Ask Mountain Counseling

Meet Two of the Mountain Counseling Team
Since we’re still awaiting questions from the community (hint, hint), I thought we’d use this month’s column to introduce two of our MCT team—our Program Manager and one of our newest clinicians.
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Bethany Evans (Program Manager)
Bethany Evans grew up in Lake Arrowhead and attended Rim of the World Unified School District before studying Linguistics and English Literature at Northwestern University. Now, she relishes the chance to give back to her home community and work with the schools that provided her such excellent support. Bethany believes in the power of random acts of kindness and contributes daily to making the lives of young people in our community better so that the ‘mountain’ thrives. When not trying to organize administrative systems or figure out county regulations, Bethany explores the mountain by hiking with her dog or finding new coffee shops to try out. Bethany was instrumental in writing the proposal that yielded approximately $750,000 in new services for mountain communities’ youth.

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​Serena Hamilton, Therapist (Associate Marriage and Family Therapist)
Although a newcomer to the mountain, Serena is not new to serving children and their families. With over seven years of experience serving at-risk youth, as coach, mentor or therapist, she is passionately committed to supporting others as they walk through their journey to healing and fulfilling their life missions.  She is also continuing her own education as a lifelong learner and hopes to complete a doctorate as well as earing her clinical licensure as a Marriage and Family Therapist. ​​Her clinical approach is client-centered and strengths-based--she believes her best work starts with seeing the client as the expert on their own lives, with the growth plan based on client needs and strengths. Her personal experience as a foster youth drives her to find the most powerful strategies to helping children and families, particularly those who have been affected by involvement with Child and Family Services (CFS).  She works each day to find the best strategies for bettering the lives of youth and families in our mountain communities.

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​Your coaching for the month:
Set up an accountability relationship with one person.  The rules:

1. Must be mutual (both of you working together to accomplish growth goals);
2. Must be weekly.
3. Must be confidential.
4. Must be short-term (do for three months and then evaluate).

Accountability is a great “stretch strategy” for taking your success to the next level. Want more tips on making accountability work?  Send email to michael@mountaincounseling.org with “Accountability” in the subject line.  Let me know how your experiments in growth and accountability take shape.

See you next month!  Don’t let your voice go unheard.  Don’t let your contribution wait another day.  Connect with MCT at AskUs@mountaincounseling.org.  If not you then, who?  If not now, then when? (Robin Sharma)
 
Michael Beavers, MCT’s CEO/Founder, will be writing some of the monthly columns but MCT’s team of clinicians, family specialists, and parent partners will also be contributors. MCT is a fast-growing not-for-profit serving our mountain communities with student services (counseling, coaching, classes), addiction recovery, and leadership development.  Send your questions for future columns to Askus@MountainCounseling.org.--we  We promise to respond to every email.  Some answers will appear in this space. 

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