The Lighter Side of Transformation

with Lisa Wessan, LICSW

Oct 13

Dialectical Behavior Therapy (DBT) has been used by Lady Gaga – watch the video here

by Lisa Wessan, LICSW

 

DBT is evidence-based; over 80% of 10,000 participants showed significant improvement after practicing these skills (Linehan, 2016). Many, including Lady Gaga, have since benefited from DBT.

Lady Gaga credits DBT for helping her manage trauma, PTSD, and self-harm urges. She uses skills like Radical Acceptance and TIPP (Temperature, Intense Exercise, Paced Breathing, Progressive Muscle Relaxation) to handle emotions and reduce symptoms. Her advocacy of DBT Skills training has highlighted the value of mental health care.

Hear how DBT transformed Lady Gaga’s life:

You can learn DBT skills too! This is not an exclusive training just for celebrities…

FEES: $100/week for 90-minute session,
14 weeks x $100 = $1400  – no insurance (except PPOs)
(plus one Intake Session prior to group start)

For more information, FAQ, fees, calendar, Zoom classroom and to set up a DBT inquiry phonecall (free), please visit
 Dialectical Behavioral Therapy | Lisa Wessan

DBT Overview:

What is Dialectical Behavior Therapy (DBT) and how can this program
enhance your life? 

One Year Program Includes:

1. DBT Core Mindfulness [focusing skills]

2. Distress Tolerance [crisis survival skills]

3. Emotion Regulation [de‐escalation skills]

4. Interpersonal Effectiveness [‘people skills’]

🌀🌀This trimester starting January 6 – April 7, 2026 –  we are focusing on Mindfulness and Interpersonal Effectiveness skills.

Interpersonal Effectiveness helps you communicate better, set boundaries, validate yourself and others, confidently ask for what you need, seek support, and end unhealthy relationships. Each class covers DBT skills, practice, role play, and guided meditation.

Good health is wealth, go for it! 

Onward and Upward✨

Lisa Wessan

www.lisawessan.com

#DBT, #PTSD, #EmotionRegulation #DistressTolerance, #Wellness #Recovery #Peak, #Mindfulness Addictions

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Sep 19

Empower Yourself: Enhance Interpersonal Effectiveness and Reduce Social Anxiety

by Lisa Wessan, LICSW

Take charge of your social interactions and personal growth with a 14-week Dialectical Behavior Therapy Skills Training Group (DBT). Learn effective strategies from expert Lisa Wessan to build confidence, set boundaries, and communicate assertively.

You can develop skills to set healthy boundaries, communicate clearly, and become resilient to others’ disapproval. Learning effective ways to interact can reduce social anxiety and enhance your success and relationships. You’ll also discover useful strategies for making requests and easing into small talk, such as discussing work, weather, or the weekend. By focusing on skill-building rather than willpower, you can foster more fulfilling social interactions.

Developing interpersonal effectiveness skills also involves investing time, effort, and resources. Many individuals choose to develop these skills when they seek change in their behavioral patterns. Sometimes your inner dialogue says “I am sick and tired of being sick and tired! I need to do SOMETHING to turn this around!” Research suggests that focusing attention on skill development leads to improvement in those areas, including social skills.

Neale Donald Walsch once wrote, “Life begins at the end of your comfort zone.” Yes, becoming comfortable with discomfort takes time and practice. By learning neuroscience-based skills, you can improve your ability to build new neural networks and succeed in mastering interpersonal skills.

Solution-Focused Therapy

The next virtual DBT Skills Group focused on Interpersonal Effectiveness and Mindfulness will run from September 30 to December 30, 2025. The course is taught by Lisa Wessan, LICSW, CLYL, RM, who trained directly with DBT founder Dr. Marsha M. Linehan and has over a decade of group facilitation experience. This 14-week program features weekly 90-minute sessions at $80 per week, providing participants with hands-on practice in social skills within small groups of 6-10.

To learn more, please visit https://www.lisawessan.com/dialectical-behavioral-therapy

🌀🌀 Register early for DBT groups, as enrollment involves several steps. Avoid waiting until the last week to sign up.

Onward and Upward✨

Lisa Wessan

boundaries Interpersonal Effectiveness Intimacy Uncategorized

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Apr 28

Mastering Dialectical Behavior Therapy Skills (DBT): 14-Week Distress Tolerance and Mindfulness Skills Training, starts June 10, 2025, 7:30 – 9 PM EST (on Zoom)

by Lisa Wessan, LICSW

Serenity is not freedom from the storm, but peace amidst the storm…

Hi, 

I’m excited to be teaching the next 14-week semester of Dialectical Behavior Therapy Skills (DBT).  This semester we will cover Distress Tolerance & Mindfulness Skills.

🌀 Click here for the current DBT FLYER.

DBT skills significantly help to reduce the escalation of your inflammatory emotions. They also lessen the painful, polarized and perfectionist thinking that often cause your meltdowns. You will learn to find your peaceful “Middle Path” here. 

There are many powerful skills included in this semester’s work. We hope you will create your own personal Distress Tolerance tool kit. Use the techniques that work the best for you.

Unfortunately, there is no “one size fits all” with these various techniques. You need to be a good scientist in the laboratory of your life and try them all out.  To that end, DBT provides excellent handouts, worksheets and exercises to help you practice between sessions. You will eventually find the techniques that you love. These techniques will help you pause successfully. They will transform difficult moments into something better.

You might have someone in mind for this next DBT Group. If so, please have them contact me soon at my web site – www.lisawessan.com – and fill out the Contact Form. This private form helps them briefly tell me the best times to reach them. (It also guides them to check out their insurance for the Out of Network benefit.)

Please know, this is a NO-SPAM zone, and no one’s email is saved unless requested to do so.

14-week fee: $1120 for continuing students, $1420 for new students (includes one Intake session.)  

It is an honor to serve your friends, family, patients or clients with this powerful, experiential, transformative curriculum.

Onward and Upward✨
Lisa Wessan

“If you can recognize and accept your pain
without running away from it,
you will discover that although pain is there,
joy can also be there at the same time.”
~ Thich Nhat Hanh, No Mud, No Lotus

Lisa Wessan, LICSW, CLYL, RM
Psychotherapist, Dialectical Behavior Therapy Skills Trainer (DBT),
Podcaster, Author, Speaker
www.lisawessan.com
UP NEXT: DBT Distress Tolerance & Mindfulness Skills (Virtual, June 3 – September 2, 2025)
🌀✨🌀✨🌀✨🌀✨🌀✨🌀✨🌀✨🌀✨🌀✨🌀✨🌀✨🌀✨🌀✨🌀

#DBT, #PTSD, #EmotionRegulation #DistressTolerance, #Wellness #Recovery #Peak, #Mindfulness Anxiety BPD Distress Tolerance Mindfulness Transformation

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Jan 30

Effective Dialectical Behavior Therapy (DBT): Open Enrollment Now

by Lisa Wessan, LICSW
 
“Between stimulus and response there is a space. In that space is our power to choose our response. In our response lies our growth and our freedom.” ~ Viktor E. Frankl

 

I am delighted to announce that the next virtual 14-week Dialectical Behavior Therapy Skills (DBT) Group will be meeting on Tuesday evenings, 7:30 – 9 PM EST, February 18 – May 20, 2025.  We will be covering both the Mindfulness and Emotion Regulation modules.  (This is an ongoing group that has open enrollment periods three times per year.)

[If you would like to receive a copy of the full 14-week curriculum, please request one HERE. (This is a NO-SPAM Zone, so your email will not be added to any list unless you request it.]

The Mindfulness material includes:

  • Learning how to be a good observer, describing your feelings, participating more fully in life
  • How to become non-judgmental of yourself and others
  • Staying in the present moment with more ease
  • Practicing being effective for the greater good of your family, workplace, community
  • Accessing Wise Mind (aka higher self, higher consciousness)
  • Understanding Reality Acceptance and detaching from negative or critical thoughts.
  • Shifting from Willfulness to Willingness

The Emotion Regulation module has four sections:

  • Understanding and Naming Emotions
  • Changing Emotional Responses
  • Reducing Vulnerability to Emotion Mind (your highly reactive and difficult emotions)
  • Managing Extremely Difficult Emotions

As DBT founder Dr. Marsha Linehan says, “It is difficult to manage your emotions when you do not understand how emotions work. Knowledge is power.”

GROUP ATMOSPHERE: My students are well mannered, high functioning and convivial.  For those who occasionally tend to demand more attention, want to give inappropriate feedback and/or act out in any way, I do have a strong “Respectful Communication Policy” in place and several useful group rules which help to maintain a safe, harmonious and cohesive group atmosphere.  All are welcome, but there is no allowance for rude or harsh behavior.

Group members will continue to process their unresolved traumas in their individual therapy, not in this group. This is a therapeutic psychoeducation program. (It is NOT group therapy.)

For dates, fees, videos and more details, please visit
Dialectical Behavioral Therapy | Lisa Wessan

May this serve you or your loved ones well in their journey towards wholeness and more inner peace.

Onward and Upward🌀

Lisa Wessan

Emotional Regulation Mindfulness Transformation Uncategorized

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May 8

UP NEXT: Spring/Summer 2024 Dialectical Behavior Therapy (DBT) Skills Training May 21 – August 27, 2024 (on Zoom)

by Lisa Wessan, LICSW

Hi,
I’m excited to be continuing to teach the evidence-based Dialectical Behavior Therapy Skills Training (“DBT”) on Tuesdays nights, 7:30 – 9:00 PM EST, in the Zoom Classroom…

It takes one year to complete the full curriculum, but I divide the work into three trimesters.

January – April we study “Emotion Regulation,” May – August is “Distress Tolerance,” September – December is “Interpersonal Effectiveness.” We explore and review Mindfulness skills the first few weeks of each trimester. 

UP NEXT: we are moving towards wholeness and more inner peace studying “Distress Tolerance.”

There are still a few spots still open for this Spring/Summer term.  Learn more here: 

Dialectical Behavioral Therapy | Lisa Wessan

Fast Facts: 

  • All 90-minute groups are $75/Week (see FAQ on web site for PPO/insurance details).
  • Students pay in full prior to start of group. [New students need to complete their registration forms, intake sessions and fees no later than 5/17/24.]
  • My students are educated and well mannered, high functioning and convivial.  For those who occasionally tend to demand more attention, want to give inappropriate feedback and/or act out in any way, I do have a strong “Respectful Communication Policy” in place and several useful group rules which help to maintain a safe, harmonious and cohesive group atmosphere.  All are welcome, but there is no allowance for disruptive behavior.
  • Group members will continue to process their unresolved traumas in their individual therapy, not in this group. This is a therapeutic psychoeducation program. (It is NOT group therapy.)
  • Group size ranges from 6-12 students.

May this serve you or other loved ones well✨

Lisa Wessan, LICSW, CLYL, RM
Psychotherapist, Dialectical Behavior Therapy Skills Trainer (DBT)
www.lisawessan.com
🌀✨🌀✨🌀✨🌀

“The mind that is awakening laughs at itself a lot. It laughs as the echo of old patterns show up.”
Wisdom Quotes from The Way of Mastery (#23)

#DBT, #PTSD, #EmotionRegulation #DistressTolerance, #Wellness #Recovery #Peak, #Mindfulness Distress Tolerance Mindfulness

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