About Anne Dranitsaris, Ph.D
Helping People Understand What Keeps Them Stuck and Become Who They Are Meant to Be
Anne Dranitsaris, Ph.D., is a psychotherapist, relationship and leadership coach, author, and co-developer of the Striving Styles Personality System®.
Her work is grounded in a central question: what keeps capable, intelligent people repeating patterns that limit their happiness, relationships and growth?
Anne helps people understand the protective behaviors and unconscious rules shaping their lives, then develop the capacities needed for healthier relationships, greater personal satisfaction, and more authentic leadership.
A Life’s Work Grounded in One Question
Anne has spent her professional life asking one central question: what keeps people from becoming who they are meant to be?
That question has shaped her work as a psychotherapist, coach, author and educator. Again and again, she has seen capable, intelligent people understand their patterns yet remain unable to change them because the emotional capacities needed for healthier choices were never fully developed.
Her work helps people recognize the protective roles, unconscious rules and survival behaviors shaping their relationships, personal lives and leadership, then begin the developmental work required to live differently.
Moving Beyond Insight Into Lasting Change
Many people understand their patterns. They know they overgive, overfunction, avoid conflict, doubt themselves, try too hard to please others or remain in relationships that do not meet their needs. Yet insight alone does not necessarily give them the emotional capacity to behave differently.
Anne’s developmental approach helps people understand how early conditioning, emotional needs, personality and learned survival behaviors shape the way they relate to themselves and others. When the conditions needed for healthy development are missing, people often rely on an adaptive Imposter Persona: a version of themselves organized around protection, approval, control, perfectionism, avoidance or caretaking.
Her work is not limited to managing symptoms or teaching people how to cope more effectively. It helps clients build the emotional and relational capacities they need to make different choices, create healthier relationships and live with greater authenticity, resilience and self-direction.
Watching people move from survival behaviors into more fulfilling lives and relationships is at the heart of Anne’s work.
Experience Grounded in Human Development
Anne draws on a rich and diverse body of knowledge, including psychodynamic therapy, attachment theory, Jungian psychology, and contemporary neuroscience. She is also the co-developer of the Striving Styles Personality System, a framework that helps people understand how their brain functions are organized, the needs that drive behavior, and how they behave when self-activating or self-protecting.
This integration of depth and practicality is a defining feature of her work. It allows her to meet people where they are while guiding them toward meaningful and lasting transformation.
An Interdisciplinary Foundation
Anne’s professional training reflects her lifelong interest in understanding human development from multiple perspectives.
She completed a rigorous six-year diploma program in psychotherapy at the Centre for Training in Psychotherapy in Toronto and earned her Ph.D. in Therapeutic Counseling from the Open International University for Complementary Medicine. She also studied business management at Ryerson University and completed a diploma in advanced dispute resolution through the ADR Institute of Ontario, strengthening her ability to work with leaders, organizations and individuals navigating conflict and change.
During a professional sabbatical, Anne expanded her understanding of the relationship between the mind, brain, and body through studies in brain and behavior, mindfulness, and stress reduction. She studied the work of Dr. Daniel Amen and Jon Kabat-Zinn and completed training to facilitate the Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction Program through the University of Toronto.
This period led her to establish the Centre for Mindful Therapies, where she integrated mindfulness and cognitive behavioral practices into her psychotherapy, coaching and consulting work.
Anne has continued to deepen her knowledge through studies in Disorders of the Self at the Masterson Institute in New York, cognitive behavioral therapy, neuropsychology, attachment, archetypal psychology and the work of leading teachers including Dr. Daniel Siegel and Caroline Myss.
Her broad educational background allows her to bring depth, practicality and a developmental perspective to her work with clients, readers and audiences.
An Author Focused on Development, Relationships and Authenticity
Anne is the author and co-author of books exploring personal development, relationship patterns, codependency, Imposter Syndrome, career fulfilment and leadership effectiveness.
Across her writing, she challenges the idea that people are broken or destined to repeat the same patterns forever. Instead, she offers readers a developmental understanding of why they became organized around particular protective behaviors and what is required to change them.
Her books help readers recognize the unconscious beliefs and relationship rules guiding their choices, understand the difference between their self-protective persona and their Authentic Self, and begin the work of developing the capacities required for healthier, more meaningful lives.
Advancing Personality Theory and Assessment
Anne’s interest in personality grew from a desire to help people understand more than their preferences or surface-level traits. She wanted to explore the deeper emotional needs, habitual behaviors and self-protective patterns that influence how people live, relate and lead.
Certified in both the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator® (MBTI®) and the Emotional Quotient Inventory (EQ-i®), Anne has used these tools extensively in leadership development, team effectiveness, and her therapeutic work with individuals and couples. Her experience showed her the value of personality and emotional intelligence assessments, while also revealing the need for a deeper framework that could explain why people repeat self-limiting patterns and what they need to develop to live and relate more authentically.
Through her work in leadership development programs, Anne saw both the value and the limitations of relying on multiple assessments to understand the whole person. The tools offered useful insights into personality preferences and emotional intelligence, but they did not fully explain the deeper emotional needs, protective patterns, and developmental blocks that influence how people behave, relate, and lead. After writing the article and quiz Who Are You Meant to Be? for O, The Oprah Magazine, Anne and her daughter, Heather Dranitsaris-Hilliard, began developing a more integrated approach to personality and human development.
Together, they co-created the Striving Styles Personality System® (SSPS®), a framework that identifies eight distinct Striving Styles and explores the relationship between personality, emotional needs, brain organization and behavior. The system helps people understand their natural strengths, the conditions they need to thrive, and the self-protective patterns that can limit their development and satisfaction.
Their work led to the publication of Who Are You Meant to Be? A Groundbreaking Step-by-Step Process for Discovering and Fulfilling Your True Potential.
Today, the Striving Styles Personality System® is central to Anne’s work with individuals, couples, leaders and organizations. Through assessment, interpretation sessions, coaching, workshops and leadership development programs, she helps people use this insight to strengthen relationships, make more satisfying career choices, improve leadership effectiveness and continue developing their Authentic Self.
Through books, articles, guides, and client work, Anne offers a thoughtful and trustworthy path for people who want to move beyond repetition and toward deeper authenticity, resilience, and connection.
★★★★★