You know those people who were plopped onto Planet Earth to do a certain thing? Well, I'm Sarah Barkley and I was always meant to love on and challenge people to become their best selves. I'm so grateful that I can be a therapist. I have been in private practice for close to 20 years, working mainly with women and adolescent female clients. I am a Licensed Clinical Social Worker here in stunning Asheville, North Carolina as well as Denver, Colorado.
My experience ranges from adolescent residential treatment in the woods of New Hampshire to forensic work on the West Coast to FBI/ victim work and serving as an expert witness in Colorado; all the while working with my private practice clients. Most recently I have been sought out as a corporate speaker to talk about how our experiences and traumas shape our behaviors and how belief systems affect professional success.
I truly believe in my clients and their intrinsic wisdom. In all of my diverse work, I have seen the incredible ability of humans to take mastery over their current position in life. My clients come to me to deep dive something they've been avoiding for decades or to fine tune areas of their life. Because we make these goals digestible, my clients absolutely make the subtle and (not so subtle shifts) they have been craving.
My therapeutic style is active and challenging. I'm not going to just sit silently. My approach melds traditional psychological approaches and life coaching modalities. If you've been to therapy in the past and it "didn't work", or you're just looking for something unique, I tend to have an "outside the box" approach. I consider the work I do to be art of subtleties learned over my thousands of data points of clients experiences and current science on how human brains process and evolve.
My goal is to leverage my 20 years of clinical experience to get clients effectively and efficiently to their desired goals. Therapy does NOT have to last years! Treatment can exist in a specific time and place then returned to many years later when something feels important to process. I've maintained relationships with many of my clients for decades, often going from one year to the next until something arises, allowing us to continue seamlessly.