About me...
I work at the intersections of neurodivergence, trans & queer identities and somatic practice. As an autistic person and family member of multiple neurodivergent loved ones I bring decades of lived experience coupled with over 15 years as a mental health practitioner to my trainings, writing, consultation, and therapy practice. I am agender (they/them) and queer, and grew up in a time and place when and where those were not identities one could claim.
My work, whether it be a large presentation or a private therapy session, is my best effort to honor all I have been gifted by my teachers who have taught me to show up, listen deeply, and open my heart to being changed by each encounter, whether it be a therapy session or a question at a training. I am deeply committed to embodying the liberation and connection that is vital to our health and to all our relations, and in supporting others in bringing their gifts to community.
Some of my teachers I can name, while others I may not, or cannot speak, due to confidentiality, my limited memory, the loss of sources due to appropriation.
Here is a most inadequate naming of teachers: the fluid mantle, fossils, geologic unconformities, hummingbird, snake, hawk, cedar, madrone, ancestors, family-especially my children, finger-painting, sculpture studio, social justice activists again and again and again, queer folk of the 70s and 80s, queer folk of the now.
The Wakwa Society, Ursula Le'Guin and Madeleine L'Engle for making some things make sense before the internet, the Energy & Resource Group, tai chi and aikido teachers and their lineages, lovers and friends, the Song that came and then kept coming, all my dance and martial arts partners, all the neurodivergent ones that didn't know, but left their beauty, pain and wonder to be picked up.
Clover Catskill, Anna Halprin, Val Loefler, Bill Bowen, Kathy Kain, Nick Walker, Reverend Angel Kyodo Williams, Zahava Griss and all their teachers.
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So many poets, so many musicians, clients and fellow students, offering each other the generosity of our mistakes and forgiveness.
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My consult groups, my comrades in the Neuroqueer Somatics Research Collective, the many teachers I have forgotten or failed to recognize what I breathed in was from you—presents with misplaced nametages, and, finally, gratitude and apologies to all I failed to learn from. Maybe the seed will sprout one day when I am ready.
Honoring and Acknowledging
I live and work on the unceded territory of the Awaswas-speaking Uypi tribe and honor the ongoing work of the the Amah Mutsun Tribal Band to restore traditional stewardship practices on these lands and heal from historical trauma.”
Finn Gratton
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Licensed Professional Clinical Counselor #826
Licensed Marriage and Family Therapist #50552
© 2024 by Finn V. Gratton