People aren't determined by their pasts — they're shaped by the meanings they make of them.
Adlerian therapy in the UK
Adlerian therapy is built on Alfred Adler's Individual Psychology — holistic, social, focused on lifestyle and meaning rather than pathology. A small but distinctive UK community of Adlerian-trained therapists. Free 15-minute discovery call.
Adler's central idea: it isn't what happens to you that determines who you become — it's what you do with what happens to you.
"Have you ever wondered why two people can have similar experiences but very different lives?"
When the story has gone unexamined
Adler thought we all live by a 'lifestyle' — a private logic about who we are, what the world is like, and what's required of us to belong. Most of it is set early in life, and most of it goes unexamined for decades. It can serve us; it can also lock us into patterns we no longer need.
If you've felt like you keep ending up in similar relationships, similar work, similar disappointments — Adler would say it's the lifestyle showing up.
How Adlerian therapy works
Adlerian therapy makes the lifestyle conscious. The therapist asks about early recollections, family constellation, the messages you absorbed about who you needed to be to belong. Together you trace how those early decisions still shape your current choices — and you decide which to keep and which to revise.
Imagine choosing your story rather than being chosen by it
Recognising the patterns without being shamed by them. Choosing differently, deliberately. Building a life that fits who you actually want to be, rather than who you decided as a child you needed to be.
Why Adlerian therapy
It's a small but coherent UK community with a distinctive philosophical foundation.
Holistic and social
Adler emphasised the indivisibility of the person and their social context — you can't understand someone in isolation from the relationships they're embedded in. This makes Adlerian work particularly suited to people for whom the relational and cultural context feels central.
Encouragement-based
Adlerian therapy is explicitly encouragement-focused — building on strengths, social interest, and capacity for change. Less pathologising than some psychodynamic traditions; more collaborative than directive.
Lifestyle assessment
The signature Adlerian intervention. The therapist works with you to map your private logic — early recollections, family constellation, the patterns you carry. Often produces clarity that shorter, symptom-focused therapies don't reach.
What Adlerian therapy looks like
Sessions blend phases the Adlerian tradition specifies — but tailored to the individual.
Building the relationship
Adlerian therapy puts the therapeutic relationship at the centre. Trust and collaboration first.
Lifestyle assessment
Mapping the private logic — early recollections, family constellation (your role among siblings), the family atmosphere, the messages you absorbed about belonging.
Insight and re-orientation
Connecting the lifestyle pattern to your current difficulties. Distinguishing what was useful then from what's useful now. Practising different choices in the present.
Encouragement and ongoing change
Reinforcing the new patterns; building 'social interest' (Adler's term for healthy connection to others); consolidating change beyond therapy.
Ce este Adlerian Therapy?
Cunoscut și ca: Individual Psychology, Adlerian psychotherapy, Adlerian counselling
Adlerian therapy, also called Individual Psychology, is a psychotherapy approach developed by Alfred Adler — a contemporary of Freud and Jung. It treats the person as an indivisible whole embedded in social context, focuses on lifestyle (private logic about self, world, and requirements for belonging), and emphasises encouragement and social interest as engines of change.
- •Founded by Alfred Adler (1870-1937), originally part of the Vienna circle with Freud
- •Holistic, social, and lifestyle-focused — distinct from Freudian and Jungian traditions
- •UK community is small but well-organised — Adlerian Society of the UK
- •Practitioners typically also BACP- or UKCP-registered
- •Particularly suited to people working on long-standing patterns and life direction
Why choose MatchyMatch for adlerian therapy?
MatchyMatch is a UK platform for adlerian therapy. Every therapist holds professional registration — with a UK body (BACP, UKCP, HCPC, BPS) or a recognised international body — so you have verified credentials before you ever pick up the phone. Your first 15-minute discovery call with any therapist is free, so you can see if it's the right fit before committing.
- Free 15-minute discovery call before you commit to adlerian therapy
- Verified UK & international credentials (BACP, UKCP, HCPC, BPS, COPSI and others)
- Online or in-person sessions, whichever suits you
- Therapy in English and other languages — including ones the NHS rarely offers