Dan does this work because feeling like he’s lessened someone’s long-term suffering helps him sleep at night. He isn’t driven by altruism; he’s someone who is searching, practicing, and most days failing in some capacity, at how to separate from ego in order to show up for others without an agenda or ulterior motive.

That orientation is grounded in Motivational Interviewing, an evidence-based approach built on the recognition that unsolicited advice lands poorly the vast majority of the time. Parker Palmer put it well: “The human soul doesn’t want to be advised or fixed or saved. It simply wants to be witnessed — to be seen, heard, and believed exactly as it is.” Dan treats that less as inspiration and more as instruction.

He holds an LADC and CCS, is completing his MSW, and has been in clinical practice since 2021. He brings more than a decade of his own sobriety to that work, not as a credential, but as context. He maintains a private practice on a sliding scale alongside his role at Portland Treatment, where he believes lasting recovery is built on five things: authenticity, connection, presence, purpose, and pull. If any of those resonate, or raise questions, he’d genuinely welcome the conversation.