance to help us better understand what it means to be human today.
In some ways, it’s like holding a previous clay vessel shaped by many hands—language, lineage, story—and discovering it still holds water. A quiet reminder that what’s been passed down can still speak to who we are now.
This has always been the foundation of my work. I try my best to incorporate this sensibility and richness into the therapy space in a creative way — not as doctrine, but as an orientation. A way of being with what’s here, slowly and kindly.
While my approach to therapy tends to be fluid, relational, and attuned to each person’s emotional rhythms, I also believe that concrete, specific skills can be essential — especially in the early stages of healing. Sometimes what we need first isn’t to dive into the depths, but to learn how to stay afloat.
That’s where Dialectical Behavior Therapy (DBT) comes in.
Rooted in both Eastern mindfulness and Western behavioral science, DBT is a research-backed framework that offers clear, teachable tools to help people navigate intense emotions and build more stable, fulfilling lives. I often draw from DBT when clients are struggling to regulate their emotions, communicate their needs, or manage patterns that feel overwhelming.
The core skills of DBT are organized into four areas:
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Mindfulness: learning to stay present, without judgment
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Distress Tolerance: surviving emotional storms without making things worse
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Emotion Regulation: understanding and working with your emotions, not against them
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Interpersonal Effectiveness: communicating clearly and maintaining boundaries while preserving relationships
These skills aren’t a cure-all, but they can be a lifeline—especially when you're just starting to find your footing. In our work together, we may weave these tools into a more spacious, intuitive process, helping you not only cope, but eventually reconnect with your own inner compass.
Eye Movement Desensitization Reprocessing
Some memories don’t feel like memories — they feel like they’re still happening. You might know something is over, but your body keeps reacting like it’s not. That’s where EMDR (Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing) can help.
EMDR is a evidence-based therapy originally developed for trauma, but it’s also used for anxiety, low self-worth, relational wounds, and stuck emotional patterns. It helps the brain do what it’s naturally wired to do: process experiences so they no longer feel overwhelming or unfinished.
Working with bilateral stimulation (like eye movements or tapping), EMDR allows us to gently revisit memories—without being overwhelmed by them. Think of it like sitting on a train, watching the landscape of the past pass by through the window. You’re not reliving the experience—you’re observing it, with support, from a safe and grounded place.
You might benefit from EMDR if you:
- Get emotionally triggered and don’t fully understand why
- Feel stuck in old patterns, even after talk therapy
- Carry beliefs like “I’m not safe,” “I’m too much,” or “It’s my fault”
- Want to feel less reactive and more at ease in your body
EMDR isn’t about erasing the past. It’s about helping it move through—so you can move forward.
Internal Family System
Inside each of us lives a world. A protective part that never stops planning. A quiet, exiled child who learned to hide. A critic who only wants you to do better. A dreamer still hoping to be seen.
Internal Family Systems (IFS) is a way of understanding the self not as one fixed identity, but as a constellation of parts—each with its own voice, history, and role. These parts aren’t problems to fix. They’re messengers. They carry our pain, our protection, our past. And when we turn toward them with curiosity instead of judgment, something begins to shift.
In IFS, we invite these inner voices into dialogue—not to control or silence them, but to listen deeply. To understand why they do what they do. And to rediscover the Self—the calm, compassionate core within you that knows how to lead with clarity and care.
In our work together, we’ll gently open the door to your inner world. With time and safety, even the most guarded parts may begin to speak. Healing doesn’t always mean changing who you are—it often means making room for all of you to be here, fully.
Internal Family Systems (IFS) is a way of understanding the self not as one fixed identity, but as a constellation of parts—each with its own voice, history, and role. These parts aren’t problems to fix. They’re messengers. They carry our pain, our protection, our past. And when we turn toward them with curiosity instead of judgment, something begins to shift.
In IFS, we invite these inner voices into dialogue—not to control or silence them, but to listen deeply. To understand why they do what they do. And to rediscover the Self—the calm, compassionate core within you that knows how to lead with clarity and care.
In our work together, we’ll gently open the door to your inner world. With time and safety, even the most guarded parts may begin to speak. Healing doesn’t always mean changing who you are—it often means making room for all of you to be here, fully.