Radical Balance
Coach, not therapist
What I do
I work as a coach. The focus is integration, parts work, intentional life design, and what happens after a psychedelic experience, a contemplative retreat, a hard conversation, or the moment when the part of you that wants to change has actually started moving.
My work is focused on helping you stay in contact with what you have already learned, especially when life pulls you toward old patterns.
What I do not do
I am not a licensed therapist. I do not diagnose mental health conditions. I do not treat acute psychiatric symptoms. I do not prescribe medication. I do not provide, coordinate, or administer any psychedelic substance.
If what you need is clinical care, coaching is the wrong tool. The Crisis & containment page points to the right places to start. A therapist is the better fit when you need support stabilizing symptoms, treating a diagnosable condition, or processing acute trauma in a clinical container.
When coaching is the right fit
Coaching tends to fit when:
- You already have stable support in place (a therapist or physician if you need one, the basics handled).
- You are integrating something that opened up (an experience, an insight, a turning point), and you want help keeping the door open.
- You want a partner for working with parts of yourself, outside a clinical setting.
- You want help building a deliberate practice around what matters to you, rather than symptom relief.
- You are ready to engage the work as a collaborator.
How I work
The coaching sessions I offer are conversational and grounded in parts-based frameworks, primarily Internal Family Systems (IFS). The pace of these sessions is contemplative. It is slower than a goals-and-accountability coaching engagement, with room for silence and deep reflection.
I have trained with Dick Schwartz (founder of IFS) and Gabor Maté, a physician thought leader in the work of healing trauma.
I also bring my own ongoing practice into how I coach. While coaching sessions are about your work, not mine, I bring more than 30 years as a meditation practitioner and teacher to every session. I also work with my own parts on a regular basis.
Nothing you say in session, nothing you share by email, and nothing about the fact that you are a client of mine leaves my direct control. The site's privacy posture and the practice's privacy posture are the same.
A note on credentials and accountability
I am not licensed by any state mental-health board, because the work I do does not require, and is not eligible for, that kind of license. Coaching in the United States is largely unregulated. The meaningful accountability lives in the work itself and in the trust between us, not in a regulatory body.
If at any point our work starts to feel like it belongs in a clinical container instead, I will say so, and we will find the right referral together.
If you are in crisis right now
Coaching is not for crisis. The Crisis & containment page is the right starting place.
Filed under: Working with Dave / coaching scope · also useful for: Crisis & containment
