About Mara
Mara Bruckner is a licensed Marriage and Family Therapist with more than 22 years of clinical experience in California. She has worked in independent practice and in county and state-funded programs, and she brings a calm, conversational style to sessions. Mara focuses on clear, practical steps and makes room for humor when it helps lighten difficult topics.
She helps people facing stress, anxiety, depression, grief, addictions, and issues around intimacy and relationships.
How Mara works
Mara also supports people dealing with parenting challenges, career transitions, self-esteem struggles, bipolar disorder, and life changes. Her work includes attention to family of origin concerns, communication breakdowns, feelings of emptiness, and isolation or loneliness. Mara uses a mix of Client-Centered Therapy, Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT), psychodynamic ideas, and Solution-Focused Therapy.
She adapts techniques to fit each person's needs and encourages clients to take an active role in shaping sessions. Sessions are conversational and goal-oriented, with practical tools to try between meetings. Those who connect with Mara often want straightforward guidance and small steps they can practice.
She values respect, collaboration, and pacing that matches how someone is coping in the moment. Her approach aims to reduce overwhelm and help people feel more in control of daily life. Mara offers sessions in English and conducts therapy online through video calls, phone sessions, live chat, or text-based messaging.
She draws on years of experience to help people find workable strategies and clearer next steps.
Mara lists 4 ways of working on the entry:
What Mara works with
The areas below are the ones Mara selected when setting up a profile. The first few are listed as the main focus; the rest are also named.
- Stress, Anxiety
- Relationship issues
- Family conflicts
Also listed
- Abandonment
- Addictions
- Aging and geriatric issues
- Anger management
- Autism and Asperger Syndrome
- Bipolar disorder
- Career difficulties
- Communication problems
- Control issues
- Coping with life changes
- Depression
- Emptiness
- Family of origin issues
- Family problems
- Forgiveness
- Grief
- Guilt and shame
- Hoarding
- Impulsivity
- Intellectual disability
- Intimacy-related issues
- Isolation / loneliness
- Jealousy
- LGBT
- Life purpose
- Midlife crisis
- Mood disorders
- Obsessions, compulsions, and OCD
- Panic disorder and panic attacks
- Parenting issues
- Phobias
- Seasonal Affective Disorder (SAD)
- Self esteem
- Self-harm
- Sexual dysfunction
- Social anxiety and phobia
Training and background
| Register | LMFT |
|---|---|
| Years in practice | 22 |
| Languages | English |
| Session format | Online: video, phone, live chat or messaging |
| Country | California |
Memberships and registers are shown as supplied; they are not licences, and this directory does not verify them.
Online support options
How Mara's Approaches Work Online
Mara frequently uses Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT) to help people identify unhelpful thinking patterns and replace them with practical skills. CBT is often useful for anxiety, depression, phobias, and relationship stress because it gives specific strategies to try between sessions.She also draws on Client-Centered Therapy, which focuses on listening closely and shaping sessions around each person's experience. This approach helps people feel heard and play an active role in deciding goals and next steps.
Finding the right approach is part of the work together. Mara will discuss options and tailor techniques to the client's needs, goals, and comfort level. The process is collaborative, with ongoing adjustment based on what is or isn't helping.
Online sessions are offered through video calls, phone sessions, live chat, or text-based messaging to make therapy more flexible. Video calls let people connect face to face, phone sessions work well when bandwidth is limited, live chat suits shorter check-ins, and messaging is useful for ongoing reflection between meetings. These options let people fit therapy into busy schedules and choose what feels most manageable.
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Common questions
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A practical next step
Write down two things you would want to be different in six months. That is the most useful thing to bring to a first session, whoever it is with. If you would rather start now than keep reading, online sessions are the quickest route.
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