Gestalt Therapy for Embodied Healing | Kingston, NY & Nearby Areas
Healing that happens in Real Time.
You need therapy that meets you in the moment. Gestalt therapy gives you something insight alone can’t: real-time awareness that actually changes how you show up.
What is Gestalt therapy?
Gestalt therapy is a way of working that meets you in the moment, not through analysis alone, but through real-time awareness.
It focuses on what’s happening now: your breath, posture, emotions, impulses, and the subtle ways you move toward or away from connection. Rather than only talking about your experiences, we notice how your patterns show up live, in the room.
Gestalt trusts the present moment as the doorway to real change. When awareness deepens, something shifts, not because you force it, but because your system finally has space to respond differently.
Most common signs you might benefit from Gestalt therapy
You’ve noticed the same patterns looping through your life, shutting down when things get real, over-explaining to keep the peace, or caretaking until you’re empty.
Part of you knows these patterns aren’t who you really are. Another part keeps bracing, managing, and performing because it’s what helped you survive.
And your body feels it before your mind can catch up: a tight chest, a swirling stomach, sudden irritability, or that familiar numbness that shows up at the exact moment you wish you could stay present.
You want connection, clarity, and grounding, but instead you keep drifting into old roles: the fixer, the ghost, the good one, without meaning to.
You’re exhausted from understanding the problem but not feeling the shift. You’ve said the words, unpacked the history, named the dynamics, but your system hasn’t changed in the ways you hoped.
You want something deeper than insight. Something that reaches the parts of you talk therapy hasn’t touched. You’re looking for a way of working where change is felt in the body, experienced in the moment, and alive in your relationships, not just analyzed.
That’s the territory where Gestalt therapy actually works.
How do I know if I am ready for Gestalt therapy?
You’re ready if understanding the problem isn’t enough anymore.
If you’ve talked things through, unpacked the history, named the patterns, but your body still reacts the same way, this work may be a fit.
You don’t need to know what you want to change yet. You don’t need to be calm or confident.
You just need a willingness to notice what’s happening in real time and stay with it long enough for something new to emerge.
What Gestalt therapy helps you do
Gestalt helps you understand your patterns as they arise, not as an abstract story. Change doesn’t come from pressure or fixing. It comes from awareness, contact, and presence.
Gestalt therapy helps you come back into contact with what’s actually happening inside you, not the story about it, not the performance, not the mask you’ve been carrying for years.
You learn to notice the micro-moments that shape your experience: the tightening in your chest when someone interrupts you, the blankness that appears when you feel misunderstood, the shift in your voice when you’re trying to stay safe.
Rather than abandoning yourself, you learn how to stay with your experience long enough for something new to happen. In Gestalt, change comes from presence, not pressure.
Over time, this work helps you unhook from old survival patterns that once protected you but now keep you stuck. You begin to name what you feel as you feel it, ask for what you need without apologizing, and stay grounded when conversations get hard.
You start trusting your body again. You learn the difference between fear and intuition, collapse and rest, people-pleasing and genuine care.
Gestalt supports you in becoming more whole, more real, and more fully here, in your relationships and in your own life.
How I approach Gestalt therapy in Kingston and nearby areas
01 - We start with what’s happening right now
Not a distant story, this moment. Your posture, your breath, the way your voice tightens when you say “it’s fine.” Patterns only change in real time.
02 - We include the body, not just the mind
Gestalt is experiential. We track sensations, impulses, micro-expressions, and emotional shifts as they arise. Your body reveals truths your mind learned to hide.
03 - We explore the parts of you that show up in the room
The achiever. The ghoster. The protector. The over-giver. The one who never needs anything. We meet these roles with compassion, not judgment.
04 - We practice new ways of being
You try on new boundaries, new choices, and new ways of communicating, right in the session.
05 - We integrate the work into your daily life
You stay present in hard conversations, speak up earlier, breathe through activation, and stop abandoning yourself.
Gestalt therapy services in Kingston and nearby areas
Hi, I’m Cris Maria Fort Garcés. Clinically trained. Mystically tuned. Deeply human.
I’m a licensed psychotherapist, somatic practitioner, and certified Gestalt therapist with nearly 20 years of experience. My work is grounded in Gestalt therapy, an approach that trusts the present moment as the doorway to real change.
I work at the intersection of body, relationship, and spirit, blending somatic practice, creative work, and spiritual attunement. As a first-generation Latinx child of immigrants, I learned early how to hold complexity, the analytical and the intuitive, the grounded and the soulful, and that shapes how I work.
In sessions, we track what’s happening in your body, your emotions, and between us in real time. Gestalt offers a living laboratory for truth; my spiritually rooted lens helps us follow what’s ready to unfold.
Together, we create space for your shadow, clarity, and emerging self, so you can feel steadier, fuller, and more whole.
What topics can we explore in Gestalt therapy sessions?
- Relationship dynamics and communication patterns
- Unresolved grief or unfinished emotional business
- Self-esteem and identity questions
- Anxiety, depression, and stress responses
- Presence, boundaries, and emotional regulation
Tips and resources for getting the most out of Gestalt therapy
- Come as you are, no performance required
- Stay curious about what shows up in your body
- Notice patterns between sessions
- Allow the process to unfold at its own pace
SERVICES:
TWO PORTALS, ONE PATH TO WHOLENESS
Deep Healing for Your Body, Spirit, and Story.
Creative Now Therapy & beyond offers two powerful pathways into this work, grounded in ritual, transformative tools, and methodologies designed to meet you wherever you are in your evolution.
Somatic Psychotherapy
Somatic, depth-oriented, and spiritually grounded therapy for sensitive souls, spiritual professionals, and space-holders in New York State. When your nervous system and spirit are asking for integration, not just more coping.
Energy Coaching: The Remembering
A sacred space for spiritual integration, combining ritual, energy work, and sacred tools to support deep transformation beyond talk therapy. For women, queer, & LatinX folks worldwide.
Frequently Asked Questions
Is Gestalt therapy scientifically proven?
Yes. Gestalt therapy is a well-established, clinically practiced approach with research support showing benefits for emotional regulation, self-awareness, and relationship satisfaction. While it isn’t as manualized as some other models, it has decades of clinical use and evidence behind it.
How can Gestalt therapy help with anxiety or depression?
Yes. While Gestalt doesn’t treat symptoms in a step-by-step way like CBT might, it helps you get underneath them, to the stuck patterns, unmet needs, and internal conflicts fueling your experience. The result is more clarity, choice, and grounded ways of relating to yourself.
What is the difference between CBT and Gestalt therapy?
CBT focuses on identifying and changing unhelpful thoughts and behaviors. It’s structured, goal-oriented, and often used to reduce symptoms by challenging thought patterns.
Gestalt therapy is less about fixing and more about experiencing. It brings awareness into the present moment, what you’re feeling, sensing, and holding in your body right now, and helps you notice how old patterns are still playing out in your relationships today.
What makes Gestalt therapy different from other types of therapy?
Instead of primarily talking about the past, Gestalt therapy brings your present-moment experience into focus, how your body feels, what emotions are surfacing, and what’s happening relationally in real time. It’s not about fixing you, but helping you meet yourself more honestly and compassionately.
What if I’m afraid this will bring up too much?
That’s a wise concern. Gestalt work can stir big feelings, but we move at your pace. We check in with your body, your nervous system, and your capacity throughout the work. You won’t be pushed, safety is something we build together.
How does Gestalt therapy work with the body or somatic practices?
Gestalt is already a body-aware therapy, and when we blend in somatic tools, it deepens the work. That might mean noticing a tightening in your chest, a shift in breath, or the urge to shut down, and meeting that moment with curiosity. Your body holds your story, and we help it speak.
I’m a spiritual person, can that be part of the work?
Yes, spirituality isn’t an add-on here, it’s part of the foundation. My work assumes that meaning, intuition, symbolism, and inner life matter. If ritual, archetypes, astrology, or symbolic language resonate with you, they’re welcome and often woven into the work in grounded, non-bypassing ways.
This approach is best for people who want therapy that honors both the psychological and the spiritual. If you’re looking for a strictly secular or purely cognitive model, this likely won’t be the right fit.
How long does it take to feel a shift?
Some people notice something shift within a few sessions; for others, it’s a slower unfolding. Real change takes time, and we move at the pace that feels right for you.
What’s the first step if I’m curious to try this?
Start with a free 15-minute consultation. It’s a low-pressure way to ask questions, feel into the connection, and see if this work fits what you’re needing.
Ready to reconnect with your body, voice, and presence?
Start your Gestalt therapy journey today and experience change from the inside out.