This program was conceived by Margarita Suarez, RN, MA and Sharon Loeschen, MSW, LCSW. It emerged out of Margarita’s teaching the six skills that Sharon identified in her book, The Satir Process. The skills are: Making Contact, Validating, Becoming Aware, Opening to Greater Understanding and Acceptance, Making Conscious Choices and Seeking/Giving Support.

Sharon had written The Satir Process as a way to share her observations of how the famous therapist, Virginia Satir used these skills. And as the executive director of Avanta, the Virginia Satir Network, Margarita often taught the skills from Sharon’s book in her trainings.

As Margarita taught the skills she began to realize that she could apply these skills to her own life and how powerful that was for her. She would call Sharon sharing her excitement and so eventually this led the two of them to begin developing the program now known as, “Enriching Your Relationship with Yourself and Others.”

It is a psycho-educational program which means that it is educational, not psycho-therapy, teaching concepts and skills specifically focused on how you relate to yourself and others.

The training can take many different forms from live presentations and workshops to lessons via email.

People can participate for their own enrichment and/or with the goal of becoming a certified trainer in the program. The applicability of the program is broad so in addition to programs for the general public, it is now being applied to specific groups. For example, it is being offered to fourth graders and their parents in Hong Kong, to a social service staff in Los Angeles, and to women in business via the internet.

It appears to us that the pressures of our world are causing more people to be in need of coping strategies and yet the resources for getting this information are limited. So we would like to offer our program as a new resource in this area.