ABOUT ME
Much of what I care about as a therapist was shaped by the twelve years I worked in hospice, helping dying individuals and their families cope with end of life. What I learned through this experience is this: at the end of life, everything drops away except for the central question of whether or not the person succeeded in maintaining safe, connected relationships. This inspired me to spend my professional and personal life learning how best to help people strengthen their connections to each other, and to repair broken bonds.
I am experienced working with people who are coping with trauma, stress, anxiety, grief, relationship problems, chronic illness, chronic pain, and other life challenges.
I am an adjunct faculty member at UC Berkeley's MSW program, and a supervisor for the Psychotherapy Institute, as well as a faculty member of the Psychotherapy Institute's Supervision Studies Program. I am also a certified EFT Therapist and Supervisor, and a certified AEDP therapist, and I teach courses for EFT therapists. My background also includes hospice work and both inpatient and outpatient psychiatric social work.
For more than thirty years, I have been engaged in the practice of meditation and Buddhist-inspired spiritual work. My license to practice psychotherapy is LCS 23644.
VALUE STATEMENT ON IDENTITY, POWER, AND PRIVILEGE: I am a social worker as well as a therapist, and I am commited to anti-oppressive practice. In my work, I attend to ways in which identity (mine as well as yours) impact our day-to-day experiences, in relationships, in society, and in therapy. This includes factors such as race, gender, ethnicity, class, sexuality, religion, and the intersection of these various ways of experiencing and being experienced by the world. I am committed to my own process of growth and discovery of self and self-in-relationship, which includes a heartfelt commitment to understanding and feeling into issues of power and privilege as they show up in any relationship. As a white, cisgender, queer man, I do my own work to understand how these identities shape what I do, what and how I know, and what I can see.
Education:
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Certified Therapist and Supervisor in Emotionally Focused Couples Therapy (EFT).
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Certified Therapist in AEDP.
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Center for Mind Body Medicine Professional Training Program, 2009, and Advanced Professional Training Program, 2010.
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Smith College School for Social Work, Masters in Social Work, 2003.
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Gestalt Associates for Psychotherapy, Clinical Fellowship, 2001.
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New York University, Masters in Education, 1997.
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New York University, BFA, 1993.
