About Us
Transforming Communities at Now I See A Person Institute
The Collaborative-Dialogical Way
“So often times it happens that we live our lives in chains, and we never even know we have the key” (The Eagles) “No one ever talked like this with me before”
“They didn’t force”
“They listen and never force you, and they do not make assumptions about you”
“You are unique and do not compare yourself to other people’s journey’s…do not do permanent decisions to things that will change in time”
These are commentaries gained from people who experienced Collaborative-Dialogic ways of helping in the Now I See A Person Institute. We invite you to hear words of hope and remedy. Where dignity, dialogue and freedom arise within therapy, coaching recovery consulting, and mentoring. We invite you into a space of reopening possibilities for futures of those we participate with. We work with ”tough” issues and collectively rebuild feelings of “normalcy,” trust, hope, self-agency and self-determination which constitute the basic elements of recovery and freedom. We offer possibilities to find freedom rather than narrowing them.
Now I See A Person Institute is a non-profit teaching and clinical institution offering training for graduate and post-graduate students. Clients find healing from trauma and resultant challenges though the use of Collaborative-Dialogic Practices and a nurturing, normal environment. As shown by evidence-based qualitative research, we especially have success with those clients who have lengthy histories of trauma and extensive past experiences with hospitalizations, therapy, residential care or rehabilitation and medications which did not aid (Swim et al., 2016; 2018; 2020; 2023).
Our clients see themselves as a person and not as a diagnosis that may have labeled or limited them in the past. Our team of therapists provide a community of support. Clients become a part of this community, where symptoms dissipate, new self-perceptions evolve and family member relationships are re-built. In the past, we utilized horse ranches, home gardens or parks for normalizing and nurturing transformative conversations If clients cannot meet us within these venues, we offer what we call “Out of the Office Conversations” virtually. Herein we provide what Lynn Hoffman coined, Kitchen Table Talk and, as cited in Mad in America, From Horse Ranch to Home Ground: Healing Families Via Telehealth (May 10, 2022).
When we are in conversations, we attempt to invite dignity and see through the lenses of a person and not a mental illness narrative, and we see all therapeutic conversations as Sacred Conversations.