ABOUT
Part of Ryan's gift as a therapist, coach, and spiritual director is his ability to seamlessly move between the medical and the mystical, the clinical and contemplative, the phenomenological and the neurobiological, the somatic and the spiritual.
This integrative approach is one he has honed as a survivor of severe complex trauma and through facing the debilitating terrain of PTSD, major depression, OCD, and anxiety disorder. There is hardly a diagnosis in the DSM-5 that Ryan didn't fit at one time or another.
For the past 20 years, he has been exploring the intersections and entanglements between mental health, spirituality, neurobiology, and trauma.
The deep dives he has taken into the dark particularities of
his own story and the debilitating mental and emotional
challenges he's navigated have invited him to use his pain to facilitate healing for others. This is what he does as a writer, trauma-informed spiritual director, coach and licensed counselor.
Ryan believes the crux of the human journey has to do with
being shattered into wholeness.
He guides people into reintegrating the traumatized
parts of themselves so they can begin restorying their lives and reimagining their sacred role in the world.
He believes that resurrection and rebirth are happening within us, all around us, and through us, and that love is stronger than death.
He has far more questions than answers, which means
he seeks to live the questions more than try to search for certainty in answers.
But he is certain of at least one thing: you are a
living story, and your life is one of the greatest stories ever
told.
A bit about Ryan's background:
His first career was in international relief, development and mission, which took him to live in fifteen cities on five continents. He has a MA in Clinical Mental Health Counseling (Grand Rapids Theological Seminary), a MA
in Theology & Culture (The Seattle School of Theology & Psychology), a Post-Graduate Diploma in Humanitarian Assistance (Liverpool School of Tropical Medicine) and a BS from University of Vermont.
A surfer and waterman, Ryan is currently lives in Holland, MI with his wife Katie and their triplets, Kirby Sitka,
Fin Eckhart, and Kailani Sophia.
