Liz White: Let me introduce myself
I have been active as group worker, trainer, therapist, consultant and presenter for over thirty years. My work now is a reflection of all that I have experienced, studied, created and shared, and its variety and richness is reflected in my history.
I began my professional life as a counsellor as a Life Skills coach and coach trainer for the YWCA of Metropolitan Toronto. Working with the coach team, I co-authored Life Skills with Women, the first in a highly successful series of manuals.
My next training experience, in psychodrama at the Moreno Institute in 1975, led me to co-found the Toronto Centre for Psychodrama and Sociometry, and to be certified as Trainer, Educator, Practitioner by the American Board of Examiners in Psychodrama, Sociometry and Group Psychotherapy. Over 25 years I held the roles of student, administrator, collective member, and member of the trainers team that designed the Certification Program and oversaw the work of the trainees. I was twice elected to the American Board, where, as vice chair, I chaired the Ethics Committee.
In recognition of my efforts in psychodrama, I was honoured to be elected Fellow of the American Society of Group Psychotherapy and Psychodrama (ASGPP), and, more recently, was a co-recipient of their Collaborators Award for the significant example of the Toronto Centre as a collective model of administration. I am active as a presenter at conferences of the ASGPP, the British Psychodrama Association, Psychodrama CH (Zurich), the Ontario Society of Psychotherapy and professional meetings of other organizations related to my field of interest.
My personal life intercepted my work dramatically in 1993 with the death of our eldest son, David, of lung cancer. I pursued my experience of bereavement in my work, and, as co-chair of the Toronto Region, served on the board of the Bereavement Ontario Network. I have presented a number of times at their annual conferences.
As psychotherapists came together in Ontario to support the profession and one another, I became a Clinical Member of the Ontario Society of Psychotherapists, on whose board I served for four years as Chair of the Discipline and the Public Relations committees.
I was invited to become the founding trainer of the Saskatchewan School of Psychodrama, which, administered by a collective, offers training four times a year. Once again, we are building a community based on sociometric principles.
In 2002 I published my book, The Action Manual: Techniques for Enlivening Group Process and Individual Counselling. I am happy to report that it has been well received and is already in its third printing! You may read excerpts and reviews from two journals.
My personal world includes a life-long partnership, four children, nine grandchildren, the respect of peers, the love of friends and robust good health.