Our Values: Politics, Social Justice, and Therapy

Tribeca Therapy strives to be an expression of our shared values as therapists, most notably our belief that intimacy and emotionality have an important place in the project of social justice and that social justice has an important place in the project of therapy. We believe that decency, equity, and creating a good life are all central to the practice of therapy and that therapy has a role in questions of morality and political identity.

Pretending that therapy can exist without political and moral implications—that therapy can be somehow value-neutral—makes it impossible to address key political questions long ignored by the field of psychotherapy, especially those of race and equity. We believe that all therapists must be fluent in the complicated racial history of mental health treatment and be intent on changing it. We are committed to the affirmative inclusion of all gender expressions and sexual orientations. Our mission is to move beyond the rhetoric of tolerance and inclusion and towards the objective of being fluent in matters of clinical importance to marginalized people who seek our help.

Because many significant aspects of emotional life have so often been rendered taboo, we strive to speak to and build fluency in uncomfortable topics like sex and sexuality (including not having sex), bodies (including bodies of difference, as locations and storage centers of trauma, as harmed, discriminated against, or ignored, and as locations of beauty and pleasure), privilege, pain, and trauma.

Foremost in the execution of these values is respect for the intensive practices through which therapists become great therapists. This includes a primary commitment to self-work—the process in which a therapist confronts the challenges of the work, as laid bare in clinical situations and supervision, as opportunities to grow emotionally, intellectually, and professionally. At Tribeca Therapy, community and collaboration are central catalysts for self-work, with both peers and supervisors invested in identifying areas of development and acting as support.

Our Methodology: Not Just Symptoms–Deep, Lasting Change

Our methodology has emerged from our values, not the other way around. Because the idea that individuals exist in the context of interrelated wholes—families, relationships, friendships, neighborhoods, communities, and the broader world—is central to our practice, we value the lens of ecosystems and family systems approaches, as well as a relational emphasis in healing. Our interest in psychodynamic psychotherapy is driven by our understanding of human beings as historical, meaning that suffering comes from our histories and must be understood in this context. Symptom management tools such as cognitive and behavioral approaches have a very limited place within our practice.

History of Tribeca Therapy: A Community of Values and the Value of Community

Tribeca Therapy is a community that is self-consciously co-created, grounded in shared values and ethics. Our community reflects on how it operates, is sensitive to harm, and is particularly reflective on questions of power, especially in regards to race, gender, and traditionally marginalized identities.

Founded in 2009 by Matt Lundquist as a solo private practice, Tribeca Therapy, from the start, expressly challenged the medical model in favor of a clinical practice grounded in a core belief in humanism—a moral belief in human life as valuable, capable, and worthy of deep respect regardless of status. Matt and Tribeca Therapy quickly developed a reputation for providing vibrant therapy that was active, playful, and creative in contrast to what he often saw as manualized, blank-slate, and dogmatic.

At the same time, while a common practice structure in psychotherapy, Matt found solo practice intensely isolating, lacking the community and collective rigor of team-directed work. In 2012, Matt expanded Tribeca Therapy into a highly collaborative group practice as an antidote to this isolation.

The experience of community at Tribeca Therapy comes from the fact that we’re not just sharing space and referrals; we’re building something together. Our therapists want to connect because they share values—not just political and social values, but also the values of self-examination, self-work, and community itself.

Professional Growth: Long-Term Commitment to Development

We’re invested in the ongoing professional growth of our therapists, both financially and clinically. We provide high-quality supervision, including training and supervision from our network of outside professionals, and full access to our training center, Emerging Practices. For experienced therapists, we teach and train in the unique skills of supervision.

Many of our programmatic offerings have emerged from the clinical interests of members of our team. This includes our maternal mental health project, Tribeca Maternity; the expansion of our family therapy offerings; and our work with gender-nonconforming and transitioning children and teens and their families. Our practice is regularly invited to provide mental health workshops and training in our areas of expertise, as well as offer commentary in the media on current events related to mental health. We also have an active website and social media presence with a substantial readership, providing opportunities for therapists to work with our editorial team on publishing content.

Our Supervision: Giving You What You Need to Become a Phenomenal Therapist

The centerpiece of our practice is an intensive combination of individual and group supervision for therapists at all levels of experience. While everyone in our practice receives supervision, including weekly group supervision and quarterly staff days, which provide a concentrated deep-dive day of supervision, therapists new to the practice receive weekly or twice weekly individual supervision to learn our methodological approach and build a relationship with an individual supervisor that is key to successful practice. 

We regularly consult with and receive supervision and training from experts outside of our practice, recognizing both the limits of our expertise and the benefits of our culture being regularly infused with different ideas and influences. 

In addition to process supervisions and case consultations, we make extensive use of role play, process recordings, and didactic methods. Becoming a therapist—or becoming a better therapist—is a transformation and, like all transformations, can be uncomfortable. We take the building of trust as colleagues and supervisors/supervisees seriously so that we may take on the challenging project of rigorous candor and identifying blind spots that can prevent the deepening of treatment.

Who Our Patients Are: Demanding, Therapy-Savvy, and Know Their Options

While most of our patients live or work in Lower Manhattan, patients come to Tribeca Therapy from all over NYC from a wide range of backgrounds and industries. Our patients are motivated and want and have choices for where they seek therapy, which leads them to demand high quality and dedication from us.

Because we wear our progressive politics on our sleeves, we attract patients who share those values and who are themselves representative of marginalized identities. They know they will not just be safe and welcomed at Tribeca Therapy, but they will receive therapy from a team with the necessary skills to help people of color, queer people, and trans and gender-nonconforming people build their emotional lives. 

Working at Tribeca Therapy: An Unconventional Group Practice Packed with Opportunity

Unlike many practices, we don’t run on a fee-for-service model. Our therapists are exclusively paid on a salary, with excellent benefits, including generous vacation and sick leave and healthcare (currently through Aetna), as well as access to vision and dental coverage and an HSA plan.

New, full-time therapists with less than a year of post-graduate experience receive a salary of $68,000 for 2022 with significant income growth for those who succeed within the practice. With a salary structured to meet or exceed what can be offered in solo private practice, Associate Therapists (full licensure, typically 3 years post-graduation) earn well over $100,000 and Senior Therapists earn a salary commensurate with the top end of therapists in private practice in New York City. Because of this, Tribeca Therapy is often a long-term home, with our most senior therapists having more than 10 years of tenure with Tribeca Therapy.

Our Hiring Process

Our hiring process is rigorous and deliberate. We bring to our application, interview, and selection process a thoughtfulness consistent with how we operate our practice and approach therapy. While we respect the work and uncertainty that can be involved for applicants in a job search, candidates for a position at Tribeca Therapy should be motivated to engage with a process designed to find an excellent match and which, therefore, involves several steps.

We make use of group and individual interviews to learn about a candidate’s capacity for self-reflection and willingness to be impacted by the process itself. Prospective therapists will be asked to reflect on the values and assumptions they bring to therapy, with aspects of the process intentionally replicating the experience of supervision that is so central to our practice. 

Even among already experienced therapists, a good fit will be someone who believes they still have a tremendous amount to learn. Humility is prized over mastery.

Who can apply

We welcome applicants with any of the following NY State licenses: LMSW, LCSW, LMFT, PhD, PsyD, LMHC, LCAT, and Licensed Psychoanalyst. New graduates or those in the process of applying for licensure are welcome to apply.

Hiring

Please complete the following for consideration for employment as a psychotherapist at Tribeca Therapy.

 

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How many years of post-masters or post-doctoral experience do you have? (Please enter a number from 0-99.)

Help us understand your experience practicing psychotherapy. For how many years, if any, have you practiced psychotherapy, as a post-graduate professional, and in what contexts?

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If you work at Tribeca Therapy, you will be challenged like never before. You will receive intense supervision in an environment with a high level of accountability where the focus is on identifying and addressing where you need to grow as a therapist. Why does this level of intensive supervision interest you?

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Our approach is relational, systems-oriented, and psychodynamic. While we make some limited use of cognitive and behavioral interventions, our approach is not symptom-oriented. We believe these relational skills are both more meaningful to our patients and harder for therapists to learn. Why do you want to learn such an approach?

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At Tribeca Therapy, we take our values seriously. Foremost is our commitment to continual growth as therapists which we believe must include ongoing self-examination. In addition, we are serious about anti-racism and affirmative inclusion of all gender expressions and sexual orientations. Finally, we talk openly and honestly about sex and sexuality, bodies, class and privilege, abuse, and trauma, including gender-based violence. Growing into competence in these areas requires uncomfortable conversations and rigorous self-examination. Are you prepared to talk regularly about these issues? Why does that appeal to you in a professional practice environment?

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Matt Lundquist headshot

Meet our founder and clinical director, Matt Lundquist, LCSW, MSEd

A Columbia University-trained psychotherapist with more than two decades of clinical experience, I've built a practice where my team and I help individuals, couples and families get help to work through difficult experiences create their lives.

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