Gary Carr

I offer in-person and online sessions to individuals and couples on Tuesdays, Wednesdays and Thursdays, between 9am and 5.30pm.

I am an experienced Gestalt Psychotherapist, working independently in the beautiful city of Edinburgh. I firmly believe anyone can benefit from a period of therapy, whether things currently feel really tough for you, or you just know you want to change an area of your life. I offer a safe, affordable and confidential service suited to your needs.

Finding the right therapist is tricky. It's a bit like stepping into the unknown. My advice is to take your time and trust your instincts. Remember, a therapist needs to be someone with whom you feel comfortable enough to share your most personal stuff. Getting this relationship right is the most important factor in any therapy. Also make sure they are suitably qualified and insured, a member of a professional body, that they adhere to a code of ethics, and are in regular supervision.

I hope you will get in touch. If there's anything else you want to know, I'm very happy to answer any of your questions. Afterwards you are under absolutely no obligation to work with me - though of course I hope you will!

What I Offer

I offer you my expertise and experience of over 20 years. As a qualified Gestalt Psychotherapist, having practised since 2001 and trained in both Person Centred and Gestalt Therapy, I believe that we all carry the solutions to our own problems and for each of us that involves a unique journey.

Gestalt Psychotherapy

Gestalt psychotherapy is a wonderfully relational, embodied, creative approach to therapy, which holds that each of us is only explainable in relation to the environment in which we live and are part of. How we behave from moment to moment depends on our constantly changing environmental conditions. When we get stuck, it's usually because certain ways of being contact with the world that once provided a solution have become fixed and we have stopped adapting to our changing conditions.

Working together

You can work with me as an individual or as a couple. Our work together is to develop awareness of yourself in relation - your thoughts, feelings, attitudes and behaviours in different situations - and to gain greater acceptance of yourself. We will explore how you have become stuck in particular areas of your life. You will gain a greater understanding of how you can support yourself better to experiment with doing things differently and take greater responsibility for your life. Throughout I will offer you my support when you feel vulnerable and my challenge when it might be useful for you to consider a different option. Together we can learn how you can increase your choices about how you live life creatively and relate more fully to others.

Coming for Therapy

There are times in all our lives when we lose direction and find it difficult to cope. Often this is because of unhelpful patterns in which we've become stuck and can no longer find a way out. Having someone with whom to share this confusion, anger and pain can begin to unscramble our thoughts and feelings, grow our awareness and uncover solutions to resolve our difficulties.

Appointments

I currently offer daytime appointments for both individuals and couples at my offices near Haymarket Station in the city centre. Sessions are fifty minutes for individuals and one hour for couples and are normally weekly, at the same time each week (though I can be flexible on this).

During our first session we will discuss whether to meet only for for a short number of sessions or for a longer period. This can then be reviewed periodically.

I offer space for supervises Tuesdays-Thursday, occasional Fridays, both in-person and online. 

I am a UKCP-accredited Gestalt psychotherapist and supervisor. I work independently from my office in the beautiful city of Edinburgh, as well as offering online availability for therapist in other parts of the country and beyond. 

My aim is to create a collaborative, dialogic space where we can explore your clinical work with curiosity and authenticity. Rather than offering prescriptive answers, I will support you to attend closely to what is emerging in the here and now as we explore your clients, the relationship between you and them, parallel processes emerging between us and an attention to the wider field.

With over 25 years of experience, I bring a steady, attuned presence and a capacity to hold complexity without rushing to resolution. I value openness, humility, and genuine contact, and I am attentive to both spoken and embodied processes. My approach is warm, grounded, and respectfully challenging, encouraging supervisees to deepen their awareness of patterns, interruptions, and relational dynamics.

I hold a strong commitment to ethical practice and ongoing professional development, and I aim to foster a reflective environment where you can feel supported to take risks, expand your practice, and develop greater confidence in your own therapeutic voice.

My work as a supervisor of counsellors and psychotherapists is grounded in Gestalt principles and strongly informed by the Seven-Eyed Model of Supervision

With a strong emphasis on awareness, presence, and the relational field, our attention to process is central. I encourage supervisees to notice patterns, interruptions, and embodied responses, using these as valuable sources of information. By staying close to immediate experience, we can uncover meaning that may be obscured by interpretation alone. I also hold an interest in how you make contact, how you engage, withdraw, and navigate boundaries, both in your client work and within supervision itself.

Ultimately, I see my role as one of fostering a reflective, supportive environment; one that promotes growth, ethical practice, and a deepened capacity for relational attunement.

Our first session focuses on building a sense of safety, clarity, and shared purpose. We will take time to get to know one another and explore what you are bringing to supervision at this stage of your practice. 

Together, we will establish a clear contract for our work, including boundaries, expectations, confidentiality, and how we will approach feedback and challenge. I want us to create a supportive framework within which your clinical work, professional development, and reflective practice can unfold with openness and trust.