It means serving as your highly skilled personal consultant—for the express purpose of helping you resolve some especially knotty or weighty problem. 

I do this by literally thinking with you as we discuss your issue together over the course of one or more meetings.  I make sure that you—or we, if you prefer—get all the information and cover all the bases we can, and then thoughtfully choose a way forward.  I stand ready to provide short-term follow-up support if you wish.  My commitment to you is to ensure you are fully enabled to understand the problem and take practical, ethical, and effective action to resolve it.

And what kind of problem?  Well, for example:

• You need or want to end a serious feud.  But how?
• You’re at a crossroads in your career.  What do you do?
• You want to “follow your joy.”  How the heck would you do that?
• What are you going to do about your adult child still living at home?
• How do you get meaning and value from a major experience you’ve had?
• What are the just-right words for an important talk you need to give or initiate?
• On what should you spend your money?  As in, what really matters to you anyway?
• You feel unfulfilled.  Where and how do you find nourishment, be it spiritual or otherwise?

It’s not that I have expertise with all such issues (some though); rather, I claim the competence to help you because I have an unusually apt set of intellectual, interpersonal, and communication skills to put towards problem-solving.  Along with more real-world experience than I like admitting to, and 34 years of professional practice.  (See below.)

Also for your consideration:  Being outside your usual circle, I bring new perspective; and I have no interest in any outcome other than what we both agree is a good one.  You could find those qualities in a capable therapist, but you don’t want a therapist; you want attention on the problem and not on you.  It would be even better if as your partner I had both some wisdom and some smarts, along with a personal style that made you feel good—right?  (Modesty won’t work here, and I do think I can live up to most of that.)

The distinction with therapy is important; my mission is to help solve problems, not to offer treatment.  However, if in the course of my service we agree the problem calls for specialized assistance—whether from a therapist, rehab program, attorney, financial planner, or for that matter a civil engineer—I’ll help you connect with a good one.  And while I do not provide general life counseling, I do believe in the possibility of rejuvenation and transformation for virtually everyone and know that there are many, many good vehicles for that journey.  Should that be of interest, I can help clear the way and, if you wish, gently but firmly push you towards your chosen road.

I’m a rather open fellow, so you’ll get a good sense of me if we meet.  For what it’s worth though, here’s a thumbnail:

After studying philosophy at Yale and supporting myself with lots of wide-ranging work, I began a 34-year career, earning a Masters in counseling along the way, as the principal and/or design clinician in notable programs in the fields of addict and criminal rehabilitation.  As such I have developed innovative programming and directed, written, and trained at the corporate, national, and international level.  My sponsoring institutions have included the Harvard School of Public Health, the National Institute on Drug Abuse, and the United Nations.  In recent years, with major federal grants I've been pioneering computer-based methodologies for training offenders and addicts in critical thinking skills.

None of which may have great relevance to your situation, but I hope it suggests a broad sensibility and a sustained close encounter with the struggles of real life.  Details and particulars are available for the asking.

Please be in touch if you are interested.  I would love to chat a bit.  Then if you like, we can meet—no charge of course—to see whether your issue and my services mesh.  Thanks for reading this.

Fred Zackon

    978-766-0098   

    or send me email