More Than “Fine”
You know something needs to change. So why do you keep ending up back here?
A 10-week therapeutic program for men ready to understand and change the patterns that keep costing them.
You may genuinely mean it when you say you’re going to handle things differently. Then something gets uncomfortable.
You shut down. Avoid the conversation. Get defensive. Lose your temper. Put something off until it becomes a much bigger problem. Hide something because telling the truth feels harder in the moment. Make an impulsive decision. Promise yourself it won’t happen again. And eventually, you’re dealing with the same consequences.
More Than “Fine” is for men who are ready to understand the patterns that keep costing them—and practice responding differently when it actually matters.
Not currently scheduled. Join the interest list to hear about future dates.
This may sound familiar.
You don’t need to identify with every example.
You may recognize yourself in things like:
- shutting down or withdrawing when conversations become uncomfortable
- becoming defensive when someone tells you that you hurt them
- avoiding problems until they become harder to fix
- procrastinating or repeatedly failing to follow through
- getting angry, lashing out, or saying things you regret afterward
- hiding, minimizing, omitting, or lying because dealing with the truth feels worse in the moment
- making impulsive or reckless decisions despite knowing the potential consequences
- looking for validation, control, escape, or relief in ways that create new problems
- damaging relationships you actually care about
- understanding your behavior intellectually but struggling to change it when you are activated
- genuinely wanting to do something differently and still finding yourself back in the same cycle
You do not need to arrive already knowing why you do these things.
That is part of the work.
Understanding is not the same as excusing.
There is usually a reason a pattern developed.
Avoidance may have helped you get through conflict. Anger may create distance when vulnerability feels dangerous. Control may quiet uncertainty. Dishonesty may temporarily postpone shame or consequences. Shutting down may have once been the safest option available.
Understanding that matters.
So does what happens next.
This program makes room for both: understanding the experiences, emotions, needs, learned responses, and protective strategies underneath a pattern and taking responsibility for how your choices affect you and the people around you.
The goal is not to decide that your past made you do it.
The goal is to understand yourself well enough that your old response is no longer your only response.
The Framework
What we’re actually working on
01 · Notice
Learn to recognize the pattern earlier—including what happens in your body, thoughts, emotions, and relationships before the behavior occurs.
02 · Understand
Explore what the response is protecting you from, what it accomplishes in the moment, and where some of these strategies may have been learned.
03 · Tolerate
Build greater capacity to stay present with shame, conflict, uncertainty, vulnerability, rejection, frustration, and other experiences that normally trigger escape, control, defensiveness, or impulsive action.
04 · Choose
Practice concrete alternatives while you still have enough capacity to make a choice.
05 · Repair
Develop greater accountability, honesty, follow-through, and ability to address impact when your choices have affected someone else.
The pattern underneath the problem
Throughout the program, participants develop an individualized Pattern Map.
Instead of stopping at
“Why did I do that?”
we slow the sequence down
- 1What happened
- 2What changed inside me
- 3What did I tell myself it meant
- 4What was I feeling
- 5What did I want to escape, control, hide, or protect
- 6What did I do
- 7What did it give me temporarily
- 8What did it cost
- 9What happened afterward
Then we ask two different questions:
Where could I interrupt this?
What would I need to tolerate in order to choose something different?
Most people already know many of the things they should do.
Knowing is not always the problem.
This program works on what happens in the space between knowing and doing.
The 10-Week Arc
What the 10 weeks include
Weeks 1–2
See the Pattern
Recognize recurring cycles, triggers, emotional and body cues, and what happens before the behavior everyone else sees.
Weeks 3–4
Understand What It Does
Explore protective strategies, short-term payoff, attachment and relationship patterns, family-of-origin experiences, learned roles, and beliefs about emotion, vulnerability, control, strength, and needing other people.
Weeks 5–6
Stay Present Longer
Build capacity for uncomfortable emotions and relational stress. Work with shame, defensiveness, projection, emotional regulation, and the ability to hear another person’s experience without immediately escaping or explaining it away.
Weeks 7–8
Interrupt the Cycle
Work with honesty, avoidance, difficult conversations, behavioral choices, and the point where an old strategy can become a different response.
Weeks 9–10
Repair + Keep Going
Practice accountability, repair, follow-through, and responding to setbacks without disappearing back into shame or secrecy. Participants leave with an individualized Pattern Interruption Plan.
Not just talking about it.
This is a structured therapeutic group, not ten weeks of sitting in a circle giving one another advice.
Depending on the needs of the group, sessions may include:
- facilitated therapeutic processing
- pattern mapping
- emotional and nervous-system awareness
- experiential exercises
- attachment and relational work
- parts/ego-state informed exploration
- body-based practices
- communication and relational rehearsal
- reflection and between-session practice
- accountability around real-life behavioral experiments
You will never be required to tell the group your entire history or disclose something simply to prove that you are participating.
We can work deeply without making vulnerability performative.
An invitation is not a command. You can ask questions, name that something does not fit, decline to share personal details, or request that we slow down. At the same time, this is a therapeutic group rather than a class or drop-in support group. Meaningful participation, regular attendance, respect for other members, and a willingness to examine your impact are expected.
What happens between sessions matters.
Each week includes a focused practice to use in real life.
That might mean noticing a pattern without immediately trying to fix it, catching activation earlier, identifying what you are trying not to feel, staying present during a manageable uncomfortable moment, listening without immediately defending yourself, practicing a more direct conversation, or intentionally interrupting a predictable response.
The point is not perfect behavior for ten weeks.
It is learning to recognize the pattern sooner, create more room for choice, and shorten the distance between a mistake, recognition, responsibility, and repair.
This group may be a fit if…
- you recognize recurring patterns affecting your relationships, work, family, or sense of who you want to be
- you are tired of having essentially the same problem in different forms
- you can recognize that other people may have contributed to difficult situations while also being willing to examine your own part
- you want more than insight and are willing to practice something different outside the group
- someone else may have initially pushed you to get help, but there is something you want to change
You do not need to be good at talking about feelings.
You do not need previous group therapy experience.
You do need some willingness to become curious about yourself and take responsibility for what is yours.
What this group is not
More Than “Fine” is not a place for public confession, forced vulnerability, humiliation, or deciding who is right in someone’s relationship.
Understanding a behavior does not erase its impact.
Accountability also does not require self-destruction.
The group does not guarantee reconciliation, forgiveness, or a particular relationship outcome. Other people retain the right to make their own choices and boundaries.
Trauma may be relevant to understanding a participant’s patterns, but this group is not designed for intensive individual trauma processing.
When another type or level of treatment would better fit the primary concern, that will be discussed during screening.
More Than “Fine” or Beyond the Cycle?
More Than “Fine”
The broader program for recurring emotional, behavioral, and relational patterns such as avoidance, anger, defensiveness, dishonesty, withdrawal, impulsivity, difficulty following through, and repeated relationship problems.
Beyond the Cycle
The more specialized pathway when pornography, masturbation, or related recurring sexual behavior is the primary treatment concern.
Explore Beyond the CycleSomeone does not need to determine the right group alone. Screening can help determine which program, if either, is the better clinical fit.
At a Glance
More Than “Fine” is a 10-week closed virtual therapy group for men ages 18 and older who are physically located in Texas, Oregon, Washington, or Colorado at the time of each session.
Format
Closed virtual therapy group
Location
Texas, Oregon, Washington, and Colorado
Participants must be physically located in one of these four states during every session.
Length
10 consecutive weekly sessions
Session Time
105 minutes per session
Schedule
Not currently scheduled. Join the interest list to hear about future dates.
Future meeting dates and times will be announced.
Population
Men ages 18 and older physically located in Texas, Oregon, Washington, or Colorado during every session.
Investment
$1,195
for the complete 10-week program. Payment option: 3 payments of $425 ($1,275 total).
Private pay only. No superbills.
Enrollment
Enrollment is for the complete 10-week program rather than individual sessions.
The payment plan finances the full program and is not pay-per-session attendance.
Materials
Mailed workbook and participant package
Discreet domestic shipping
Consultation
A brief consultation is required before enrollment.
The $40 consultation fee is credited toward tuition if you enroll.
Current Status
Interest List Open
Not currently scheduled. Join the interest list to hear about future dates.
A consistent structure, with room for what emerges
Each meeting will follow a predictable rhythm so participants know what to expect, while leaving enough room to attend to what is happening within the group.
- Arrival and grounding
- Brief individual check-in
- A frame for the week’s focus
- Reflection or experiential practice
- Facilitated group process
- Closing and reorientation
Depending on the session, participants may be invited to notice sensations, reflect in writing, practice language for a difficult conversation, explore a protective response, or consider what is happening between group members in the present moment.
Virtual group therapy requires a genuinely private space.
- Attend from a private location in Texas, Oregon, Washington, or Colorado.
- Provide your physical location at the beginning of each virtual meeting when requested.
- Notify Sasha in advance about planned travel that could affect eligibility to attend.
- Do not participate while physically located in a state where Sasha is not authorized to provide psychotherapy.
- Do not participate while driving, working, intoxicated, or supervising children.
- Use headphones when needed to protect other members’ privacy.
- Do not record, photograph, screenshot, transcribe, or use AI meeting tools during the group.
- Do not allow another person to remain in the room or listen outside the camera’s view.
- Protect the identities and personal information of other group members.
- Understand that Sasha is legally and ethically responsible for maintaining confidentiality, but another participant’s confidentiality cannot be absolutely guaranteed.
- Provide an emergency contact as required for virtual psychotherapy.
What is shared in the room is expected to stay in the room, and every participant commits to that agreement before we begin. That commitment is an expectation we agree to together, not a guarantee I can enforce on someone else’s behalf.
A group can be valuable and still not be the right level of support for every person.
We’ll have a consultation before you enroll. I want to understand what is going on for you, what you are hoping for, and whether this group gives you enough support for where you are right now.
During the consultation, we will discuss your goals, current concerns, available supports, group expectations, privacy, attendance, and anything that could affect your ability to participate safely.
The group may not be the appropriate current level of care when someone needs immediate crisis support, medical stabilization, substance withdrawal support, a higher level of psychiatric care, court-mandated treatment, intimate-partner-violence intervention, sex-offense-specific treatment, or another specialized forensic service.
Having used harmful behavior does not automatically make someone ineligible. However, understanding the reason for a behavior does not remove responsibility for its impact, and this group cannot replace specialized intervention when that is needed.
YOUR PARTICIPANT WORKBOOK
More Than “Fine”: A Private Relational Reflection Workbook
Your investment includes a private relational reflection workbook created for More Than “Fine.” It offers space to notice protection, anger, distance, closeness, support, repair, and how you want to be known in relationships.
You may bring something you noticed into the group when it feels useful, but the workbook remains yours. You will never be required to submit it, show completed pages, or read private reflections aloud.
Before the group begins, each enrolled participant will receive a discreetly mailed More Than “Fine” package created to support the 10-week experience.
- Private More Than “Fine” workbook
- Participant materials
- Quality writing pen
- Grounding object
- Privacy door hanger
- Welcome letter from Sasha
- Sealed final-session reflection
- Discreet standard domestic shipping
This resource is here to support your experience, not to measure your progress. Nothing is submitted, graded, or required to be shared with the group.
Facilitator
Facilitated by Sasha Flores
Sasha Flores, LCSW-S, PMH-C, RYT-200, is licensed to provide psychotherapy in Texas, Oregon, Washington, and Colorado. Her work is compassionately direct, experiential, body-aware, and grounded in both consent and accountability.
Her approach to this group is informed by training in EMDR, Brainspotting, parts and ego-state work, Deep Brain Reorienting, Accelerated Resolution Therapy, Emotionally Focused Therapy, Relational Life Therapy, Gottman Method Couples Therapy, restorative yoga, sexual health, compulsive behaviors, complex trauma, moral injury, and work with military, veteran, law-enforcement, first-responder, and helping-professional communities.
Understanding why something developed does not mean excusing the ways it may be hurting you or someone you love. The work makes room for compassion and accountability at the same time.
Frequently Asked Questions
You do not have to wait until everything falls apart to become curious about what keeps happening.
You may already know that anger, distance, control, shame, or handling everything alone is costing you something.
You do not have to arrive completely comfortable, certain, or ready to tell a group your whole story. The first step is simply letting me know you are interested.