Brooks Witter, MA, LMHC, LPC
Office Location
2700 Westown Parkway, Suite 425,
West Des Moines, Iowa 50266
Phone:+ (515) 528-7766
Fax:+ (515) 528 -7771
Email Brook
Brooks Witter, MA, LMHC, LPC
For the past 30 years, I’ve followed a life calling to be of service. This service finds expression through bringing myself fully to the work of helping people discover, articulate and chart their unique course towards what they truly yearn for in this one precious life.
My therapeutic intent is to draw out the intelligence within our struggles, so as to derive valuable wisdom from the myriad experiences we encounter. By developing the courage to be with ourselves in an open and honest way, we can begin to see how our greatest fears point the way towards our greatest hopes and longings. I believe that a meaningful life cannot be lived without contacting the pain of anxiety, doubt, insecurity or grief. Rather, times when we willingly risk the vulnerability of loss and failure in order to stay true to the values and principles that lay at the core of our being are times when we become most fully ourselves.
In terms of how this looks from a client’s perspective, my work is collaborative, practical, rewarding and ultimately liberating. I seek to draw on my clients’ strengths to help them meet in new ways the inner challenges that interfere with making outward progress in life. Together, we address personal struggles, interpersonal issues and transpersonal longings in ways that develop radical acceptance of reality while also calling forth latent strengths and new skills to move life towards greater vitality, purpose and fulfillment. Working with me, clients should expect to learn, among other things, practical tools for: managing emotional distress, unhooking from problematic thinking, engaging more effective interpersonal communication strategies, identifying core values, and developing greater capacity to orient towards and act on what truly matters.
Professional
I completed my undergraduate degree at Brown University and received an MA in Contemplative Psychotherapy from Naropa University in 2005. I have been a practicing mental health professional since 2004, having spent my first decade of clinical practice working in a small intensive therapeutic program supporting young adults in Boulder, Colorado where I eventually served as Clinical Director. I then worked with Naropa University’s Community Counseling Center, providing clinical training, supervision, program implementation and therapeutic group facilitation. I have worked in private practice since 2010, and have done so exclusively since 2019. I am a peer-reviewed trainer in Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT), and have delivered dozens of trainings on ACT for various applications to diverse audiences.
I currently offer individual and couples counseling, clinical training as well as life- and parent-coaching. My individual clients come to find support in facing struggles with anxiety, depression, lack of purpose, and seeking to craft lives with greater vitality and fulfillment. I also work with parents of adolescents and young adults who need guidance in supporting their kids’ successful launch. My work weaves together the science of cutting-edge behavioral therapies – Acceptance and Commitment Therapy, Functional Analytic Psychotherapy, Compassion Focused Therapy – and practical wisdom stemming from my background in Buddhism and nature-based spirituality. I also integrate elements of Ecopsychology, Depth Psychology, Psychodrama and improvisational theater. My work with couples draws on the Psycho-biological Approach to Couples Therapy (PACT).
In addition to my work in the office, I love bringing people into deeper contact with themselves and the natural world through facilitating individual and group experiences in wild places.