SPIRITUAL -- TRANSPERSONAL COUNSELING
While traditional approaches of psychotherapy and counseling can be very powerful, sometimes we may wish to process our experience of life at the level of the symbolic, the transcendental -- that is, with our ultimate concern as a human in the universe. Healthy, mature religion and spirituality act as a symbolic and ritualized container in which we are perpetually confronted with a most wholesome interrogation. Questions arise such as, who am I?, what is death?, what is life?, what do my actions mean?, is love real?. Wrestling with the questions themselves, more than the "answers" creates rich opportunities to discover news ways of being and stepping into deeper levels of human maturation.
Spiritual -- Transpersonal Counseling affords the space to get "right to the heart of the matter" in a way that is less concerned with symptom reduction and diagnosis. It is a deep conversation about your very "situatedness" in the universe itself. In the words of Paul Tillich, "Faith is the state of being ultimately concerned."
Cody L. Oaks
MA, LPCC, Co-Founder
With advanced training in philosophy, religious studies, and theology -- in addition to his training as a psychotherapist -- Cody has a deep conviction that the line between our spiritual wellbeing and psychological health is not nearly as sharp as we have made it in our culture, if it exists at all.
For millennia before the advent of psychotherapy, humans sought out spiritual counsel as a means to understand themselves and their place in the world, whether through shamans, priests, pastors, or gurus. This tradition continues down to the current day. Though the advent of conceptualizing counseling primarily through a medical lens has brought us an enormous amount of insight, it has unfortunately been at the cost of the human soul. Rather than journeying through the inherent "wildness" of our human existence, mainstream psychotherapy urges us to get on with the work of symptom eradication so human beings can get back to being productive citizens (not that this is a bad aim, it is just incomplete). This does not bode well for the spiritual journey, as it is inherently fraught with both peril and adventure. Furthermore, the medicalization of counseling in the west has alienated cultural groups who see counseling as a fundamentally spiritual act, who therefore understandably carry with them suspicions of the field of psychotherapy.
Cody is passionate about reconciling counseling work with its spiritual forefathers and foremothers, and is enthusiastic to bridge this gap at ENSO Center. Cody has a Master of Arts in Systematic Theology from Luther Seminary. He completed graduate coursework at Princeton Seminary, and is currently a candidate for Initiation into the Soto Lineage of Zen Buddhism.