Steven Karras

My Passion

You are sacred. This is true no matter what you’ve gone through in your life, and what wounds you have experienced. My work is rooted in compassion, which literally means “to suffer with.” God is with us, and He created us to be a loving and compassionate presence with each other as well.

My family immigrated here from Egypt, and I am passionate about working with trauma, immigrants, and refugees. When I’m not doing therapy, I am the Children’s Ministry Director at Rancho Bernardo Community Presbyterian Church, where I also provide administrative support and participate in missions trips to Egypt. I speak Arabic and some Spanish.

My Approach

I use a combination of narrative and experiential therapy in a way that separates the person from the problem, meeting the person and the problem separately. I help you care for yourself as you navigate life and overcome challenges.

Questions such as “What do you do for fun?” seem small but are in fact a huge part of my therapeutic approach. They are the gateway for meeting person-to-person, giving us a starting point from which to explore the problems that brought you in. I want to know what you care about, so we can focus on your goals for therapy.

My Training

• Undergraduate Degree in Psychology, Point Loma Nazarene University

• M.A. in Marital and Family Therapy, Bethel Seminary

• PREPARE/ENRICH Program Facilitator

• Eye Movement Desensitization Reprocessing (EMDR)

• Narrative Therapy

• Experiential Therapy

• Supervised by Adam Erlenbusch, LMFT #80877