Ryan Howes, Ph.D.

I earn a living sitting in a comfortable chair talking with people about the most imporant issues in their lives.

That's my canned response for "what do you do?" It may be a bit simplified, but it captures how I feel each morning coming to work: honored to be a part of my clients' world, privileged to use my training to help people.

In college I was a youth worker who decided to take some psychology courses so I could better help the kids with their breakups, parent's divorces and teenage angst. This budding interest morphed into a major and several years of graduate school. My education at Fuller entailed a master's in theology en route to a Ph.D. in clinical psychology, a perfect meld of my interests. I also entered my own therapy at this time, helping me experience the challenge encountered from both chairs. It was then I realized the inherent disparity between therapist and client. Therapists spend years in school and read scores of books learning their craft, while most clients enter the experience raw.

I was trained at the LA County/USC Medical Center, Wright Institute Los Angeles and Southern California Psychoanalytic Institute, and was fortunate to teach courses at Glendale College and Pepperdine University's graduate school. I've been Clinical Professor for Fuller's Graduate School of Psychology since 2002, supervising graduate student clinicians with their clients. But my heart has always been in private practice.

I've been a psychotherapist since 1997 while pursuing mutual interests in music and writing. In 2007 I co-authored a sex manual for Christian men entitled What Wives Wish their Husbands Knew about Sex: A Guide for Christian Men. For the past five years I've envisioned a book for my clients helping them navigate the complicated waters of the therapeutic relationship. A chance email to the Psychology Today editors resulted in this blog - both an opportunity for me to reach the masses and the motivation I've needed to write. I hope you enjoy what you read, and even more, benefit from the dialogue.

I write the PT blog In Therapy. My private practice in Pasadena, California can be reached through my website or Find a Therapist listing.