About Em
Welcome! I’ve been in practice as a mental health therapist since 2007 with an emphasis on resilience, soul work and community.
Welcome! I’ve been in practice as a mental health therapist since 2007 with an emphasis on resilience, soul work and community. I currently work with women and couples in therapy, focusing on resilience and psychospiritual development through experiential and somatic work.
That said, healing and evolution happens within relationships. It’s in the actual risk and challenge of vulnerable connection that we learn to see ourselves and others through more mature sets of beliefs.
Beyond therapy, I focus on community tending. I lead a monthly women’s sangha and retreats on the Wasatch Front, in Capitol Reef country, and abroad. I additionally founded Madrona, a 501(c)(3) nonprofit community centered on soul work, art and nature which will one day become a sanctuary space in the Utah desert.
I deeply appreciate writing as a way to connect to one another more broadly through story. I release a weekly essay along with event announcements on Fridays, which you can join at the bottom of the page. I am also currently writing a weekly Substack called A Year of Authoring Beauty.
I completed my master’s degree in social work from the University of Utah in 2007, seeking out independent study in mind-body wellness. Given my draw to systemic change, I went on to obtain a master’s degree in business administration in 2011. I became a 200-hour Certified Meditation Teacher in 2017 and completed Yoga Teacher Training that same year.
I am continually in awe of and tremendously grateful for the opportunity to witness our innate ability to rise together in the midst of seemingly insurmountable challenges to heal, repair divides, and turn even the greatest tides.
“In the stretching, painful as it is sometimes, we expand, we grow, we change ourselves, we change the world.”
– Jon Kabat-Zinn
You are the hero of your story.
Soulful resilience is the key to everything we hope for in life, liberating happiness from happy conditions.
Adversity creates an opportunity to see yourself and your reality from a new perspective, grow stronger through it, and orient toward what matters most. Here you can find a variety of services, resources, and opportunities to connect within a broader community of kindred spirits.
Women’s Support and Community
I specialize in working with women in therapy and community. You can find upcoming women’s sanghas and retreats on the events calendar.
High Conflict Relationships
I’ve specialized in supporting women through high conflict relationships, divorce and co-parenting since 2016. These situations are complicated by psychological manipulation, control, and a legal system that fails to protect victims.
Chronic Illness
The ACES research illuminated the lifelong health implications of adverse childhood experiences. There is an indisputable body of evidence that our bodies manifest stress somatically. My own trauma led to the autoimmune disease type 1 diabetes.
Holistic mind-body care should be the baseline for all healthcare, including mental health care. If we work together, don’t be surprised if we triage your sleep, nutrition, movement, and health conditions as they relate to your stress, energy, mood and focus.
If you have a chronic illness, or are a caregiver for a loved one with chronic illness, therapy can support the acceptance journey following diagnosis, an empowering plan for health and longevity, and communication and boundaries within relationships.
The Resilience Class
More than five years of research resulted in the development of The Hierarchy of Resilience framework, a tangible model for triaging and optimizing personal stress resilience across six domains. Get lifetime access inside the online program.
The Resilience Centered Course
Helping professionals are at the frontline of trauma. Not only are they critical to the well-being of our communities, the nature of the work can result in compassion fatigue, burnout and vicarious trauma. The Resilience Centered Course supports practitioners in establishing a robust personal resilience practice while integrating a trauma-informed resilience approach to their work with clients.