Meet Lisa Kleingarn, MA, LMFT
Licensed Marriage & Family Therapist & Certified Emotionally Focused Therapist
Compassionate listener, hope creator, and empathetic guide helping couples and individuals build stronger connections.
My Mantra: “We're in this together.”
If you've never gone through therapy before, you'll learn that couples or individual counseling is a process—but on the other side of that process can be a deeper, more intimate connection with your partner and yourself.
If you have prior experience in therapy, you'll find that my approach is to create a supportive space for you to be vulnerable, recognized, and heard. My clients often describe me as warm, welcoming, nonjudgmental, direct, and funny. Together, we explore your challenges and hopes and chart a path toward the changes you'd like to see.
Above all, I love the work that I do and am consistently amazed by the transformations I witness in my clients.
It's My Job to Hold Hope
My official title may be "relationship therapist," but I like to think of it this way: it's my job to hold hope. For you. For your relationship. Through difficult life seasons and in the toughest of moments. Because hope can create space for change and get those long stuck places within ourselves and our relationships moving again.
It's also my job to be a clearer of new paths.
You likely find yourself caught in the same patterns in your relationships and in your life. Together, we'll identify the stuck and hurt places as the first step on the path to new ways of thinking and doing that can usher in the changes you'd like to see. And we'll work through your challenges with the help of a healthy dose of humor.
How I Work
My training, work, and personal experiences have shown me that change is facilitated through attunement to and relentless empathy for you. With trust and safety established between us, I can challenge you where you need to be challenged and help you identify and move through those blocks to the changes you desire.
From more than five decades on the planet and after many therapy sessions with a diversity of people, there is little that shocks me, and there's no topic that's off-limits during therapy.
What Informs My Work
In addition to my professional training, I am informed by my own experiences, including:
Divorce and remarriage into a growing blended family that now includes grandchildren
Parenting two kids (now young adults)
Being adopted
Surviving cancer
Living abroad
Like you, I've had my own challenges and understand first-hand that everyone goes through difficult seasons in life and needs help once in a while. I am here to help you.
Credentials & Training
I have a master's degree in Marriage and Family Therapy from St. Mary's University and am licensed by the states of Minnesota and Iowa as a Licensed Marriage and Family Therapist (LMFT). I am certified by the International Center for Excellence in Emotionally Focused Therapy (ICEEFT) as a Certified Emotionally Focused Therapist.
As part of my ongoing commitment to professional development, I am a member of the Minnesota Association for Marriage and Family Therapy and the International Center for Excellence in Emotionally Focused Therapy, and attend a variety of trainings to keep my skills and knowledge current.
My practice is LGBTQIA affirming.
In My Real-Life Job Description, I:
Listen compassionately to your experience
Witness growth and change
Collaborate in healing
Hold space for all of the emotions
Believe in science, social justice, that Black lives matter, and that families take many different forms
Do my best to be an LGBTQIA ally
Seek humor in even the darkest of places
Occasionally break rules
Love my fellow humans
Start With a Free Consultation
One of the most important factors in the success of counseling is the relationship you have with your therapist. That's why I offer a no-cost, 20-minute phone consultation so you can get a sense of me and how it might feel to work together.