Tara Samiy, Psy.D.
Licensed Psychologist
I became a therapist because I’m deeply interested in how people adapt and make meaning, especially when life doesn’t unfold as expected. I’ve long been drawn to the connection between mind, body, relationships, and the ways experience shapes us, often outside of awareness.
In our work, I pay attention not just to what you say, but to how you experience yourself as you say it. Over time, we begin to notice the patterns shaping how you move through the world, patterns that once helped you cope, but may now limit your capacity for ease, connection, or choice. I’m less interested in fixing you, and more interested in helping you understand yourself with clarity and compassion.
I hold a broad view of survival. The ways we protect ourselves are shaped by early relationships, but also by larger forces, cultural messages, generational trauma, systems of power, privilege, and oppression, and lived experiences that ask us to adapt in order to stay safe or connected. What feels confusing now often began as an intelligent response to something difficult or inadequate.
Alongside my clinical training, I bring my lived experience into the room - immigration, bicultural identity, neurodivergence, loss, long-term relationship, separation, parenting, and rebuilding. These experiences have deepened my respect for how complex and nonlinear change can be. I don’t believe in quick fixes, but in careful, honest work that makes space for both resilience and vulnerability.
Clients often experience me as calm, attuned, and direct in a gentle way. I’ll name what I notice, ask thoughtful questions, and stay with you when things feel uncertain or intense.
Therapy with me isn’t about becoming someone else. It’s about developing a more honest, resourced relationship with yourself, so you can move through your life with more steadiness, flexibility, and self-trust.
My Background
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Licensed Psychologist, California PSY27422 (2015)
Doctorate in Clinical Psychology, California Institute of Integral Studies (2006 - 2012)
Bachelor of Science and Arts, Psychobiology and French (double major), University of California, Los Angeles (1994 -1999)
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Innate Somatic Intelligence™ Trauma Therapy Approach (ISITTA) Training (2025)
MAPS Adherence Rating for MDMA-Assisted Therapy Training (Spring/Summer 2022)
MAPS MDMA-Assisted Therapy Training Program, Parts A – D (2019 - 2022)
Hand in Hand Parenting Professionals Intensive (2019)
Sensorimotor Psychotherapy Level I Graduate: Training in Affect Regulation, Survival Defenses, & Traumatic Memory (2016 - 2017)
NeuroAffective Relational Model (NARM) Level 1 Professional Training (2016)
2-year pre-doctoral psychoanalytic training, Access Institute (2010 - 2012)
Hospital Based Yoga Therapy in Cancer & Chronic Illness Teacher Training Level 1 (2010)
Year-long supervision with Dr. Kirk Schneider in Existential-Integrative Psychotherapy (2009 - 2010)
Year-long training, AgeSong Institute. Hospice care & assisted living facility for elders; trained in geropsychology and humanistic-existential psychology, process oriented psychology, expressive arts therapy dementia program, & spiritual care (2008 -2009).
Purusha Yoga, Classic Hatha Yoga 200-hour Teacher Training (Yoga Alliance registered) (2008)
Yoga Works 200-hour Teacher Training (Yoga Alliance registered), Center for Yoga (2006)
The Thinking Body-The Feeling Mind™SM, intensive developmental movement practice and yoga/movement Teacher Training (Yoga Alliance registered), Two Snake Studios (2004 - 2005)
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20+ years of dedicated personal depth psychotherapy
15+ years of contemplative and movement‑based practices (e.g., yoga, dance, somatic/movement arts)
Ongoing personal practice in trauma‑informed, mindfulness‑based, and integrative approaches to healing
