What messages or themes does the Counterpoints film hope to convey to the people of the mental health community?

Its main point is reaching those with mental illnesses to effectively eliminate the fears of therapy, so we can encourage everyone to enter treatment earlier. We realize that the biggest problem is that there are so many people today not reporting their illnesses, and those illnesses spiral out of control fast without treatment, so the film aims to stop that trend.

What is currently causing those people to stay silent or to hesitate when searching for help with their mental illness?

I think there’s a fear of therapy, and that is certainly natural, because there’s so much misinformation out there about it, and it scares people, which is why we want to present therapists that take viewers through the process, so they can see what actually happens in your sessions, and see why therapy is able to help.

Was therapy influential for you or to the main themes in Counterpoints, and if so, how is your own personal therapy sessions influencing those for the film’s content?

When I went into therapy it changed my life, the sessions were the counter to the intrusive thoughts, and my therapist showed me how to form the “counterpoints” by myself, so honestly, without her, I would not be sitting here today. I’ve seen what therapy can do, and that is the foundation to the film, so yes, there is that influence, however, I’m not in the film, it’s not about me, and the real purpose of its content is to apply the powerful, positive effects of therapy to every subset of this mental illness, so that it helps everyone watching, because that’s who it’s really for and about.

How are you preparing for the film in terms of directing or the process of searching for the contributors?

Researching the film industry has been the best way for me to learn how to direct by trying to learn from those past films, and because I want this movie to be as interactive as possible, it absolutely has to connect with people through how we present it, so my intent is for it to be emotional, to be informative, to entertain, plus to be able to motivate people to enter therapy. Preparation in terms of the contributors has been focusing on even more research to ensure we have the top experts, as it pertains to psychology or neuroscience, and in CGI animation, the lighting, the score, and other technical parts, so that we can give everyone everything they expect from the film, then go way past the expectations to reach them in many new ways they have not seen or thought of yet.