My Academic (and a few other) Interests

In addition to being a writer and life coach (and former licensed professional counselor), I am a professor of counseling psychology at the Graduate Theological Foundation. GTF is an educational institution that “serves those within faith communities who are engaged in the wide world of traditional and emerging forms of ministry as a way to strengthen their quest for a deeper sense of unity both among themselves and in their developing relations with other religious traditions and secular society” (www.gtfeducation.org).

My specific niche at GTF is the classical schools of psychotherapy, which include such notables as Sigmund Freud, Alfred Adler, Carl Jung, Viktor Frankl, Erik Erikson, Harry Stack Sullivan, and, of course, the humanistic psychologists Abraham Maslow, Carl Rogers, Erich Fromm, and Rollo May. My signature focus is on the intersection of religion, spirituality, and humanistic psychology, and that interest expands to include the larger world of spirituality, religion, science, and humanism.

My hobbies include reading and hiking. My favorite recent books are Barbara Kingsolver’s Demon Copperhead (fiction) and Jill Lepore’s These Truths (nonfiction) and, as for hiking, I am almost always drawn to the American Southwest, from Texas’s Big Bend to the Four Corners area of New Mexico, Arizona, Utah, and Colorado. I’m part of one of Richard Rohr’s Illuman groups, which serve to help men lead more authentic spiritual lives, and a smaller book club that emerged from that experience; we’re currently reading Brian McLaren’s Faith after Doubt.

If you have similar or intersecting interests, please share them with me.

As a Licensed Professional Counselor with a Doctorate in Psychology, I work therapeutically with clients who wish to work towards their personal goals.  

My areas of specialization include:

  • Marriage and family
  • Interpersonal relationships
  • Life transitions
  • Self-esteem and self-image
  • Spirituality
  • Life vocations/careers
  • Depression
  • Anxiety
  • Stress and coping skills
  • Other related concerns

As a Life Coach, I work more from a problem-solving and goal-setting perspective, helping clients reach their personal life goals. I’ve worked with many clients over the years on non-therapeutic concerns such as family (parenting, blended families, raising children in divorced families, aging parents, death and dying, etc.) and business (interpersonal relations on the job, returning to work in later life, career choices and uncertainties, juggling family and career, etc.).

Sometimes our life struggles demand a spiritual response. As a Spiritual Director (trained through the HeartPaths Spirituality program), I add a spiritual dimension to my work upon the client’s request, either separately or in conjunction with my counseling or life coaching.

My personal philosophy is simple.

I believe we are created with a divine plan, a purpose that is unique to each of us.

I believe that divine plan or purpose is related to what we call the soul.

I believe that our life challenge is to grow in understanding of that divine plan and become the person each of us is called to be.

I am available for counseling during the week (typically 8:00-4:00) and on Saturdays (typically 8:00-2:30).