Going through these academic programs, your job really is to learn how to be a therapist. They're training you to sit in front of clients and it's a serious matter. You're holding people's psyches.

Coming into Pacifica I knew that I wanted whatever I was going to learn there, I knew I wanted to integrate that into my art no matter what.

I was supporting other people's creative dreams and I wasn't supporting my own. I didn't feel like I could really serve people having that kind of process within me.

If my artist life didn't work or if I needed to work in some capacity part-time in something, I knew I'd have a real life skill [become a therapist].

With regard to how I chose Pacifica, my story is interesting. I did not go to Pacifica to specifically become a therapist. I went to Pacifica to study Jungian psychology and archetypes and mythology and there were many different programs there.

I had a client who just wanted to entertain me the whole time, that is a defense against going deep, in my mind. What happens when the jokester is not allowed to deflect with humor? You then have to feel the pain, and learn that you can survive it. It makes you more resilient and stronger in the long run, and your sense of humor will always be there. Being able to see the funny is deep.

[Humor] could be dicey for a therapist and needs to be used very deftly.