But what if meaning’s not hidden? What if it’s not something to find? What if that’s not the story? What if the story is that meaning is not found at all—that it’s made? It’s made by the willingness to proceed as if some things must be…that life is not your lifespan or your children’s lifespan or the lifespan of what you hold dear? How about holding dear the fact that nothing you hold dear lasts? How about holding that close to your bosom? That’s making meaning of the end of life: the willingness to do that.
– Stephen Jenkinson

“All beginnings are hard” say Rabbi Ismael and the Talmud. To sit down to write an introduction to why or how I do what I do, whence this journey began, and how I envision our collaboration—I’m not sure it’s an attainable thing any more than it would be for you to put into simple words what grief has made with the myriad pieces of your broken heart, or how death and deep change have permanently altered what you understood of the world, or how loss has, like some super-massive black hole, captured your attention in its gravitational field, leaving as the only available perception the presence of absence. So, let’s accept that we will both fail. Let’s start from that place. And then let’s try anyways.

Fundamental to my practice is a movement away from the colloquial usage of “grief” as an emotion roughly synonymous with deep sadness + longing + disorientation in the wake of a death. I think it’s too small. Grief is a skill. Grief is a process—non-linear and layered. Grief is healing. Grief is relational transformation. Grief is a burden too heavy to carry alone. Grief is a teacher shaking free stale ways of knowing. Grief is bitter medicine. Grief is a mother birthing us into new life. Grief is surrendering to the truth after battling desperately to make things otherwise. Grief is how we come home again. Grief is how we bury the parts of ourselves that have died and grief is how we come back to life. 

You may have already gotten the sense that what I do is different from conventional psychotherapy. I am, after all, not a therapist. My scope is, blessedly to my mind, more tailored to and focused on the particular challenges and opportunities related to deep change, death, and grief. I do not diagnose any psychological condition, nor am I able to prescribe or adjust medication, nor do I take insurance. When my clients desire it, I do collaborate with therapists and psychologists, particularly when there is trauma involved, and also with professionals in more traditional death- and grief-focused roles (e.g. end-of-life doulas, life-cycle celebrants, funeral guides, ceremonialists, etc.).

My journey to this work came through my own experience vis-à-vis illness, heartbreak, deep change, and death. Eventually I found my way to hospice grief counseling and spiritual care, conflict resolution and peacebuilding, contemplative practice and sitting at the feet of wise elders who had done what they could in the field and then settled into tending the next generation so that we could do our part to carry on the work. I do think that giving grief a voice, using the imperfect language we have to trace the edges of the void and to articulate the stories we carry is very important, but I have found that talking, on its own, is insufficient to satisfy what grief is asking of us. Body, mind, and soul are all called across the threshold in this work. So I don’t offer talk therapy. I offer counsel, collaboration, guidance, education, facilitation, and ceremonial support rooted in the leaf mold and humus of thousands of hours with the dying and the grieving, and with my brilliant teachers and my beautiful colleagues.

My facilitation style sits at the nexus of many influences: peace education, evolutionary biology, Eastern contemplative technologies rooted in the physical body, Interpersonal Neurobiology, various flavors of “parts work,” Nonviolent Communication, the “Orphan Wisdom forensic audit method,” and “meaning reconstruction.” When appropriate, I will invite writing practices, meditation, movement, village-building, and ritual into our work. If I had to put into a few phrases what I seek to manifest with my clients, it would go something like: a body-based, mortality-informed cultivation of reverence for the unknown, of courageous compassion, of restful cocooning, and of faithful witness in service of integration, equilibration, and liberation.

Because we live in a time and place of grief-illiteracy, death-phobia, emotional repression, and a general disdain for the slow, the sorrowful, and the mysterious, I do spend a little more time than the average therapist might, especially in the early days, on describing and (re-)framing, normalizing and contextualizing, eliciting and educating. It is also very likely that I will emote with you more than others with whom you have worked in the past. I am myself still learning how to be fully human, and I see crying, laughing, resonating, and harmonizing as being human skills as valid and essential as the skills of listening, patience, and compassion.

In order for this work to be sustainable for me and in order to continue deepening my own understanding, I regularly take time away from the office for silent retreat, ceremony, professional training, and travel. This time away will affect the rhythm of our meetings. I like to let folks know this in advance so that it doesn’t come as a surprise or add unnecessary stress to the process. I find that these breaks in the work can actually be a valuable time to take stock of what has been done in the preceding weeks and months.

I care deeply about my practice being a space that is welcoming and affirming to people of all races, ethnicities, religions, genders, sexual orientations, and abilities. If there are things I can do that would make the space more welcoming and inclusive, or if I do or say anything during our time together than undermines that aim, I would value your feedback, even if it is indirect, so that I can improve the way I hold space.