About Christian
Christian Maciel is a licensed marriage and family therapist with 25 years of clinical experience. He focuses on helping people manage anxiety, stress, depression, and relationship concerns. He practices in California and offers therapy in English and Spanish.
He uses practical, problem-focused methods to help people feel steadier day to day. Sessions often work on clearer communication, managing strong emotions, and changing unhelpful behavior. He also addresses wounds from past trauma and patterns such as codependency or fear of abandonment.
Background and approach
Christian draws on several evidence-informed approaches including cognitive behavioral techniques and acceptance-based work. Those methods help people notice difficult thoughts, choose values-driven actions, and build skills for calmer responses. He also uses attachment-focused ideas to examine how early relationships shape current patterns.
Therapy sessions aim to be collaborative and straightforward. Clients can expect a mix of talking, skills practice, and real-life assignments to try between sessions. He adapts pacing and tools to each person’s goals and daily life demands.
People come to Christian for help with chronic stress, persistent worry, low mood, and problems that affect close relationships. He also supports those coping with caregiver strain, chronic illness, body image concerns, and the aftermath of separation or domestic violence. His long experience includes working across cultural contexts and offering care in English and Spanish.
Approach-driven care available online
Acceptance and Commitment Therapy helps people notice painful thoughts and feelings without getting stuck in them, then choose actions that match their personal values. It can be useful for anxiety, depression, and chronic stress by shifting focus from getting rid of feelings to moving toward meaningful goals. Cognitive Behavioral Therapy focuses on the links between thoughts, feelings, and behaviors and teaches practical skills to reframe unhelpful thinking and change patterns that keep problems going. It often helps with anxiety, phobias, and low mood. Attachment-Based Therapy looks at how early relationship patterns shape current connections and helps people build healthier ways of relating and handling intimacy or trust issues.Finding the right mix of approaches is part of the work. The therapist collaborates with each person to decide which methods fit their goals, needs, and preferences. That can mean combining acceptance strategies with skills training or leaning into attachment ideas when relationship patterns are central.
Online therapy offers flexible ways to meet by video call, phone, live chat, or text-based messaging. Video sessions allow face-to-face interaction for in-depth work, phone sessions can be a lower-bandwidth option, live chat suits quick check-ins, and messaging supports brief reflections or ongoing check-ins between sessions. These formats make it easier to fit therapy into busy days and to keep continuity when schedules change.
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What this therapist works with
Most often
- Stress, Anxiety
- Relationship issues
- Trauma and abuse
Also listed
- Abandonment
- Attachment issues
- Body image
- Caregiver issues and stress
- Chronic pain, illness, and disability
- Codependency
- Commitment issues
- Communication problems
- Control issues
- Dependent personality
- Depression
- Divorce and separation
- Domestic violence
- Emptiness
- Forgiveness
- Guilt and shame
- Impulsivity
- Isolation / loneliness
- Jealousy
- Life purpose
- Men's issues
- Midlife crisis
- Money and financial issues
- Mood disorders
- Multicultural concerns
- Narcissism
- Panic disorder and panic attacks
- Personality disorders
- Phobias
- Post-traumatic stress
- Postpartum depression
- Pregnancy and childbirth
- Prejudice and discrimination
- Seasonal Affective Disorder (SAD)
- Self esteem
- Self-harm
- Self-love
- Sex addiction
- Sexuality
- Social anxiety and phobia
- Women's issues
- Workplace issues
- Young adult issues
Therapeutic approaches
- Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT)
- Attachment-Based Therapy
- Client-Centered Therapy
- Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT)
- Dialectical Behavior Therapy (DBT)
- Emotionally-Focused Therapy (EFT)
- Existential Therapy
- Gottman Method
- Mindfulness Therapy
- Motivational Interviewing
- Narrative Therapy
- Solution-Focused Therapy
- Trauma-Focused Therapy
- Systemic Therapy
- Experience
- 25 years
- Licensed
- California
- Languages
- English, Spanish
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