I'm here to help you navigate the most challenging moments on your relationship journey.

For as long as I can remember, I've been passionate about relationships. Not the fairy-tale version: the real, messy, complicated, beautiful reality of what it takes to truly connect with another human being. Relational skills that work no matter the situation.

That passion has taken me on quite a journey. For more than 15 years, I've worked with hundreds of individuals and couples, witnessing countless breakthroughs, supporting them through courageous growth. And I've spent more than 30 years researching and experimenting with what actually works when you're trying to communicate with someone important, about something important, and your nervous system is hijacked. Yes, I'm that old (over 50 as of 2024).

And I've interviewed over 100 of the world's leading relationship and healing experts on my podcast, Relationship Alive - with more than 8 million downloads worldwide.

But these aren't just interviews with experts. I learn from them, ask them the hard questions, test what works, and bring those insights directly into my coaching, online courses, and workshops.

A bit of my story...

I'm from Maine. Not originally, but enough to feel at home here. Maine culture supports you being real...but it doesn't always support you being "who you are." So that quest to be authentically you, despite the judgments of the world around you...I've been on it myself.

I have two kiddos...well, one is over 18...so technically he's an adulto now. I'm divorced from their mother, and have had to navigate the challenges of co-parenting and blended families. It was the process of being married, and trying "everything" - only to feel everything ultimately crumble - that led me to my coaching career, and to starting Relationship Alive. Feeling like there HAD to be a better way, I was determined to find it for myself. And then to share what I learned with others.

So I dove in - to everything. Made more choices. Some great. Some less great. I learned - the hard way - the consequences of not standing in my own integrity, of making choices that were more based in fear than in courage. And I saw just how much it takes to change directions when the momentum of life is carrying you - even when you know, in your bones, that the path isn't quite right.

Fortunately I've found my way to a loving, reciprocal partnership. And even though it still takes work, it's amazing how much less work it is when the ingredients are all there. I'm a firm believer in doing your best, all the while learning the things that you don't know about how to be better in relationship. And, sometimes, you do need to just make a different choice. Those are tough moments, and they're challenging to navigate with kindness even when you're at your best. If you think you might be at a choice point like that...I see you.

You do what you can. You regroup. You repair. You learn. And then you try again, hopefully doing it better the next time.

How I think about the world...

I've always been an interdisciplinary kinda guy. Which basically means that I'm curious about a lot of things, and am looking for the connections that tie them all together. So whether it's my 17 years of experience in the corporate world (culminating as the Director of Technology for a software company), a side hustle as a dog trainer (learning an emotion-centric way of working with pups), studying physical comedy (yup - clown school), or my lifelong passion for music and songwriting (currently working on a full-length album of original tunes) - I've seen common threads that clearly lead to better relational and collaborative outcomes.

Some of these principles are:

• You have to be truly present to be relational.
• When you're not present, it's important to take time to figure out what specifically is getting in the way.
• Once you identify an obstacle, determine what you need, specifically, to meet the moment - and honor it.
• What's required will be different based on the people involved, and their individual strengths and challenges.
• You have to work with what is...in order to evolve to where you want to be.
• Your resilience (or the resilience of a relationship that you're in) is based on how well you can learn to bounce back from challenging situations (not on your ability to avoid them!).
• You can develop your ability to discern what challenges to face, and which challenges to avoid. (yes, sometimes there ARE challenges worth avoiding)
• Sometimes we make the wrong choice. Fortunately there are great ways to course correct, and repair. You just might not know them yet.
• You have unique abilities, ways that you are uniquely prepared to show up in your life. And you'll feel best the more that your life is structured around those unique gifts of yours.