Workshops for Parents and Teachers

Children and Teens with Mental Health Issues

Do children and teens seem more complex than ever? This workshop is designed to address new research and treatment techniques that have been developed to identify, understand and manage the highened emotions and maladaptive behaviors seen in mental health conditions such as ADHD, Bipolar Disorder, Anxiety, Depression and Asberger’s Disorder.

Are You Losing Control of Your Teen?

Long before children become adolescents they begin leaving their parents. The child squirming on your lap to’ get down’ and the defiant seventeen year old coming home past curfew are both sending you the same message. At the same time, they need you and (believe it or not) want you to set boundaries. This workshop will look at the developmental stages of independence and how parents can be ‘graceful’ as they let go.

Talking (yes, talking!) with your Teen

Sometimes it seems as though the communication between a parent and their teenager is either non-existent or goes from zero to sixty faster than a sports car. Either way the results are the same - nothing of much consequence is accomplished and all parties can leave feeling hurt, powerless, and not understood. This workshop will take a look at the common patterns of communication that evolve between parents and their teenagers and how those patterns can be changed and become part of a meaningful relationship.

When Helping Starts to Hurt: Understanding Professional Burnout

People in helping professions (clergy, teachers, social workers, etc.) often find their energy drained, and burnout setting in. The literature on burnout tends to focus on two causes: systemic (the problem is within the workplace) and intrapsychic (the problem is within the helper). This workshop, based on When Helping Starts to Hurt: Understanding Professional Burnout by David C. Olsen, PhD and William Grosch, MD, will look at how the interaction of these two issues produces burnout, and how burnout can be prevented.

Note: This workshop can be modified for any helping profession

Relationship Workshops

The Tipping Point: Getting Couples Back in Balance

Drawing on a variety of resources, including The Tipping Point by Malcolm Gladwell, this workshop will explore how pictures of partners become negative and rigid, which impacts communication, conflict and intimacy. New research on brain functioning will also be presented and participants will learn specific strategies to tip the marital picture back into balance.

Note: this workshop can be modifed for an audience of couples or professionals / clergy.

Eyes Wide Open: Removing the Blinders from Sexual Satisfaction

Contrary to popular opinion, marriage and passion are not incompatible. Too often, as passion fades, women claim that more intimacy results in better sex, while men argue that more sex would lead to greater intimacy. Couples will learn the top five roadblocks to heightened passion and intimacy, as well as important keys to unlocking deeper emotional and sexual connection.

Note: The professionals / clergy version of this workshop is titled Treatment of Couples with Low Sexual Desire

From Conflict to Caring

This workshop focuses on practical principles for effective marital conflicts and healthy resolutions. We’ll give you five easy steps to help you “fight fair.”

Tune-up Your Relationship

This workshop will help you clarify the strengths of your relationship and the areas that “creak and grind”

From Idolatry to Grace: The Spiritual Work of Marriage

Utilizing the principles of integrative couples therapy, participants will learn to recognize and treat the powerful spiritual themes that couples are unconsciously working on in their relationships, such as forgiveness, entitlement, grace and redemption.

Juggling Work and Family

“How can I keep everybody happy?” Too many people feel torn between the pressures of the workplace and the pressures of family. Burnout is often the result of feeling pulled in too many directions at once. This workshop will explore strategies for balancing work and family based on The Couples Survival Workbook (Olsen and Stephens). The workshop will focus on practical ways of addressing the needs of family and the workplace, as well as the need for personal time.

Professional Workshops

Boundary Awareness

Maintaining boundaries are an essential aspect of the practice of ministry. This workshop will explore the complexity of ministerial boundaries from a variety of perspectives.

Note: this workshop can be modified for churches, judicatories, or business offices.

Leading Change

This course will focus on how clergy can lead change creatively in the midst of anxious times. It will draw on three authors: John Kolter, Leading Change and The Heart of Change; Edwin Friedman, Generation to Generation and Failure of Nerve; and Daniel Goleman, Primal Leadership. These three authors focus on three essential aspects of change: theories and strategy of organizational change (Kotter), differentiated leadership (Friedman), and the use of emotional intelligence in leadership (Goleman).

Note: this workshop can be modified for churches, judicatories, or business offices.

Workshops for Clergy and Congregations

Boundary Awareness

Maintaining boundaries are an essential aspect of the practice of ministry. This workshop will explore the complexity of ministerial boundaries from a variety of perspectives.

Leading Change

This workshop will focus on how clergy can lead change creatively in the midst of anxious times. It will draw on three authors: John Kolter, Leading Change and The Heart of Change; Edwin Friedman, Generation to Generation and Failure of Nerve; and Daniel Goleman, Primal Leadership. These three authors focus on three essential aspects of change: theories and strategy of organizational change (Kotter), differentiated leadership (Friedman), and the use of emotional intelligence in leadership (Goleman).

The Congregation as a Family System

This workshop will help participants identify congregational triangles, congregational projectiong, and multi-generational transmission in the parish setting. Strategies for addressing these situations in an effort to create a healthy church system will be presented.

Creating Healthy Clergy Families

This workshop examines the many facets of burnout as they pertain to clergy families. Strategies for self-care, an indepth examination of stressors, and burnout prevention will be carefully considered from both anecdotal and empirical reseach. Participants will learn to better access their own tendencies toward burnout to become proactive toward burnout prevention.

Workshops Under Development

Workshops for Clergy & Professionals

• Spirituality in Psychotherapy: Working with Religious Issues in Psychotherapy

Workshops for Parents & Schools

• Developmentally Appropriate Boundaries for Teens
• Cutting / Suicide
• Teen Depression
• Parenting for Academic Success
• Co-Parenting in the Midst of Divorce / Blended Family