Finding the right therapist is part of the work.
Each clinician brings a distinct voice, area of focus, and way of working. We have offices in West Los Angeles, West Hollywood and Los Feliz.
Psychologist
Psychoanalyst
Philip Lance’s work as a psychologist and psychoanalyst reflects the culmination of three distinct yet deeply interconnected careers. Before entering clinical practice, he served as an Episcopal priest and later founded a large nonprofit community development corporation experiences that continue to inform his dedication to spiritual, educational, and psychological human development.
He maintains a full-time private practice in West Hollywood, where he works with individuals while also mentoring pre-licensed associates and supervising clinical interns. His commitment to the field extends into teaching and scholarship, including work with doctoral students at graduate schools and psychoanalytic institutes, as well as hosting the New Books in Psychoanalysis podcast for many years.
His academic and clinical interests focus on the intersection of psychoanalysis and critical theory, particularly sexuality studies, Lacanian thought, and queer theory. Trained at The Psychoanalytic Center of California, his doctoral work, Toward a Gay-Centered Liberation Psychology, reflects these longstanding interests. His research has been featured in Studies in Gender and Sexuality and the Harvard Gay & Lesbian Review.
Associate Marriage & Family Therapist
Marco Naggar, AMFT, works with adults, young adults, couples, and families who are navigating life transitions, questions of identity, relationship challenges, trauma, and periods of profound personal change. Many of his clients are thoughtful, curious, and highly reflective people who want more than symptom relief—they are interested in understanding the deeper emotional patterns and unconscious dynamics that shape their lives. He has a particular interest in working with young adults finding their own path, new parents and fathers, LGBTQIA+ individuals, transgender and gender-expansive clients, and those wrestling with the expectations that can accompany influential families, achievement, or affluence. His work is informed by psychoanalytic, Jungian, depth, and Object Relations traditions. He aims to create a warm, collaborative space where clients can explore their inner world, deepen their self-understanding, and move toward a life that feels more authentic, meaningful, and fully their own. Marco is supervised by Dr. Philip Lance. Office location: 2150 Hillhurst Avenue in Los Feliz.
Registered Psychologist
Jordan Rodriguez, PhD, is currently a Psychological Associate in West Hollywood, offering individual psychotherapy to adults. His clinical interests include “difficult to reach” patients, clients who function on a borderline spectrum, and young men’s issues around identity, intimacy, and the defensive adoption of “manosphere” ideologies.
He received extensive clinical training in the theory and technique of the British object relations model, while completing his pre- and postdoctoral training at Valley Community Counseling Clinic in North Hollywood, where he provided psychoanalytic psychotherapy to the diverse populations of the San Fernando Valley in Greater Los Angeles. He completed a one-year certificate in psychoanalytic psychotherapy at the Psychoanalytic Center of California.
Dr. Rodriguez earned his doctorate in clinical psychology from The Chicago School in Anaheim, California. His dissertation, “Toward a Psychoanalytic Understanding of Intra-White Conflict,” is a contribution to the psychoanalytic literature on Whiteness and othering. He also holds credentials from the University of California Berkeley and Staffordshire University in philosophy. In addition to his psychotherapy work, he also works as a neuropsychological associate in a private practice in West Covina and is on the faculty of a graduate program in clinical psychology where he teaches courses on psychodynamic theory and the integration of neurobiology with psychoanalysis. Jordan’s is supervised by Dr. Philip Lance. Office location: 566 S. San Vicente Bl in West Hollywood.
Registered Psychologist
Hilary Zipperstein, PhD, is a Psychological Associate. She holds a B.A. in Literature, an M.A. in Psychology, and a Ph.D. in Clinical Psychology with a Depth Emphasis. Since 2018, she has worked in trauma-focused, psychoanalytic community clinics with survivors of severe sexual trauma, people recovering from addiction, formerly incarcerated and unhoused populations, LGBTQIA+ couples and individuals, and people exploring nontraditional relationship structures. Her orientation integrates Jungian and Lacanian psychoanalysis, existential philosophy, literature, mythology, and non-dual approaches to psychological and spiritual transformation.
Hilary works best with thoughtful, high-achieving creatives, lawyers, academics, and entrepreneurs who are successful in important areas of life, yet find themselves constrained by self-doubt, repetitive relational patterns, identity issues, longings, inhibitions, and grief. She specializes in relationships, sexuality, intimacy, LGBTQIA+ support, exploration and reconnection to desire, and expansion of emotional, creative, and relational capacity so that my patients may reach their fullest potential. She attends closely to dreams, language, fantasy, symbolism, and the unconscious patterns that shape our choices, hold us back, and set us free. She sees therapy as a practice of love grown from trust, sometimes rapturous and energetic, often tender, sometimes brutal, always unconditional, and best when cultivated over time, with patience, attention, and above all, respect. Her unique style of therapy requires openness to the uncomfortable and the unknown, and a willingness to be transformed by what we discover. Her hope is that through working together, you will integrate your desires, find peace within your conflicts, soften your reactivity to make space for understanding, and expand your sense of freedom so that your appreciation for and enjoyment of life grows limitless. Hilary is supervised by Philip Lance. Office location: 8271 Melrose Ave in West Hollywood.
Associate Social Worker
Laura Gillespie is an Associate Clinical Social Worker who provides primarily in-person psychotherapy to adults and couples on the eastside of Los Angeles, with offices in Los Feliz and Highland Park. She specializes in working with thoughtful, intellectually engaged individuals who often find themselves stuck despite considerable insight, self-awareness, and effort. Many of her clients are academics, former academics, professionals, creatives, and others who have spent much of their lives relying on intelligence, reflection, and problem-solving, yet continue to feel stuck in ways that insight alone has not been able to change. Drawing on both her clinical training and her background as a former academic, she strives to create a therapeutic space where unconscious patterns can be explored with curiosity, compassion, and honesty. She believes that meaningful change often emerges not from acquiring more insight alone, but from developing a deeper relationship with one’s emotional experience. Her style is warm, collaborative, and attentive to the complexity of each person’s inner life. Dr. Gillespie is an affinity therapist for LGBTQ+ clients and works regularly and thoughtfully across racial difference.
Laura earned her M.S.W. from the Smith College School for Social Work and holds a Ph.D. in Philosophy from the University of California, Los Angeles. Prior to becoming a psychotherapist, she was a Postdoctoral Fellow at Stanford University’s McCoy Family Center for Ethics in Society. She is a member of the American Psychoanalytic Association, the American Association for Psychoanalysis in Clinical Social Work, and Division 39 of the American Psychological Association. Laura is supervised by Dr. Philip Lance, PhD. Office locations in Los Feliz and Highland Park.
Registered Psychologist
Danny Pimentel, PhD, is a Licensed Marriage and Family Therapist and Registered Psychologist whose work is informed by a relational psychoanalytic and psychodynamic orientation. He works with adults experiencing anxiety, depression, burnout, life transitions, relationship difficulties, and concerns related to identity, self-esteem, and belonging. His clinical interests include men’s issues, first-generation and Latino experiences, attachment and relational patterns, academic and professional pressures, loneliness, and identity development across cultural, racial, and sexual dimensions.
Danny views psychological difficulties within the context of unconscious processes, developmental experiences, relational patterns, and sociocultural influences. His approach integrates relational psychodynamic therapy with Internal Family Systems (IFS), narrative, person-centered, and multicultural perspectives. He is particularly interested in how culture, family systems, and lived experience shape the development of the self and influence the ways individuals relate to themselves and others. His goal is to foster a therapeutic relationship that supports insight, emotional growth, and deeper engagement with one’s authentic self. Danny’s work is supervised by Dr. Philip Lance. Office location: Telehealth only.
Licensed Marriage & Family Therapist
Laura Gillespie is an Associate Clinical Social Worker who provides primarily in-person psychotherapy to adults and couples on the eastside of Los Angeles, with offices in Los Feliz and Highland Park. She specializes in working with thoughtful, intellectually engaged individuals who often find themselves stuck despite considerable insight, self-awareness, and effort. Many of her clients are academics, former academics, professionals, creatives, and others who have spent much of their lives relying on intelligence, reflection, and problem-solving, yet continue to feel stuck in ways that insight alone has not been able to change. Drawing on both her clinical training and her background as a former academic, she strives to create a therapeutic space where unconscious patterns can be explored with curiosity, compassion, and honesty. She believes that meaningful change often emerges not from acquiring more insight alone, but from developing a deeper relationship with one’s emotional experience. Her style is warm, collaborative, and attentive to the complexity of each person’s inner life. Dr. Gillespie is an affinity therapist for LGBTQ+ clients and works regularly and thoughtfully across racial difference.
Laura earned her M.S.W. from the Smith College School for Social Work and holds a Ph.D. in Philosophy from the University of California, Los Angeles. Prior to becoming a psychotherapist, she was a Postdoctoral Fellow at Stanford University’s McCoy Family Center for Ethics in Society. She is a member of the American Psychoanalytic Association, the American Association for Psychoanalysis in Clinical Social Work, and Division 39 of the American Psychological Association. Laura’s work is supervised by Philip Lance, PhD.
