Brooklyn psychotherapist uses puppetry to help people cope amid pandemic
News 12 StaffJan 15, 2021, 8:29am EST
Updated on:Jan 15, 2021, 8:29am EST
A puppet in Brooklyn is
helping people all over the world cope with deep issues many have gone through.
Since the pandemic, Louie the
Monster logs on social media a couple times a week to help people through.
Behind the puppet is Avi
Steinhardt, a Brooklyn-based psychotherapist and licensed social worker.
"I liked the idea of
trying to get at deeper ideas with a puppet," he says. "The seed of
the idea came a few years ago watching footage of Jim Henson's memorial."
Steinhardt says he was so
moved he bought a puppet himself.
"It wasn't until the
pandemic started and the lockdown started that Louis kind of tapped me on the
shoulder and was like, 'We should start talking to people,'" he says.
All over the world people are
clicking on Steinhardt's videos that tackle tough topics.
He says, "Some of it is
me trying to integrate a psychological response to difficult things in life
with a poetic response to difficult things in life."