Empowering Families and Executives with Edvardo Archer at AP Family Counseling Ep.59

Episode Overview

• Episode Topic:
  In this episode of Mastering Counseling, we will learn about the world of counseling and therapy with Edvardo Archer, the founder of AP Family Counseling. Edvardo shares his personal journey into the field of mental health, reflecting on crucial moments that led him to dedicate over 15 years to helping others navigate life’s challenges. From his experience as a house dad for young men transitioning out of foster care to his current role as a therapist, Edvardo provides insights into the complexities of family dynamics and the importance of authenticity in the healing process.
  
• Lessons You’ll Learn:
  Listeners will gain valuable insights into the power of authenticity and honesty in therapy, as Edvardo emphasizes the significance of creating a safe space for clients to explore their emotions and experiences. From his approach to working with families to his new venture into executive therapy, Edvardo highlights the importance of understanding individual and systemic dynamics in fostering growth and resilience. Through his stories and reflections, listeners will learn about the transformative potential of counseling in empowering individuals and families to navigate life’s challenges with courage and resilience.
• About Our Guest:
  Edvardo Archer is the founder of AP Family Counseling, bringing over 15 years of experience in the field of mental health. His journey into counseling began after a transformative experience as a house dad for young men aging out of foster care, where he witnessed firsthand the impact of trauma and the power of support in fostering resilience. Edvardo’s passion for helping others navigate life’s challenges has led him to develop a unique approach to therapy, grounded in authenticity, honesty, and compassion.
  
• Topics Covered:
  Throughout the episode, Edvardo discusses various aspects of his practice, including his approach to therapy, the challenges and rewards of working with families, and his new venture into executive therapy. He shares insights into the importance of creating a safe and supportive environment for clients to find their emotions and experiences authentically. From the use of office space to the automation of scheduling and accounting tasks, Edvardo offers practical tips for managing the business side of counseling while prioritizing client care and well-being.

Episode Transcript

Edvardo Archer: Productivity isn’t you doing more productivity should be you knowing what to ignore so that you can invest and be present in the things that actually matter. That’s the journey. That’s the work that I’m working to build up and serve.

Becky Copeland: Welcome to Mastering Counseling, the weekly business show for counselors. I’m your host, Becky Copeland. I’ve spent 20 years working in education in the role of both teacher and school counselor. Each episode will be exploring what it takes to thrive as a counseling business owner. From interviews with successful entrepreneurial counselors to conversations with industry leaders on trends and the next generation of counseling services, to discussions with tech executives whose innovations are reshaping counseling services. If it impacts counseling, we cover it on mastering counseling. So glad you’ve returned to mastering counseling. Today we are really excited to talk to Eduardo Archer, who is the founder of AP Family Counseling, and he’s been doing this work for over 15 years. Welcome to the podcast today, Eddie.

Edvardo Archer: Thank you. Thank you for having me.

Becky Copeland: Why don’t you go ahead and tell us the beginning of your experience in the mental health world and why you went into it, and what appealed to you about it and how it started for you?

Edvardo Archer: Awesome. I’d love to. And again, Becky, I appreciate your invitation and allowing me to be a part of this series that you’re putting together. So how I started as a therapist, one, I think I’ve always been intrigued by the idea of psychology. I will say this, that those are certain point in my life that I crashed into, that really mandated that I needed to lean in. After college, I became a house dad for young men that aged out of foster care. These are young men that turned 18. They’re no longer wards of the state, and they’re trying to build life and learn to be independent. What I didn’t know at the time is all the trauma that these young men would walk with and their experience and being in the system, or even the situation that caused them to be in the system and be removed from their homes. There was one evening where a young man who at that time was suicidal and had a number of different things going on, and I remember spending hours in that evening with him, just drawing from things I’ve read, classes I’ve taken, just really digging in to try to help him navigate this moment that he was in. It was that moment where I realized that I need to do more. I’ve got to go deeper into understanding this field, understanding this world. I knew that I was always intrigued and wanted to be a part of it. That was my clarion call where it’s like, hey, this is now the time that I could get more resource for the community that I love and those I’m trying to serve.

Becky Copeland: That’s very powerful, for sure. But we’ll want to hear all about your career and everything. Sure. In your practice now, AP Family Counseling, which what does the AP stand for?

Edvardo Archer: It stands for Anchor Point, and it’s a word pitcher for a number of different things. It’s the position that an archer takes right before the arrow launches. I thought like resting point. It’s also the core anchoring for a bridge before it’s being built. It really captured like my heart about this work and what I wanted to look like.

Becky Copeland: Yeah, I love those metaphors. Very cool for sure. What does Anchor Point look like these days? Are you the one therapist? Are there others and what types of challenges are you helping families with?

Edvardo Archer: Yeah, it’s just me. Solo practice and it’s private practice only and private pay only. The way that it’s rolling in my world, mostly when I am able to get a family group together, we all just roll into my private practice at my office and we’re working through the situations. Of course, in my world there’s always an identified patient, the one person in the family group. But one of the things early on that I do and the way I serve families, is to begin to show everyone that your family is actually a corporation, and everyone has a job that they play. In order for this family to stay stable, this person that I identified patient has a problem that keeps you all in your jobs. And if he were to one day change, everyone would have to change. I lead families through the pain of changing and that is, I find the process that is most healing as a whole. Entire system has to lift up and be different.

Becky Copeland: Do you then sometimes do individual sessions with the one person, and then bring the family back monthly, or give us some examples of some of the dynamics in how you work it out in families?

Edvardo Archer: Yeah, I think generally my approach and thinking around a session is essentially we can flex and use a session however we choose. I’ve used different formats. There’re some sessions where it’s the entire family and we’re in together for that 50 60-minute time. Then there’s everybody’s coming. But I’m doing individual conversations and then bringing everybody together. I’ve also done things like, hey, I’m going to do a quick 30-minute coaching online sessions because that family might be in that place of health where it’s quick touches. That’s the thing that’s going to keep moving them forward. And then of course, I have instances where it’s paused everything, dad, it’s going to be me and you for a few sessions until we can get to the next phase of transformation that the family needs. So yeah, I’ve seen all those dynamics and I use them really willingly based on what I’m noticing. Yeah. Happening in the family.

Becky Copeland: When you said you were a house dad, and I think you were out of college at that point. Did you have your master’s at that point, or is that what pushed you into getting certified in that realm?

Edvardo Archer: Yeah. No, exactly. I was finished with college, actually, Becky, I was trying to get into real estate investing. I was taking classes. I was going out making deals, fresh out of college. The crazy thing is that this was all happening around 2007 when the whole market crashed.  I got my butt kicked. I’m sure that’s one of the things that took me out of that. Yeah, I was just coming out of college with my bachelor’s, and that experience had me show up to the next set of orientations at my university that I attended, and I started to go for my master’s and rolled into that process, got licensed, became a licensed supervisor. And yeah, that’s kind of takes us to where we are today.

Becky Copeland: Wow. Real estate investing and into this very different world. Yeah.

Edvardo Archer: What is interesting though, is there is a full circle aspect to it because I’ve always been very entrepreneurial and I think any therapist is. That’s one of the reasons I’m grateful for what you’re doing here, is you’re helping us address that side of it, too, innovation and the building aspect of it.  I’ve always been very entrepreneurial, and that’s actually the next evolution of my family work, is I’m now working with executives and entrepreneurs to implement the same kind of strategies and ideas into their world. It’s cool. I’m grateful for that, for the experience I had.

Becky Copeland: You offer both in person and online sessions. Is that basically what the client wants, or how do you decide how that works, whether they should be coming in or if you can meet with them online if possible?

Edvardo Archer: I always want to at least start with one face to face, and this time where it’s just for trust. You and I both know that it’s trust, and joining is the most significant factor in determining the effectiveness of therapy. Whatever I can do to build towards that is helpful in some clients actually just need that online, right. That’s the best way to build trust. I will say my biggest observation is during Covid online sessions. Was it we all were building our online worlds after that, I’m finding that a lot of my clients have quite an aversion to the idea of meeting online anymore, because it’s been done, and they still are doing it? It’s now just a better experience coming into the office. So right now, I may have just a couple clients who I meet online with. And often that’s determined because of distance and time. But majority of my other folks, they’re coming into the office.

Becky Copeland: We’ve talked on other episodes about office setup and furniture placement and everything, especially once when we were talking about couples and marriage therapy. Do you find yourself doing any rearranging or anything like that with your space? Depending on who’s coming in and how big the family is?

Edvardo Archer: Yeah, that is interesting for sure. If it’s a bigger family, I’m bringing in chairs for sure. Okay, there are instances where I will deliberately meet at a board table as opposed to open space. I find that there’s just some settings I think, that require a little bit more formal confrontational. Let’s put the pieces together and then we have breaks. And so oftentimes when I do that, I will do one on ones and bring people to the more relaxed environment so that we can decompress and process and build in. So, to come back to the board table and have kind of board table conversations, I think space is important. Right now, I am collaborating with the organization called Co Space down here in Florida that rents and offers office space specifically for therapists, and they do a beautiful job. It’s just all of their offices are my dream offices. It’s cool because that’s a consideration. Like how nice is that space for you, the therapist. Like how comfortable are you in creating it so that you can flow and feel like you’re just in your zone for the work that you’re doing?

Becky Copeland: This episode is brought to you by Masters in Counseling. Org. If you’re considering enrolling in a master’s level counseling program to further your career, visit Masters in Counseling. Org to compare school options via our search tool that allows you to sort by specific degree types, tuition, our costs, online flexibility, and more. A big part of your values and your work is authenticity and honesty, which you referenced earlier. Just talk to us about how is that a main goal for you, especially in the work of families that you’re doing?

Edvardo Archer: Look, I’ve been doing this work for, as you say, 15 years, 20 years and sit back and realize there’s some patterns here about how and why things go wrong. And one of the biggest patterns that I’ve noticed is that people don’t have a voice, or they don’t give themselves permission to exercise their voice. And I think the word authenticity and honesty, those two words really capture of the becoming aspect of giving myself permission to feel, giving myself permission to express, giving myself permission to grieve or to hurt. I think the road towards some of the tough lifting that you have to do in therapy comes with authenticity and honesty, and I find that sometimes the dance of therapy is like, hey, I’m going to create a space and keep affirming you. It’s called leading from one step behind. I’m going to create this so that you can arrive at a place of saying, hey, let me be honest, let me take off the mask. Let me stop putting on the show to impress you and just use this space for what I need in my growth and my healing. Those are really important concepts. They’re important for my own expression, but I really want all my clients to arrive at something like that.

Becky Copeland: To your new venture in the work that you’re going into is executive therapy. Let’s talk about that.

Edvardo Archer: Yeah. Executive therapy. I guess one of the things I’ve noticed is that even the best of us struggle. When you think of the epitome of productivity and success, you’re thinking of entrepreneurs, executives, achievers, overcomers. And that is true. But one of the things if you really sit back and look at it, is that the activity of achieving the activity of success in itself can make you a villain in your own story, because the work is demanding and it becomes your identity because you burn out. And now who am I outside of what I’m doing? And how do I rediscover who I am? Because of life circumstances? Because of never being able to learn to dance with the insecurities inside of you and stuff like learning to constantly overwhelm by achieving and doing more.  Alot of my work with executive therapy is just going back into let’s get you authentic, let’s get you honest, let’s give you permission to orient yourself to a journey. We’re using a lot of the same really good tools in therapy, except I’m creating a bridge specific to entrepreneurs and executive leaders so that it’s both very productive, focused. But here’s the thing productivity isn’t you doing more. Productivity should be you knowing what to ignore so that you can invest and be present in the things that actually matter. That’s the journey. That’s the work that I’m working to build up and serve.

Becky Copeland: Let’s talk about you mentioned how you might use that office space. That’s definitely I would say one check box. But when we think of the other angles of the practice and like the accounting, do you have any assistance with those parts of it, the business side or are you able to handle that as well?

Edvardo Archer: Yeah, I handle it. But let me tell you, the key to me is automation. What’s important to me is I have to enact several tools so that those things can work without me having to be involved for referrals and for incoming calls. I have set up my voicemail so it’s immediately, hey, I’m either with a client or I’m with my family. But here’s a link to schedule a consultation to my consultation for scheduling. I use a series of different apps on my calendar together, so everything is communicating and all my clients can only see my availability and when they book it, I’m actually available and it’s a great time for us to meet. A lot of those tools, same thing with my accounting side is I just use a QuickBooks for self-employed, and I do have an accountant. I don’t want to mess with that.

Becky Copeland: Yeah.

Edvardo Archer: Make sure I have the right person for that. But yeah, automation is a huge part to my solo entrepreneurship effort right now.

Becky Copeland: Now, one thing that stood out to me and looking at what you’re doing is that you have offered the free course of journaling, and my husband is a huge journaled. I’m always aspiring to journal, but he really does years and years of journaling. I was like, this is amazing that you’ve done this. Talk to us about this free course. I think it’s newer. And what prompted you to create it and where can we find it?

Edvardo Archer: I’ll make sure I send you a link to it. But if you go to my website, APFamilyCounseling.com, it’s right there on the first page. What I wanted to address is all. The fear around journaling. And I think a lot of people don’t journal because it’s like, I don’t want to do it wrong. I want to do it right. I want to do it consistently. The approach that I took here is, how do I interact with my journal like a therapist? I’m using the storytelling aspect of it, which kind of goes through act one, act two, act three. The intention of this course is how do you like you would in the therapy office, authentically throw up on the page, let everything out, and then process the things that you just like threw out there and then at the very end, be able to build out internal support and affirmation and validation for what you’re noticing. The idea there is daily authentic journaling. There’re so many different ways to journal. This is one that’s it really great. If you’re looking for high impact, I really need to sit down with my thoughts and get it all out. This is a really good one to get you on that road, and to make journaling a little bit more consistent for you.

Becky Copeland: Do you use this as part of your sessions with families as well, or it’s just one strategy? Is it your main strategy? Is are they very connected? I guess if.

Edvardo Archer: You come to my office and work with me, you’re going to hear about journaling. I tell all my clients I need them to engage some level, and maybe it just looks different for each person depending on where they’re at. For the younger people I might do, you’re going to do a voice note on your iPhone and walk around the block. That’s your journaling for another person is you’re going to do weight lifting. Like notice it while you’re. But journaling is super important because at the end of the day, where we need environments so that we can think about thinking that metacognition, which is the magic of therapy. Right? Let me sit down and consider what I’m actually doing and thinking and how am I approaching this? Those things are important. I think that’s really key.

Becky Copeland: If you were going to go back to when you got out of college and you were going through careers and then the market crashed, what would you want yourself to know at that time, if you knew what you were doing now, or what would you just say to the up and coming counselors and therapists who are either trying to begin their work, or maybe they’re still in the middle of their getting their license?

Edvardo Archer: I think what’s important, especially early on, is find a supervisor early on. You have so much book knowledge and theory and understanding about how this thing is supposed to work. The next journey you’re about to engage is how does this thing fit? How does it fit the work I do, the people I work with, but also me as an individual? And your effort now over your supervision and your licensing process is you as a professional. Integrating the two. I find that getting a supervisor is incredibly important. I think paying attention to the entrepreneurial and business side of things is important too. Paying attention to podcasts like yours and other tools and resources so that as we’re building, we’re not limited by, Therapy has to look like you’re working in a hospital for insurance and you have to have these limitations or it’ll never work. That’s not true. Don’t do that. Expand that, learn and get supervision. That will help you really integrate your understanding and your experience.

Becky Copeland: Do you feel like the supervisor needs to be in the same type of work, or in clients you’re focusing on, or just a general part of mental health? What would you be your thoughts on that?

Edvardo Archer: I don’t think it’s paramount that they work with the same clients that you work with. I think what is important is that they have the ability to give you the principles on navigating all the different pieces. That’s going to be important for supervision, but also how to ask the critical questions to help you navigate who you are as a therapist in that room. I think that there are instances where it’s helpful to have a supervisor that has similar experiences. You’re dealing with dual diagnosis, you’re dealing with addiction. You have to understand that takes a different kind of personality approach. And having modeling from that standpoint from supervisor could be credible.

Becky Copeland: You’ve given us so much, lots of exciting things happening in Florida and love that we got to go through the journaling process. Is there anything else that you feel we didn’t get to cover today, or you wanted our listeners to know about?

Edvardo Archer: No, you did fantastic. I think we covered just about everything. And of course, for listeners, y’all feel free to utilize the journaling resource we just talked about for yourself or share with others. All there for you. And I’m again grateful for the opportunity to connect with you and have this conversation.

Becky Copeland: No, we’re very grateful to hear from you. Eddie Archer, family therapist down in Florida. Thank you so much for your time today and just always bringing new ideas to the show as we hear from our different guests, says so. Thanks so much for your time today, Eddie.

Edvardo Archer: Of course. No, I’m grateful and thank you so much for allowing me to be a part of this today.

Becky Copeland: Yeah. Be sure to check out the website he mentioned AP Family Counseling to our audience of listeners. Please leave us comments and questions on mastering counseling and join us again for our future episodes. Have a wonderful day. You’ve been listening to the Mastering Counseling podcast by Masters in Counseling. Org. Join us again next episode as we explore what it takes to be a business success in the counseling industry.