Because of my personal history (visit the home page), the topics of high-functioning depression and burnout are near and dear to my heart.

Thanks to my nerdy Enneagram 5 nature and a lot of lucky breaks, I carved out a path to overcome my own high-functioning depression and burnout. Then, after working as a recovery coach in the substance abuse space and studying shamanic energy medicine, I realized that I had a winning formula to help others find a way out as well.

The people that I work best with are generally high-functioning adults with stable lives, but a lingering sense of dissatisfaction. They’re dissatisfied, but they feel ashamed of being dissatisfied. From the outside, their life looks pretty good, so they feel guilty about feeling the way they do.

Here’s an example:

“As I sat there in my business class seat, flying home from Europe after the kind of vacation that my younger self could have only dreamed of, I wondered, ‘Should I go to work tomorrow or should I kill myself instead?’”

- A shamanic client who captured the essence of high-functioning depression. The client went on to overcome depression in the kind of awe-inspiring transformation that makes me want to share this work.

Please note: this client didn’t actually have any plans to harm himself. It was an idle thought that captured his ambivalence towards life. Active suicidal urges: way outside my realm of expertise. Not feeling super enthused by being a human on this planet? I gotchu.

The Beta Program

After completing my shamanic energy medicine apprenticeship (see the “Shamanic Energy Medicine” page for details), I learned that I like to do deep dives and am more interested in partnering with clients who want to transform their life than offering one-off sessions.

As such, I’m now offering a 6-week beta program for this “Satisfied Mind” offering.

The program involves meeting once per week (usually virtually) for 60 to 90 minutes. Part of each session will include sharing the tools that helped me overcome depression and burnout, and the remainder will be used for shamanic energy medicine.

Goals of the program include:

1. Reviewing the stress-vulnerability model of mental/emotional health - we discuss an empowering perspective on mental health that explains why some people develop conditions like depression and burnout while others don’t

2. Identifying your personal well-being formula - we review your history to determine what you need to thrive—from both a basic “human animal” perspective (the things we all need) and from a personal perspective (what the unique bundle of nature, nurture and life experiences called “your-name” needs)

3. Using energy work to address the heavy, depleted, tired feeling that comes with depression and burnout - read about an example here

Pricing

At the moment, everything on this website is offered as a non-monetized hobby while I use my sabbatical to figure out what comes next. I’ve been very lucky in recent years: my deep dive into shamanism helped me gain clarity on my life’s purpose. However, I haven’t yet figured out how to be in strengths-based service: how to contribute in a way that fills my cup instead of depletes me.

This beta program is part of my learning process: do I want to work with people one-on-one? Am I better off writing a book? Is a teaching-style role right? What comes next?

A fair and reciprocal exchange of energy is always important. So, while I am not seeking monetary compensation from program participants, I do expect people who go through this beta program to invest significant time, energy and effort in tracking the results of our time together, then to turn their experience into a case study. Details of this expectation will be discussed on our inquiry call.

Interested?

Fill in this Google Form and I’ll be in touch.

At this stage, I’m trying to understand if there’s interest in this program. All other details are TBD.

If you can’t access Google Forms, please use the contact page to send me a message to express your interest.

Why is this called “A Satisfied Mind”?

Read this blog post.