About Dan Halpern, MA, LPC
I specialize in treating anxiety, recent and childhood trauma, relationship issues, existential crises, and integrating one’s spirituality into daily life. I work with individuals on a spiritual or contemplative path, as well as those for whom that’s not a central aspect of their life.
​
To me, spirituality supports living in greater connection with our essential nature and limitless potential, while also deeply rooting ourselves in a web of belonging with the human and more-than-human worlds. In other words, I don’t see spirituality as a way to transcend and escape this life, but to come into and live it more fully.
I'm a Licensed Professional Counselor in the state of Colorado (LPC.0020448), and hold certificates in EMDR; Somatic Soul-Based Trauma work, a 9-month training I’ve also assisted; Integrative Somatic Parts Work; and Foundation Studies in Anthroposophic Social Therapy.
In addition to being a counselor, I’m also a father, husband, poet, dancer, and musician.
My Background
I’m a descendant of Jewish ancestry from Eastern Europe, primarily Poland, Russia, and Ukraine, and more recently from 3 generations living in Boston, Massachusetts. I grew up on ancestral lands of the Wampanoag and Massachusett people in a town called Sharon, MA, and now live by the foothills of the Rocky Mountains in Colorado on traditional lands of the Arapaho, Ute, and Cheyenne. I am indebted to the lands on which I’ve walked, fallen, and rested, and to the tenders of these lands, as well as to my ancestors, family, friends, teachers, and to the nurturing forces that create, sustain, and renew life.
In addition to many different programs, studies, and trainings, my therapy and coaching is largely based on the direct healing experiences of myself and others. On my personal journey, I experienced an existential crisis in the form of a spiritual emergency as a young adult, something that was not understood or held as the initiatory experience it was by those around me. Through many years of grounding and seeking to understand life, reality, and my place in it, I’ve developed a unique sensitivity and practical approach to the profound potential of counseling and psychotherapeutic healing. Working with extremely helpful, trauma-informed, contemporary models of psychology and human development, I also value meditation, mysticism, and a wider awareness of life than is typically taught through the Western worldview. In this way, I support a holistically generative, soul-nourishing, healing and growth process for the essence of your whole self, as its expressed through your current life circumstances.
How I Work
I’ve found that merely talking about our lives and feeling our emotions, while often necessary steps on the healing path, doesn’t create the lasting changes we yearn for. To affect the deepest and most enduring shifts we need in our lives, I work directly with the nervous system and the felt-sense awareness of the body.
Utilizing embodied awareness:
-
establishes you in the present moment,
-
helps you renegotiate the ways your past affects you on a cellular level,
-
grows your capacity to experience strong emotions without losing control, and
-
directly connects you to your deepest truths and purpose so you can freely choose how you live today and into the future.
​
Integrating years of study and training in different therapeutic modalities, approaches and aspects of healing, and an expansive awareness of being human, I meet you where you are in this moment and in the scope of your entire life. We’ll address your most immediate needs, while simultaneously working on the deeper patterns of your personality that may need validating, shifting, or updating for you to live in alignment with your highest truth.
Wisdom Streams
My approach draws from the work of Peter Levine and Somatic Experiencing, Internal Family Systems and parts work, Gestalt and Existential Therapies, attachment healing, developmental psychology, addiction counseling, and contemporary understandings of trauma taught by Bessel van der Kolk and Gabor Maté. I’m also very influenced by Joanna Macy’s Deep Ecology teachings and The Work That Reconnects, the grief work and initiatory teachings of Francis Weller, and the sincerely compassionate and cutting view of modernity and living of Bayo Akomolafe. I’ve also studied and practiced in various traditions of mystical Judaism, Buddhism, Taoism, Christianity, and Hinduism, as well as shamanism, animism, and other forms of energy healing, including Reiki and ancestral healing.
Awakening Your Potential
​Through my own healing journey, I’ve learned that although pain is an inevitable part of life, ongoing suffering doesn’t need to be. It’s possible to heal deep wounds, even wounds you may have been living with for years. It’s possible to come into healthy and fulfilling relationships with yourself and others. And it’s possible to awaken inner strength and resources to navigate life’s challenges with confidence, ease, and joy.
"I have grown so much with Dan’s help. Frankly, I never thought I would be this peaceful with myself as much as I am now. Dan is such a gift."
C.D., Client
Education
-
Master of Arts in Counseling, Regis University, 2019
-
Bachelor of Arts in Religious Studies, Psychology, and Writing, Naropa University, 2014
​
Trainings
-
EMDR (Eye-Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing), Personal Transformation Institute, 2022
-
Somatic Soul-Based Trauma Training, Katie Asmus & Wilderness Therapy Institute, Student 2020-2021; Assistant 2021-2022
-
Integrative Somatic Parts Work Certificate, The Embody Lab, 2022
-
Spiritual study and practice with Zvi Ish-Shalom in the Kedumah / Primordial Light mystery school, doing "wake down" work, in-depth somatic inquiry, and personal, relational, and spiritual healing and development, including ancestral Kabbalistic teachings, 2014-present
-
Certificate in Foundation Studies in Anthroposophic Social Therapy, Camphill Village Academy, 2010
​
Professional Experience
-
Therapist for adults, couples, and teens at People House’s Affordable Counseling Program
-
Group Facilitator for adult survivors of childhood sexual abuse at WINGS Foundation
-
Residential Counselor and Caregiver for adults with learning and developmental disabilities at Imagine! and Camphill Village USA
-
Crisis Line Operator with the Samaritans of Greater Boston
-
Hospice Volunteer with Family Hospice
-
Camp Counselor for children and teens at Camp Tel Noar
​
Therapeutic Modalities
-
Somatic Trauma Therapy
-
Parts Work
-
Gestalt Therapy
-
Mindfulness-based Therapy
-
EMDR
-
Multicultural Counseling
-
Feminist Therapy
-
Person-Centered Therapy Other Study and Experience
-
Nonviolent Communication
-
Motivational Interviewing
-
Bereavement Counseling
-
Crisis Intervention