Clinician

Jenny Santi

LMHC

I am a New York State-licensed mental health counselor and performance coach working with adults of all ages and from a wide range of backgrounds. I support individuals navigating depression, anxiety, relationship difficulties, career challenges, life transitions, and questions of identity, meaning, purpose, and belonging.

I have extensive experience working with founders, executives, entrepreneurs, and professionals navigating the pressures that can accompany ambition and achievement. I particularly enjoy helping people through career and identity transitions, including those questioning who they are beyond their professional roles or looking to bring more creativity, spontaneity, and meaning into their lives.

I also have a strong interest in working with immigrants, expats, third-culture individuals, and others navigating questions of identity and belonging.

What should I expect in our first session? 

Our first session is a conversation about what brought you to therapy, what is happening in your life now, and what you would like to be different. I will want to understand both the immediate concern and the larger context, including your relationships, work, family, history, and patterns you have noticed in your life.

My style is active and collaborative. I want clients to feel heard, but I also believe therapy should help you identify patterns, consider new perspectives, and determine what you can do differently moving forward.

How do you describe your therapeutic approach?

My approach is integrative, active, and highly individualized. I draw from cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT), person-centered therapy, motivational interviewing, existential psychotherapy, narrative therapy, coaching, and psychedelic integration.

I tailor our work to your personality, history, culture, circumstances, and goals. Sometimes we need to understand how you got here. Sometimes we need to decide where you want to go. Often, we need to do both.

How long have you been practicing?

Before becoming a psychotherapist, I spent nearly two decades advising individuals and families on questions involving careers, relationships, wealth, impact, legacy, and major life decisions. My previous career included serving as Head of Philanthropy Services for UBS and working as an entrepreneur before returning to graduate school to train as a psychotherapist.

That experience continues to inform my clinical work, particularly with clients whose professional and emotional lives are deeply intertwined. Career challenges often involve identity, self-worth, perfectionism, family expectations, or fear, and our work can address both the practical and emotional dimensions.

What’s the most rewarding part of your job?

I love seeing someone begin to see themselves differently. Sometimes that leads to a major life decision, but often it begins with something smaller: recognizing a pattern, responding differently in a relationship, doing something they have avoided, or questioning a story they have told themselves for years.

Ultimately, I want to help people become more active authors of their own lives.

What inspired you to get into counseling?

My own experience with psychotherapy played an important role in my decision to become a counselor. At one point, I realized I had accomplished many of the things I once believed would make me happy but was still questioning what fulfillment meant to me.

Working with a psychotherapist who had a profound impact on my life ultimately helped inspire my own professional reinvention. It left me deeply interested in the questions that often bring people to therapy: Who am I? What matters to me? Am I living in a way that feels true to m

In another life, if you weren’t working in counseling, what would you be doing?

I do not have to imagine another life because I am also a working artist and painter in New York City.

I came to art seriously as an adult, and it has shown me what can happen when we allow ourselves to develop identities beyond the ones we already know. I see many parallels between painting and psychotherapy: both require curiosity, experimentation, close observation, and a willingness to tolerate uncertainty.

What’s something your clients might be surprised to learn about you?

I have traveled to 55 countries and have lived in Manila, Singapore, London, and New York. Those experiences are part of why I am so interested in identity, belonging, and reinvention. I am also a working painter and love dogs, fashion, flowers, and Japanese food.

What is a self-care ritual you practice?

I think of self-care less as a single ritual and more as staying curious about what helps us live meaningful and fulfilling lives. Over the years, meditation, travel, art, and other personal-development practices have all been important parts of that exploration for me. These experiences have deepened my curiosity about the different ways we change, understand ourselves, and create lives that feel meaningful.

Experience and Accolades

  • Author of The Giving Way to Happiness: Stories & Science Behind the Life-Changing Power of Giving (Penguin Random House), with a foreword by Deepak Chopra
  • Former Head of Philanthropy Services for UBS Wealth Management
  • Co-founder of the Post-Exit Entrepreneurs Retreat (PEER), created for entrepreneurs navigating identity and purpose after an exit
  • Working artist and painter in New York City, with work held in private collections including that of Lionel Richie
  • Featured in international media including BBC, Fox News, The New York Times, TIME, Psychology Today, and Big Think
  • MA in Counseling for Mental Health and Wellness, New York University
  • MBA, INSEAD; exchange at the Wharton School

Pronouns

She/Her

Languages

English, Filipino, intermediate French

Education

MA in counseling for mental health and wellness (NYU), MBA (Institut Européen d’Administration des Affaires, Wharton Business School)

Works With

Adults, Families

Licenses and Certifications

Licensed Mental Health Counselor (LMHC), Chartered Advisor in Philanthropy

Specialties

Depression, anxiety, existential and identity concerns, relationship issues, burnout, loneliness, career concerns and transitions, purpose and meaning, creativity and self-expression, interpersonal conflict, immigration and cross-cultural adjustment, third-culture identity, psychedelic integration

Style

Interested in working with Jenny Santi?

Experience and Accolades

  • Author of The Giving Way to Happiness: Stories & Science Behind the Life-Changing Power of Giving (Penguin Random House), with a foreword by Deepak Chopra
  • Former Head of Philanthropy Services for UBS Wealth Management
  • Co-founder of the Post-Exit Entrepreneurs Retreat (PEER), created for entrepreneurs navigating identity and purpose after an exit
  • Working artist and painter in New York City, with work held in private collections including that of Lionel Richie
  • Featured in international media including BBC, Fox News, The New York Times, TIME, Psychology Today, and Big Think
  • MA in Counseling for Mental Health and Wellness, New York University
  • MBA, INSEAD; exchange at the Wharton School

Get in touch

We provide personalized, hands-on care

Reach out to us using any of the contacts below or our general contact form.