I have long desired to write a book or even a series of books about psychology. In fact in 2007 I retired entirely from the practice of psychology. I did keep my license current by participating in the required continuing education courses – 48 hours every two years. I was all set with a paid for house, a generous pension for life, and a younger spouse who was still employed as an executive. I immediately set to work on my first book which I tentatively titled, “On Becoming a Better Person.” As you can see I was paying homage to Carl Rogers and his groundbreaking book, On Becoming a Person, published in 1961. Two themes exist here: the first is Roger’s book and the second is my preoccupation with what it means to be a good person. Twelve years later that book still exists in infant form as neat pile of handwritten 5-1/2 x 8 inch index cards with carefully outlined chapters.
After 14 months of that retirement, I sorely missed the engagement in the world of employment with coworkers and meetings and membership on teams with goals bigger than one person could accomplish alone. Because I have had a lifelong devotion to food, I have acquired sufficient culinary skills to be called “chef” without blushing. I managed to land a job as a retail associate in the high end cooking store, Sur La Table in the Gateway District of Salt Lake City for $9.00 an hour. After a year of having grand fun as a retail associate working in the store of my dreams, I wormed my way into the position of chef instructor where I could teach culinary classes at the store. I was one of the very few nonculinary trained chefs that Sur La Table had ever hired. I taught a wide variety of classes in baking, pastries and hot kitchen. I was elated.
In the meantime I found my way back to the practice of psychology in 2010 through the generosity of Dr. Jon Bone, a brand new, very smart and very driven psychologist who was just establishing his private practice. He advertised through the Utah Psychological Association Forum that he was looking for a psychologist who could see patients in his new office space and pay a fee to help support the enterprise. I know that Jon was looking for a young person closer to his age of about 30, and I don’t know what he thought when an “old” man twice his age asked for the job. Anyway, Dr. Bone agreed and all I can say is, “Thank you, Jon.”
For almost a year I saw 8 to 10 patients a week and taught culinary classes at Sur La Table. I liked that my fee for providing one hour of therapy was about what I made for each cooking class which required about 6 hours of prep, teaching and cleanup even with assistants to help me. But, the classes paid me in mental health. Sadly, by the summer of 2010, my patient load forced me to make a choice between culinary and psychology. I loved psychology and reluctantly let go of teaching. I do want to acknowledge Executive Chef Kyle Nicholson who had the confidence to take me on even without formal culinary training. Chef Kyle was the same age as Dr. Bone, and they knew each other from their soccer team in elementary school. Thank you, Chef Kyle, for the opportunities and the knowledge you gave me.
Now you may be wondering where Carl Rogers fits into this narrative. Just a little patience and I will get there. Well, I spent almost the entire decade of the 1960’s in preparation for the Catholic priesthood. With great enthusiasm and in spite of my parents’ obvious reluctance, I trundled from Layton, Utah to Baltimore, Maryland and later Oak Ridge, New Jersey for a seven-year coming of age adventure in a boarding school/minor seminary in the quest of become a Paulist Father. If you are wondering what that was like, look no farther than Harry Potter and Hogwarts except, sadly, it was not coed. It was all there, the dining hall (refectory) with the head table, close friendships, and some conflicts with other students and with the faculty. Many of the faculty were priests from New York City of Irish heritage, and they did not like Italian boys like me. No worries: I was academically at the top of my classes, and I enjoyed the atmosphere so much that no one could spoil it for me.
My last months in the seminary were spent at the novitiate just outside of Oak Ridge, New Jersey. It was a monastic life of prayer and work and a year off from academic studies. While at the novitiate I had become increasingly aware of a desire to help people going through life’s difficulties with something more immediate than religion. But, I did not know what. Then, one Saturday night around December of 1967. I was alone in the extensive novitiate library and just wandering through the stacks and looking for a book to read. A title stared out me: On Becoming a Person by Carl Rogers. I absentmindedly removed it from the shelf and started to read it while I stood in aisle. The opening paragraphs floated off the page and overwhelmed me: Of course, I wanted to be a psychotherapist! I left the seminary, moved back in with my parents and eight younger siblings, and enrolled at Weber State University in Ogden with a declared major in psychology. I have never looked back.
As to the mission of this website. It will be a series of posts addressing cutting edge topics in both the academic science and the clinical practice of psychology. The posts will cover not only those book chapters from the index cards mentioned above but also discussions about psychology as a hard science, evolutionary psychology, neuroscience, history of psychology, and the scientific underpinnings of epistemology, ethics, aesthetics, logic, metaphysics, and politics.
About six years ago I moved my psychology practice to the Center for Human Potential (https://c4hp.com) where I work with a dozen wonderful colleagues. In honor of my 72nd birthday, I limited the practice to two days a week so that I can blog on two sites: This one and https://thecosmos.blog. I am extremely excited about beginning this blogging journey with you the readers. Thank you very much for signing on with me!
