Molly Burrets, Ph.D.

Licensed Clinical Psychologist 

Hi, I’m Dr. Molly Burrets.

I’m a clinical psychologist licensed in the state of California with 15 years of experience practicing psychotherapy, conducting psychological research, and teaching psychology at the undergraduate and graduate levels. 

From my office in the Los Angeles area, I run a private practice where I treat couples and women experiencing anxiety, depression, and reproductive concerns. Many of my clients are high-achieving professionals who have challenges balancing work, home life, and relationships. Having been trained in advocacy and culturally informed care, I’m dedicated to supporting non-traditional couples, members of the LGBTQ+ community, BIPOC, and Veterans. 

I completed my predoctoral residency training at Northwestern University’s Feinberg School of Medicine, where I developed my expertise in women’s issues and couples therapy and received the Distinguished Clinician’s Award. 

At Texas A&M University, I received my Ph.D.. Then I completed a postdoctoral fellowship at the Veterans Affairs Palo Alto Health Care System, conducting couples therapy with United States military Veterans and their spouses. 

An opportunity to treat trauma disorders in women Veteran survivors of military sexual assault deepened my desire to address health and wellness for women and the unique stressors they face. 

For the past five years, I’ve served as Director of the Clinical Psychology Ph.D. program at the California School of Professional Psychology. I am currently in my 10th year on faculty in the program. I’m the head of the Diverse Couples Lab, whose mission is to study relational processes in couples and partners belonging to typically underserved and understudied groups. These groups include ethnic minorities, military couples, LGBTQ+, and interracial/interfaith couples.

I’m also a member of the editorial boards for Couple and Family Psychology: Research and Practice and Training and Education in Professional Psychology. I currently serve as Associate Editor for the Encyclopedia of Couple and Family Therapy. My work has been published in books and scientific journals about relationship issues and couples therapy.

I live in Los Angeles, CA, with my husband, our two children, and our golden retriever.

Re-evaluating the Pursuit to Have it All

I’ve always felt deeply passionate about the work I do — but a time came when the two most important parts of my life collided. After completing my training, I took a demanding position as a professor at a university. Around the same time, I got married, and my husband and I decided to start our family. 

Like many women, I had been told that I could have it all. That I should have it all. And for a moment, I thought that was coming to fruition.

But there I was, training doctoral students, seeing couples in my private practice, managing my household, and trying to care for my infant son. As I continued trying to juggle the demands of motherhood, marriage, and my career I noticed something interesting happening around me. Similar themes to the one in my life were emerging among my clients, students, and colleagues.

These smart, capable, interesting women were losing their identities as people while internalizing the message that they needed to have it all. Which meant they should have high-powered careers, be excellent wives, have children, be amazing mothers — and at all costs — stay thin and attractive. 

I began to get curious about the quest to have it all and the toll it takes on the modern woman. I could see the innate pressure we were under to be successful in every realm of our lives without many of the resources needed to support that success. 

I Started Making Changes, And I Invite You to Join Me

I think we all believe we’re living a life aligned with our values. If asked what those values are, most people would list things like integrity, respect, honesty, and compassion. I might have named them myself if asked a few years ago. But what if we turn inward and dig deeper?

There are actually hundreds of different values, and I poured over them all to choose the one that felt most aligned with who I am at the core of my being. For you, it might be creativity. Or intimacy. Or wealth. 

For me, it was passion. 

Passion became the North Star that helped me start peeling away the parts of my life that no longer served me. If something didn’t inspire passion, it was a no for me. Whether in my relationship with my husband, how I mother my children or the way I show up for my clients, I wanted to feel passionate about my life. 

I decided to release all the things that weren’t guided by passion and true desire but rather by pressure, obligation, perfectionism, and self-abandonment. And I work on maintaining that commitment to myself every day.

MY HOPE IS TO HELP YOU LIVE A FULL LIFE IN TECHNICOLOR

A Life That’s Inspired by, and Aligned With, Your Values — While Releasing the Weight of Everybody Else’s Expectations

Let’s find your North Star, shall we?

And that’s not to say that identifying your highest values will give you a direct route to your destiny. There are so many ways that we get pulled off our path. There are obligations, other people's needs, societal pressures — all the things we do because we think we should, or we must to survive. 

But once you have your internal compass shined up, recalibrated, and ready to lead the way, it gives you a  way to sort through the many things that are vying for your attention and energy. If something isn’t aligned with your values and what feels authentic to you, it could move you further away from where you want to be. 

Making decisions with your North Star as a guide will bring you out of the wings of your life and onto center stage. As you align with your values, you become more of who you truly are and bring your fully expressed self into all parts of your life. 

Your work feels more purposeful and less exhausting.  A sense of balance among all the moving parts becomes attainable. And maybe most importantly, your relationships develop a richness and depth that is hard, if not impossible, to achieve when you’re spread too thin to be fully present with the people around you. 

It doesn’t matter if it’s your partner, children, friends, or community members. Relationships are at the core of how human beings experience themselves. I want to help you build a more satisfying relationship with yourself and others. 

Whether working directly with me in psychotherapy or doing inner work on your own, identifying your core values is an essential first step. But it’s only the beginning. 

The beginning of a journey to identifying (and eliminating) the barriers that get in the way of living as your most authentic self, and I can promise one thing. It’s a journey you won’t want to miss.

First things first. Take the values quiz to investigate what it is within you that will guide you to the fullest life that only you can create.