Roots to Rise
Phoebe Teare and Julie Schneider met back in 1995 when they were both graduate students completing clinical training at Children’s Hospital in Boston. Each intending to be therapists for children and families, and at similar stages in life, they quickly developed both a productive professional relationship and a lasting friendship.
In their years since their training each has worked in a variety of different settings and has gained extensive clinical experience. Having trained within a medical model, for years their work focused largely on observing symptoms, diagnosing “disorders”, and providing various modalities of problem-focused treatment. While they see the benefits of many of these practices and interventions and recognize that the medical model certainly has its place, they also see the drawbacks of focusing primarily on pathology, symptom management, and inexpensive and/or short-term solutions. This model, which tends to view people through a lens of pathology, often falls short of actually healing people and allowing them to become their best selves.
While building successful careers working within this model, Phoebe and Julie each led active and fulfilling lives outside of work. Each traveled extensively, encountered different cultures and schools of thought, explored different approaches to health and wellbeing, and worked on their own personal growth in various ways. Each of them married and are actively involved in raising children and teenagers. Through all of these separate professional and life experiences, they’ve remained connected and for years have thought about someday finding a way to work together.
Having grown weary of and disillusioned with systems that place strong emphasis on fixing problems instead of cultivating health and wellbeing, Julie and Phoebe decided to integrate what they have learned through their training with what they have learned through their life experiences and personal growth. With all of this in mind, Roots First was born.
Roots First emphasizes the seeds of health and wellbeing that exist in all people and seeks to help individuals find these seeds and learn how to cultivate them so they can grow, rising up to become their best selves. Roots First draws from the Root to Rise principle of Yoga, which teaches us that we must first root down before we can rise up. This means rooting down into ourselves and finding, and/or building, our own solid foundation in our “whole selves”, so that we can then rise up with the strength, flexibility, and balance we need to be and do our best at whatever it is we are doing: work/career, relationships, parenting, and just living. The really good news here is that the foundation and grounding we need actually lies within ourselves, and building and nurturing this foundation is something that is within our control and within our reach.
Roots First teaches you how to nurture your own seeds of health, emphasizing the development of your own system of roots through easy and manageable practices and lifestyle changes over time. This is a very “whole person” approach that looks at all aspects of being human: the basics (nutrition, exercise, rest), the environment, the mind, the spirit or soul, and daily lifestyle habits. Making one small change at a time actually has a rippling effect that can have a monumental impact on health and happiness over time.
Only through the development of your own roots will you be able to rise up and become the person, parent, or professional you want to be.