Clea Weiss, LCSW

Clea Weiss is a licensed clinical social worker with 25 years of experience helping adults navigate life changes. She focuses on practical steps people can take to reduce anxiety, manage depression, and improve relationships. Her style is straightforward and compassionate, meant to help someone feel heard and move forward. She uses cognitive behavioral therapy to help people notice unhelpful thoughts and try small behavior changes. She also draws on client-centered and emotionally focused methods to build trust and strengthen emotional connection. Psychodynamic ideas and solution-focused work help uncover patterns and set achievable goals. Sessions are collaborative. Clea listens first, then helps set clear, realistic goals. She often gives concrete tools and short exercises to practice between sessions. Some work can include creative assignments when that feels useful. Clea has worked with people dealing with grief, parenting strain, blended family challenges, infidelity, divorce and separation, social anxiety, and issues around self-esteem and career decisions. She also supports those coping with bipolar disorder and other mood concerns, helping them manage symptoms in daily life. People who prefer direct feedback and practical steps tend to do well with her approach. She aims to create a steady pace, balancing emotional exploration with skills practice. Her office is in New Jersey and she offers several online session formats to fit different schedules.

How her approaches translate to online therapy

Cognitive behavioral therapy helps people identify and change unhelpful thoughts and habits. Online sessions can focus on concrete skills, homework, and short behavior experiments to practice between meetings. Emotionally focused work centers on understanding feelings and improving emotional connection in relationships; it can be done over video to preserve facial and vocal cues. Client-centered therapy emphasizes listening and collaboration, giving people space to set the pace and topics for the work. Choosing a method is a shared decision. The therapist will talk with each person about goals, preferences, and what has helped in the past. Together they decide whether to lean into CBT techniques for symptom relief, use emotionally focused work for relationship concerns, or combine approaches to match the client's needs. Online formats offer practical flexibility. Video calls let the therapist and client use visual cues and share worksheets. Phone sessions can be easier when bandwidth or camera use is limited. Live chat and text-based messaging support brief check-ins, progress notes, or ongoing support between longer sessions. These options make it simpler to fit therapy into a busy schedule and to keep continuity when life gets hectic.