A Little About Me

I grew up on Catalina Island, located about 25 miles off the coast of Southern California, and where my family has lived for three generations. This is not much time in relation to the land, the wildlife, and native peoples, but it is long enough to develop a strong sense of place. As a child I was deeply moved by this landscape. Much of my sustenance came from the surrounding hills, steep canyons, and wildly narrow beaches. I was raised among Prickly Pear, Scrub Oak, Manzanita, Iron Wood, and California Sage. The surrounding ocean, with its emerald translucency and multicolored kelp provided me with a sense of profound mystery.  “Expose a child to a particular environment at his susceptible time and he will perceive in the shapes of that environment until he dies”, writes Wallace Stegner. My early impressions of the island are the specs through which I view myself and the world. They enter my dreams and call for my attention. They make up the topology of my inner map.

My strong attachment to my island landscape has taught me that the surrounding environment provides us with the material that gives substance and form to the myths and archetypal images by which we live.  Whether it is rocky islands, vast deserts, precipitous mountains, deep valleys, or grassy plains, the characteristics and contours of the landscape shape our cosmology, form our spiritual beliefs, and construct our worldviews. As for me, the island has taught me that although most of my life occurs above ground, firmly placed on this small mound of terra firma, the greater sources of life remain beyond the island, within the surrounding ocean. Islands provide a perfect metaphor for depth psychology which views a small and limited ego-consciousness adrift a bountiful and alluring unconscious sea.  It comes as no surprise that I spent much of my youth attempting to dive as deep as my little lungs would allow, always pulled downward toward the oceanic dreamscape. 

In 2004, I completed the PhD program in Depth Psychology at Pacifica Graduate Institute. Here, I wrote my dissertation on Landscape Archetypes, which weaves together insights from Jungian Depth Psychology, nature studies, and wilderness experiences. My passion resides in the realm of psyche and nature, wilderness rites of passage, and depth psychology. I am also the co-director of Vision Quest and Training for the School of Lost Borders, a training center for wilderness rites of passage located in Big Pine, CA.  Currently, I am Associate Professor of Counseling at California State University, Los Angeles, where I teach teach graduate studies in marriage and family therapy. 

Much of my free time is spent hiking the California Sierra, Catalina Island, and the Mojave and Great Basin Deserts. I also have a lifelong passion for Mexico, particularly Baja California (where I was conceived - so I’ve been told). Once in a while I pick up the guitar and pick out a tune.

Check out my blog at http://psycheandnature.wordpress.com/

To contact me you can send e-mail to betsy@psycheandnature.com