Not all those who wander are lost
- J. R. R. Tolkein
My Approach
My approach is a blend of humanism, existentialism, Internal Family Systems, and skills work from Dialectical Behavior Therapy. How I really see myself, though, is as a trail guide and the client as a hiker who would like help along their trail. As the guide, I am here to help you develop skills and tools that you are likely to need on your particular journey. We sit down together and see what things you are carrying that don’t serve you anymore, and how to load the things that must be carried into your pack so that it is a more comfortable fit. I arm the traveler with tools and skills so that they learn how to navigate on their own and manage any difficulties that they are likely to encounter. After all, a compass is just a disk with a mysteriously spinning arm until a person knows how to use it. When used properly, though, it is a tool that will always show a traveler true north when they get turned around and have lost the trail.
We all have our own terrain created by the seismic shifts of our life. Some people have had a relatively smooth time of it and have moderately level trails sweeping through meadows with only the few requisite low hills that occur in every life. Some trails have formed as a result of tectonic plates clashing catastrophically, sending jagged spires upward and creating seemingly impassible mountain ranges. These events shape the trail we must travel and have a huge effect on our lives.
Sometimes the progress down the trail feels slow or too difficult, but it is the work of progress. The view is why we keep hiking, and one of my most important jobs is to remind them to look up again. On the long and sometimes strenuous trail, you get to lift your eyes to the horizon and see jagged mountains or the ocean crashing on the coast. It’s the view that keeps us moving forward when our feet are sore and the trail ahead looks steep. The view pulls us over boulder fields, stretching our preconceived notions of the limits of our abilities just to see what wonders lie at the ridgeline above. It is why we persist in challenging work. We hike, we struggle, we fight, we strive, because there are things worth all of it. There are the joys of our everyday lives, our relationships with friends and loved ones, and above all there is the belief that we can learn to hike whatever trail is in front of us. That we are capable of more than we imagined, and that the power to create the changes we want in life is in the palm of your hand, a spinning compass that you just need help reading before you are on your way up the path ahead.