January / February 2023 Volume 22, No. 1

Beginning Anew in 2023

I am filled with gratitude as I welcome 2023 as the new, incoming President of AAMFT: we have a new, incoming CEO, Christine Michaels; a new group of Board members; some ongoing challenges which we are newly poised to tackle, and opportunities that await us as we are in as strong a fiscal and strategic [...]

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September / October 2022 Volume 21, No. 5

Systemic Understanding for Healing and Health

For the past four years, I have been serving on the AAMFT Board of Directors in my presidency tenure (two years as president-elect, two years as president; in 2023 I will shift to past-president). I have watched in awe as the world changed in some radical ways, and alongside my fellow board members, have worked [...]

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May / June 2022 Volume 21, No. 3

A Warm Salutation to Each of You

One of my favorite novels is The Book Thief, by Marcus Zusak. Set in 1939 Munich, Death tells the story of an assembled “family” amid chaos, fear, book banning, and love. I’m re-reading this book right now. It is essentially an MFT book, in that it recognizes that relationships are fundamental to the health and [...]

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January / February 2022 Volume 21, No. 1

Farewell 2021 … Hello 2022!

It’s that time of year again, to glance into the rearview mirror at what lies behind and to look to what lies ahead. As you look in the rearview mirror of your past year, what do you see? We’ve all been enduring a worldwide pandemic—that is still ongoing—and it has shaped each of us, our [...]

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September / October 2021 Volume 20, No. 5

Profession and Practice

In the AAMFT Governance Policies (December 2019)—and on the AAMFT website—there is a Core Purpose statement of AAMFT that reads, “Recognizing that relationships are fundamental to the health and well-being of individuals, couples, families, and communities, AAMFT exists to advance the profession and the practice of marriage and family therapy.” Have you ever considered what [...]

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May / June 2021 Volume 20, No. 3

Change and Hope

In January, I reflected on hope for 2021 with vaccines on their way and the promise of perhaps moving as an entire worldwide system to the other side of COVID19. In a few days, I will receive my second “jab” and be filled with gratitude that I have the ability to receive a life-saving miracle-of-science [...]

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January / February 2021 Volume 20, No. 1

The Greater Systems Around Us

Welcome to 2021, AAMFT Members. As I enter this inaugural season of my presidency in the midst of metasystemic changes, I find myself mentally framing AAMFT’s place in the greater systems around us. As the smallest of all mental health professions, Marriage and Family Therapy has our own unique story: Our origins started with “others”—psychiatrists, [...]

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September / October 2020 Volume 19, No. 5

Reflections on a Pivotal Time

As I draft this final column of my term as your AAMFT president, I cannot help but reflect on the sense of wonder and awe of this uniquely historic year. It is almost cliché to keep highlighting the unprecedented times in which we are living. I say almost because it is true—and almost every day [...]

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May / June 2020 Volume 19, No. 3

Caring and Connecting

In so called normal times, I would be reflecting on the promises of spring and joys of summer. At the time I am drafting this column, nearly 350,000 people across the globe have died of complications due to coronavirus—and that is likely an undercount. In the U.S. we are approaching nearly one-third of that total. [...]

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January / February 2020 Volume 19, No. 1

The Road Ahead

Happy New Year 2020! Just saying that conjures a sense of vision. My hope is that this year—indeed, this decade—is one of vision, foresight, and generativity. I’m staring down the road of my second year as president—and thinking beyond. I’m reflecting on the thematic aims and hopes I expressed last year for my term of [...]

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