​Words from those I've served (shared anonymously)

"The work we're doing has supercharged my growth, and it’s fun!" 
​—B (after a year of ongoing weekly sessions)

"I feel like [the person I referred] is in one of the best, most grounded places in [their] life since working with you. [They are] setting more boundaries and making many changes while also being patient. From the outside, whatever you're doing is really working."
—F (A therapist, after making a referral six months before. Name and gender have been anonymized.)

"​Thank you, friend and teacher and fellow traveller, for being here for me."

"I believe that Daniel's vibrant spiritual life and his own journeys in meditation have provided him with a deep well of trust in the process. He never held himself out as an elevated authority but it was clear to me that he had done extensive research, both academic and personal. He is fascinated by the myriad expressions of the human experience and he is open to the mystery of it all. I believe he holds each client the way he held me; with openness, respect and deep caring." 

"​You are a healer and a minister and a spiritual counselor in every cell."

"Daniel, you have held my hand and guided me to shine light into places that need it.  Thank you for allowing your gentle kindness to move through you toward me. I appreciate your presence and centeredness. Thank you for reflecting back to me keen observations and insights that are so helpful.  My heart is full." 

"Thank you for everything...You're a world changer."

"Daniel is a gem & offers this work in a lovely, caring present way.  He offers the daylong meditations in Richmond, CA. If for any reason it doesn't work schedule-wise, or other-wise, he will happily put interested friends in touch with other Guides whom he knows/loves/trusts well."

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My belief and approach

I believe that people naturally want to live in a way that satisfies, feels whole and contributes. I also believe that everything we need to move toward healing and wholeness is already inside of us. Therefore, as I guide, I don’t see my role as bestowing anything upon you. Instead, I am here to assist, encourage, and enable you to connect with and manifest your own healing impulses, powers and potentials. I believe that healing and the easement of suffering is possible.

And that’s why I guide people on this path. It’s deeply satisfying to me. It feels like a way to model completion in relationship. And, having benefited myself from the modalities I now practice, this is my contribution to you and to your world. It’s also my way of integrating the healing I’ve experienced. I hope this perspective might be useful to you and that it will begin a wonderful conversation between us.

​*​NOTE: I offer services as a spiritual counselor on a donation basis. I am not a therapist, psychologist, social worker or doctor, and I make no claims to the roles and responsibilities of any title other than spiritual counselor. I am trained in Hakomi Mindful Somatic Psychotherapy, which I encourage you to read about, but despite the name, I am not a psychotherapist nor do I offer psychotherapy.

My story in a nutshell

I started on this path around 2001, newly married and well into exploration of self-discovery and healing. Anxieties from childhood remained influential in my life, leading me to shun opportunities and limit my own experience. In seeking to deepen my relationship with my primary partner, my friends, and potential children (still years away), I sought counseling from a friend who was a Hakomi practitioner. Hakomi is an interpersonal counseling style that works with mindful and somatic awareness. 

Without specifically seeking consciousness medicine work, it came into my life. I was hesitant at first, but thanks to the trust I had built with my guide, I embarked on the path. This is a path that arrived in the United States in the 50s from the Mazatec tradition of Mexico and has since been explored, developed, and deepened by a beautiful lineage of healers and teachers. I am honored to be in this tradition.

The work was challenging and intense for me. For the first year, I saw my guide weekly and did retreats once per season with plenty of preparation and integration between. We worked across many areas of my life using Hakomi, mindfulness, poetry and storytelling, meditation, and other modalities he mixed intuitively. Over the course of six years, I tapered my journeys to twice, then once per year and started seeing him less often.

The truth is, I was changing. Exploring my anxiety within non-ordinary states of consciousness had opened my awareness to unprocessed grief. Learning to meet the grief opened my awareness to confusion, anger, and core beliefs that had limited me—but limited me less and less the more work I did to reorganize my past experiences, drink in new perspectives and integrate the wisdom of my discoveries.

Around 2007, my guide and I decided we had come to an ending. I felt solid and as free as I’d ever felt in my life. That’s not to say life was without challenges or that marriage — and new fatherhood — didn't require effort and adjustment. But I now had more resources to meet the challenges and not be thrown. I had greater choice about going toward experiences instead of automatically retreating from them. I could recognize my anxiety at its onset, welcome its protective messages, and allow it space to exist in peace.

I continued to explore non-ordinary states occasionally, often on my birthday. And I began to feel that guiding others on this path that had done such good for me would be an expression of my gratitude and a culmination of my learning. So, in 2017 when my friend and mentor said he would train me and one other guide, I made the fraught decision to do it. Since then I have been learning consciousness guiding, Hakomi and energy work, and deepening earlier trainings and practices in Breema bodywork, creative processes, writing, poetry, storytelling, improvisation, meditation, dance, and loving presence. 

I started assisting in group retreats in 2015, and began guiding one-on-one in 2018. Helping others on their healing paths feels natural and beautiful to me, full of love, creativity and wisdom. It is always a mutual creation.

Today, I am deeply honored, moved and nourished to guide seekers on this path even as I continue to learn and practice the infinite art of healing.

If you have any questions, ask.