In My Practice
I love seeing the lightbulb moments in my clients’ eyes when they have break through realizations & experience grace they never dreamed could be possible. My practice centers around helping people integrate these moments of awareness into their lives so they can have lasting transformation. While I often support people in healing anxiety and depression, my expertise includes Healing from Religious Trauma / Oppression, Men's issues, Relationships, and Recovery from Addiction.
Throughout my career, as a Counsellor, Addictions counsellor, Executive director of a first nation's men's treatment center, group facilitator of: Men's Peaceful Warrior Circles (group therapy for men), Healing from Religious Oppression Circles, Sacred Empowering Language workshops, and The Secrets of Thriving Relationships, and NLP Life coach, I have worked with individuals from diverse backgrounds. One of the common themes I find in my work is how trauma leads to a loss of connection and a sense of aloneness. My heart for helping people find connection and healing with themselves and others stems from my personal experience.
I See My Experiences as Great Wealth
Informing my Practice
I endured religious oppression and trauma growing up. I became the scapegoat in my family system. I lived with the underlying beliefs that I was unworthy of love and that I didn’t belong in the world. Perfectionism and people-pleasing are ways I adapted to try to feel accepted and safe, little did I know that they were compounding my problems. In my early adulthood, I struggled with addiction as a way to deal with the pain of my traumas yet the journey of recovery led me to healing my shame, guilt, and fear, discovering a path of self worth, self forgiveness, and compassion.
This created a depth of empathy and strength in me that allows me to hold space for my clients’ most severe painful experiences with grounded clarity.
Education & Experience
The spiritual, ancestral/intergenerational, and experiential aspects of psychological healing gave me the most traction on my journey of Transformation which led me to earn my diploma in Transpersonal (Spiritual) Psychology Counselling from Clearmind International Institute whose approach is centered around Family Systems Theory, and experiential processes.
Somatic and experiential group therapy have been foundational in my healing and my practice which is now deeply influenced by in depth training in Therapeutic Qigong.
My desire to bring deeper influence to states of being through the power of communication led me to an in depth certification mentorship with one of the top Neuro-Linguistic Programming & Timeline Therapy Masters in the world, Niurka. I am a certified NLP & SIIA Practitioner with the American Board of Neuro-Linguistic Programming which has been foundational to my Life Coaching work and supporting people in Recovery.
For two decades I’ve helped hundreds of men find solid lasting recovery. I work with a variety of recovery modalities in and outside the 12 step model. I’ve personally done thirteen sets of steps in six fellowships. There’s a magic that happens in groups that can be found nowhere else. This is one of the reasons why I love facilitating Wellbriety Recovery Circles which are rooted in Indigenous Teachings & Principles. In these Circles, there is an exceptionally high recovery rate for the men who finish these groups.
My Roots
As a seeker, I’ve explored many spiritual paths, and today as a man of Scottish, Polish and Plains Cree heritage with many warriors in my bloodline, I have chosen to walk the way of the Red Road and honor the way of all of my indigenous ancestors from their corners of the Earth. I see my ancestors as ones who were able to walk in a more harmonious way with the Earth and one another and value this as a Peaceful Warrior way.
Happily united with my beautiful beloved Rebecca, we have an outstanding relationship and love to share the secrets we’ve discovered to healthy thriving relationships. This has been a passion of learning and growth for both of us due to past challenges. Now the joy of uniting successfully brings us to sharing all that we’ve learned.
I am a Father and grandfather to 3 grandchildren.
Offering my Gifts
I’ve come to see the gifts in all situations, allowing gratitude to flow into the deepest parts of me.
I deeply value relationships first, one's relationship with themselves and then with others. This is at the root of my work with Counselling, Coaching, Teaching, and Group Facilitation.
My passion is to help people reconnect with themselves at the core and see themselves through the eyes of compassion, be able to receive love, and uncover their hidden gifts so they can bring them into their relationships, family, business, community, and the world.
Yours in the delight of transformation,
Vince Wishart
