Christopher

As a child I was curious in matters of spirituality, as a teen I was driven. I started as a staunch atheist and then became a part of the Christian Youth Movement. In a hurry to grow up, I was married with two wonderful children in a marriage that was clearly not working by the time I was twenty-five. I returned to Christianity as a way of saving my marriage. I was still driven and was quickly immersed into fundamentalism. It didn't work and at twenty-nine I started looking for alternatives.

My therapist had a unique way of getting me in touch with myself and invited me on an emotional intensive weekend. I blew my emotional world wide open. I worked for the next year and a half going to retreats, trying to figure out what was wrong with me. If I could only figure out what was wrong, then I knew I could fix it.

At 30 I began a new relationship with Ronna. This relationship would be different; without the problems of my first marriage. After all we were two aware people on a conscious journey and spiritual journey. By age 32 I was a father to 5 kids, working full time, often out of town, and 100% committed to my personal journey. The only trouble was, I was less and less sure of what that meant.

Ronna and I entered our power struggle years and all the old feelings came back. This wasn't the relationship of eternal love, happiness and never feeling damaged. More retreats, more books and more spirituality. I worked with all kinds of models and began looking at constructing a life that I could be proud of. I started leading my life by principles rather than rationalizations and feelings. I explored all aspects of the psyche celebrating each with new awareness; painful, angry, shameful and fearful parts of myself that needed to be integrated. Transforming them into light didn't work; every time I turned around they were still there. I began looking at these as gifts and strengths rather than damaged goods and weaknesses.

Ronna and I began our own psychotherapy practice and began leading retreats. It took various forms over the years depending on our lifestyle and the age of our children. I enjoyed teaching, reaching out, and watching people transform their lives. I celebrated their struggles, failures and successes.

At 39 the questions still begged to be answered. Where does God fit? Who is God? What is Love? What is the meaning of life? What is the meaning of death? Many questions, few answers and the answers I did have kept slipping away. I had to go deeper. Deconstructing and challenging with nowhere to go but deeper. No thought was left unturned. I watched all my walls, all my beliefs, all my security come crashing down, fade away and move beyond existence.

Now at 50 I teach my passion so others can have the tools to Radically Accept themselves and fully embrace life.

With over 25 yrs of personal growth and 18 yrs of being a psychotherapist I have a few tools and maybe some wise tidbits I can share.

As a child/teen, I never really felt I fit in; not in my family, school, social scene or work. After high school I decided to be a nurse and went into psychiatry. I was married at the age of 20 and had my daughter when I was 21.

I began exploring alternative health at the age of 22. It opened up areas to my life that I never knew existed. I learned about herbs, homeopathy, energy work and the connection between feelings and physical states such as pain. This began challenging my belief systems and introduced me people that became mentors and teachers.

At work I had just accepted a position in the Out Patient Department to provide group and one-on-one therapy. As a psychiatrist I began a group where staff would present a client and then we would look at our unconscious motives for what was happening or not happening in our sessions. I loved this weekly group. I had to look at some painful things, like why I took on clients' battles instead of letting them do it.

I came smack up against powerlessness and that is certainly what was happening in my personal life; powerless to stop a marriage from falling apart, powerless against feelings of shame, depression, grief and anger. I was just plain powerless. And here I was at age 25, married with two great kids, working full time and exploring alternative health with a marriage on the rocks and feeling depressed. I felt like a fraud by presenting myself as confident and self assured, but feeling like damaged goods.

At age 28 my marriage ended and I went into therapy. I was fortunate to meet a woman who knew just what to say to get me to explore myself. She invited me on an intensive retreat that she and her husband led. This was another major stepping stone in my life.

I attended many, many retreats trying to get my emotional world working for me or at a minimum to try and understand it. I met Chris at this first retreat and we began a friendship. The foundations of the relationship were that we challenged one another to grow and change. Over the 15 months of friendship our relationship grew and deepened until we entered a committed relationship and eventually married.

By age 31, Chris and I now had 5 children; 2 were mine, 2 were his and 1 was ours. We were on a spiritual journey, but we had responsibilities up to our necks and could not go off to an ashram for the next 15 years. However, I refused to put my journey on hold. It was too important to me and frankly, I couldn't even if I wanted to. Chris and I continued the painstaking journey of challenging, reading, constructing and deconstructing. Every time we thought we had arrived somewhere we challenged each other to go deeper.

I went through many, long dark nights of the soul episodes. I worked with various models like Psycho synthesis, Gestalt, Creation Theology, Jungian, Archetypes, Carolyn Myss, and chakras. All assisted us in letting go of attachments.

Then one day while I was leading a retreat, I realized I had totally accepted myself and that I loved all aspects of myself. That included the hater and lover, the feelings of sadness and the joy, the bitch, Kali and Venus. There wasn't anything that I could not say yes to. I was all. I no longer had to get my self esteem met from others. I no longer had to look outside of myself for respect, or confidence. It was all right there. Radical Acceptance!!

Clients are angry asking me why they are spending $1,000's of dollars on therapists, workshops etc. and come to see me and their lives are transformed in a relatively short period of time. They complain that they can't find this in a book either!! They go away with the skills to begin radically accepting themselves. They no longer have to fight the wrong battles. The inner wars are easier to win when we know what tools to use and how to use them. Choosing wrong tools can lead to years and years of battles without going anywhere.

Now at 50 I teach my passion so others can have the tools to Radically Accept themselves and fully embrace life.