6 Signs It’s Time to Find a New Therapist
I often tell clients that starting therapy is a relationship, just like any other. It depends on trust, safety, and genuine connection. You don’t have to open up right away, but you should feel that, over time, you could.
If that sense isn’t there, or if sessions start to feel more like routine check-ins than meaningful work, it might be a sign that something in the fit or approach isn’t quite right. Here are six signs it’s time to consider a new therapeutic connection (and what that realization can open up for your growth).
1. You don’t feel emotionally safe enough to fully be yourself.
Therapy is most effective when you can show up authentically with all the messiness, contradictions, and emotions that come with being human. If you find yourself censoring most of what you share, worried about being judged, or trying to say the “right” thing, it might be a sign that the relationship doesn’t feel safe enough for deeper work.
A good therapeutic match helps you access what’s beneath the surface, not by pushing, but by creating safety. A therapist who is attuned should ideally help you feel seen and supported enough to explore what’s hard to name (or what’s even hard about letting yourself go there).
2. You’ve gained insight, but change still feels out of reach.
Maybe you’ve had lots of therapy already! You might understand your patterns, can name them, explain them, even anticipate them, yet they keep repeating. You might know your partner’s triggers, your childhood wounds, and your coping mechanisms, but insight alone hasn’t shifted the emotional experience that drives them.
This is where emotion-focused and experiential work (bottom up approaches that work using the body to shift implicit learning) can shift things. I work with many clients who have been in traditional talk therapy before and have no shortage of coping mechanisms. But it’s another thing to move from knowing about your emotions to actually experiencing and processing them. When emotion is felt and integrated, the pattern starts to change from the inside out.
3. Sessions feel repetitive, and you’re not sure what’s changing.
All therapy ebbs and flows, but if every session starts to sound the same and you’re not noticing growth, it may be a sign that your work has plateaued. Sometimes this happens because you’ve reached the limits of a particular approach or because you’re ready for something deeper than problem-solving or coping skills.
Experiential therapy invites movement. Instead of circling the same topics, you slow down and explore what’s happening in the moment: the tightening in your chest, the sadness behind your anger, the hope that’s been hiding under numbness. That’s often where real transformation begins.
4. You feel supported, but not challenged.
Good therapy should feel like a soft place to land — but not a place where you stay parked forever. A great therapist balances empathy with gentle challenge, naming what’s avoided and inviting you to stretch in ways that feel safe.
If your sessions have started to feel more like chatting with a friend than therapy, your therapy may no longer match what you need. You deserve someone who helps you expand your emotional range — not just to feel better, but to feel more balanced and fully alive.
5. You’ve outgrown what originally brought you to therapy.
You may have come to therapy to manage anxiety, navigate a breakup, or get through a crisis. As life shifts, your needs do too. What once felt like the right fit may not serve the new version of you that’s emerging.
Good therapy is meant to evolve as you do. Sometimes that means deepening the work with your current therapist; other times, it means finding someone who can meet you in this new chapter.
6. Your therapist should know your name — and be fully present with you.
Yes, this should go without saying, but here we are. Your therapist should remember who you are, be engaged in your story, and not be driving, checking email, or casually online shopping while you’re pouring your heart out. (Yes, I’ve heard the stories. Too many.)
You deserve a space where you feel seen, respected, and taken seriously. A therapist worth their weight treats your vulnerability like gold, not background noise.
How do you know it’s time for a change?
If you’ve made progress, that’s something to celebrate. The work you’ve done may have been exactly what you needed at that stage of your life — and realizing you’re ready for more is a sign of growth in itself. At the same time, recognizing what’s no longer working is often the first step toward getting your needs met. It takes courage to name what you truly want.
If you’re wondering whether it’s time for a new approach, that curiosity alone can be a sign of change. You’re tuning in to something wise within you – the part that knows when it’s ready for the next step.
If this resonates, I encourage you to explore what you need now. And if you’d like to see whether my approach could be a good fit, I invite you to learn more about me here.
