Robert Espiau, LMHC

Robert's path into trauma work is unusual, and clients tend to feel the difference. Before and alongside his clinical career he spent six years in Buddhist monastic training, and he has taught classical meditation practices for more than three decades. His professional background spans psychiatric nursing, clinical leadership, and work in prison and juvenile justice settings, and his practice has taken him across cultures, including years of international work with expats and cross-cultural clients in Southeast Asia.

In the therapy room, that history shows up as steadiness. Robert works somatically, with the nervous system as well as the story, and matches the method to the person. Clients working with him have access to the full range of his training, from EMDR and Brainspotting to Focusing-Oriented Therapy and Acceptance and Commitment Therapy, approaches that within our collective are unique to him.

As Clinical Director, Robert provides clinical consultation and supervision for therapists, and he leads our religious trauma certification training for clinicians. He developed the Self-Remembering methodology, has taught meditation in settings ranging from retreat centers to a federal prison, and his perspective on trauma and recovery has been featured in podcasts, recorded talks, and international media. He has also published academic work on meditation and contemplative practice.

Robert is the creator and developer of Self-Remembering, a non-dualistic awareness methodology for religious trauma treatment. It integrates non-dual awareness, somatic psychology, mindfulness, attachment theory, and trauma treatment to help people recover from religious trauma, spiritual abuse, shame-based identity, and developmental trauma. The approach grew out of decades of clinical work at the intersection of contemplative practice and trauma therapy, and it informs both his client work and the training he provides to other therapists.