Gentle Spirit Therapy

In addition to being a psychologist, I have been trained as a Professional Life Coach.  My training included over 300 hours of instruction, and observed practice through the Earth-Based Institute.  Please visit my coaching website at: www.earthbasedcoachphd.com for a complete understanding of nature connected life coaching and my offerings as a coach.

The Earth-Based Institute specializes in training Nature-Connected Transformational Life Coaches. www.earthbasedinstitute.org.  Through EBI I have had the benefit of becoming both a coach, and understanding coaching through a nature-based lens.  Therefore, I can offer both traditional Life Coaching and also Nature-Connected Coaching, for those who are drawn to nature and the wilderness.

Life Coaching is different than therapy in many ways.  One of the crucial ways it differs from therapy is that therapy often focuses on managing emotions.  With coaching, managing difficult emotions when making significant life changes occurs, but the assumption is that the client has the ability to manage their moods, such as anxiety and depression, so that mood stability is not the primary goal of the meetings.  In part because of this, one generally meets with a coach less frequently than with a therapist and does more outside of the sessions to make changes and try new things.  Coaching is also not confined to working with an individual based on their location.

Therapy requires that the therapist and the client meet in the same state, and almost always require face-to-face meetings. With coaching, you may live, work, or travel anywhere you want and still maintain regular sessions with your coach through internet meetings or phone sessions.

Life Coaching and Nature-Connected Coaching are different in some ways, and I have been trained in both modalities.  I have found that most individuals are not aware of Nature-Connected Coaching, or how it works.  So let me explain. Nature-connected Coaching begins in a similar way to typical Life Coaching in that we work to understand you and your goals, your deeper needs, and changes that you are seeking.  However, in Nature-Connected Coaching, we do that in an outdoor setting, and begin to incorporate the ways in which nature and the wilderness becomes a partner in your healing and growth.  We progress, again in a similar way to typical Life Coaching, by gently uncovering what has gotten in the way of the changes you seek and finding ways to be open to deeper connection to yourself.  As we do that in Nature-Connected Coaching, nature becomes even more important as a a co-guide, to provide answers, to bring peace, and to challenge you.

There are many psychologists who offer themselves as both a therapist and as a Life Coach.  I have discovered that most of them do not have formal training as a coach; possibly assuming that the skills they were taught as a therapist included coaching skills.  I have found through my own training in both therapy and as a coach, that some skills are the same, but there are many differences between them.  I am proud to be a certified professional coach, and eager to bring these skills into my community.  I welcome your call to discuss if Life Coaching or Nature-Connected Transformational Life Coaching is right for you.

Walk with me in the woods.  Talk with me in the woods.  Be, with me, in the woods.  Let us take our hearts into the wild and listen to the creek, the mallard, and old, wise, trees, while they fill our souls with silence and power.