About Joan

My Journey to Become a Therapist

Part 1
My decision to become a therapist derived from my early experiences of struggle and pain in my life. First, as a child, I was raised in a variety of different settings, as my Mother (a working single mom), struggled to keep me out of state orphanages. As a by-product of the frequent changes of schools, friends and caretakers, I learned how to fit myself in to each new environment by watching and listening to the people around me, so I could learn the “right” thing to do. Without realizing it, I was learning how to acquire and keep rapport, and develop empathy toward others.

Part 2
As a teenager, total strangers would often confide very personal secrets and stories to me. I found these disclosures so engrossing, as they fulfilled a need in me to understand how other people lived. It was also comforting to discover that I wasn’t alone in the difficulties I was having in my own life.

Part 3
In my late thirties, while raising my family, I was very curious about how our minds worked and read as much as I could on the topic. I became fascinated by the uses of hypnosis while reading about Edgar Cayce, and the amazing “visions” he had while in a deep trance and the treatments he recommended for the physically and emotionally troubled souls who sought him out. I was particularly impressed with how quickly his emotional remedies took effect. This information contradicted what I had read about traditional psychiatric and psychological treatments needing a great deal of time and money for a “cure”.

How it all came together
These three experiences came together in my mind as a way to move back into the working world and have an occupation about which I really felt passionate. So I took several courses on hypnosis and then realized I needed an advanced degree to do the kind of work in which I was interested (I still have a tendency to jump in the water before I know how deep it is.) After receiving my M.A. in psychology, and my license to be a counselor, I started my private practice and continued to take advanced hypnosis courses through ASCH, the national organization for clinical hypnotists.

Enter Neuro-Linguistic Programming
While attending these courses, I repeatedly heard about Neuro-Linguistic Programming and the astonishing results reported by clinicians who were using the model. So I took the plunge and immersed myself in every course for which I had the time and money. The NLP model had such broad applications for a seemingly unlimited number of situations that I became totally committed to learning all I could and applying it in my practice.

It was in these courses that I developed a deep respect and appreciation for the effectiveness of the model when used as a therapeutic tool.