DESCRIPTION OF CLINICAL PRACTICE

I cultivate a safe space where clients can talk comfortably about the full range of their emotional and felt experience and the challenges they face in living and healing. My style is quite interactive and I invite candor and openness in the sessions.
I look at both conscious and unconscious patterns, past and present and as they are expressed in the therapy relationship. I aim to understand how these patterns shape and often inhibit a fuller life. I integrate mindfulness and a contemplative perspective in allowing all parts of the person to be explored without judgment as well as exploring all levels from somatic to emotional to the spiritual. I have a particular interest in the interface of psychological issues and the spiritual quest. I believe one’s deeper longings can be better realized when emotional and psychological blockages are worked through in a safe relationship. I am a decades-long meditator and bring a deep awareness of the impact of meditation practice on one’s life, including the deeper feelings it can stir up.

VIPASSANA/MEDITATION BACKGROUND

I began Vipassana practice in 1978 at IMS and have had a daily practice for over thirty years. I have sat dozens of retreats in this and other practice styles. I also teach meditation at the Osher Center for Integrative Medicine where I have led Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction groups and continue to lead a weekly group for cancer patients. I have studied and completed training with Jon-Kabat Zinn.

I have worked with many teachers over the years including Joseph Goldstein, Sharon Salzberg, Guy and Sally Armstrong, Jack Kornfield, and Stephen Batchelor, as well as many others. In Tibetan Buddhist practice I am currently working with Lama Tsultrim Allione and Tsoknyi Rinpoche.

I have also studied with Toni Packer Hari Lal Poonja, Francis Lucille and Peter Fenner in more inquiry based appraoches. I remain a life-long student of meditation and contemplative inquiry.

RELEVANT CLINICAL TRAINING AND EXPERIENCE

I am a graduate of Smith College School for Social Work and am a licensed clinical social worker/psychotherapist. I have continued my studies actively over many years through local psychoanalytic institutes and independent study groups in contemporary psychoanalytic thought, as well as in attachment theory and practice. I have done a 4 course on-line program with Dan Siegel in Interpersonal Neurobiology. I have studied with Karen Peoples and others in the interface of spirituality and psychology. I have studied AEDP with Diana Fosha and Linda Graham, eco-psychology with Bill Plotkin and healing through writing with Laura Davis.