Today we’d like to introduce you to Robert Lewis
Hi Robert, we’re thrilled to have a chance to learn your story today. So, before we get into specifics, maybe you can briefly walk us through how you got to where you are today?
I’m Robert Lewis – owner of Kinship Wellness and Kinship Psychotherapy where we offer in Executive Coaching, Workplace Wellness and Counseling services. I’ve a Masters in Psychotherapy, and trained as a humanistic integrative psychodynamic psychotherapist which basically means we learned most modalities so we can meet clients where they are, not through one specific lens.
A resident of Austin for three years, I originally started my company back home in Dublin, Ireland. My work focuses on helping individuals facilitate, understand and identify who they learned to be so they live as they want to be – whether a leader trying to balance work-life demands or leadership skills, or an individual trying to navigate many of life’s difficult experiences and situations.
I studied Psychology after high school, but just before starting I lost my dad quite suddenly, so I took a year out and travelled Australia and India. I came back and finished my degree, and while deciding which course to choose, a close friend opened up a coffee shop and wanted me to run it. I worked there for four years as I completed my Masters. We were big coffee nerds – every detail in the process of making an espresso was done with precise precision – I loved this job, we were voted best coffee in Ireland quite a few times, I got to host art events raging from small plays, music, photography and facilitate conversations between the audience and the artists, but mostly I just loved getting to know the people who came in every day. This job, while a segue from the direct path to being a therapist made me a much better therapist.
After I graduated with my MA in Psychotherapy, I started Kinship Wellness in 2015. As the practice quickly scaled beyond forecasted expectations, I was invited to speak to a leading corporate travel brand surrounding the importance of stress management. While highlighting the translatable skills and my knowledge of Psychotherapy through a corporate lens, coaching became a core component of Kinship Wellness and a diversified offering. Since then, Kinship Wellness has partnered with multiple corporate entities, providing much needed support for their staff wellness implementation tactics surrounding work life balance, mindfulness, productivity and stress management.
I love what I do and helping people relate to themselves, their teams and their relationships is one of the most gratifying principles of a career devoted to helping my clients be the best version of themselves they can be. I’ve got one of the most privileged jobs in the world.
Can you talk to us a bit about the challenges and lessons you’ve learned along the way. Looking back would you say it’s been easy or smooth in retrospect?
I was strategic enough that when I started my practice in Ireland, I had built up a good network that I had a full schedule relatively quickly. Covid threw a few hurdles, as I was a fully in person therapist before, it forced me to provide online sessions, but without Covid I wouldn’t have been able to have my practice still in Ireland.
The hardest obstacles have been in the transition from Ireland to America, I had to re-enroll in different classes again, and then translating my qualifications to the Texas requirements took a few months longer than I expected. At the same time I was building my own community in a new country so that was a difficult time. I still had my Irish practice, and I used the time to up-skill my coaching and got trained in Emotional Intelligence for leaders.
Alright, so let’s switch gears a bit and talk business. What should we know?
Well there are three parts to Kinship Wellness – there is Psychotherapy and Counseling, Executive, Leadership and Life Coaching, and finally Workplace Wellness.
Psychotherapy and Counseling I offer individual and group therapy for adults – here I help people work on depression, anxiety, relationship struggles. I focus a lot on early life so that people can understand the environment that their mindset were shaped, so that they can shed the automatic processes and live with more agency with who they want to be.
In my coaching work, the focus is less on the past, and more on recognizing where someone wants to be, finding the barriers and creating actionable steps to get there. With executive coaching that can focus on company and personal goals, in leadership coaching we focus a lot on identifying the culture and values that a leader wants to develop and finding the pinch points when that become difficult. In both executive and leadership coaching I put a high emphasis on emotional intelligence and self-awareness. In life coaching we focus more on the wider life goals outside of work. While all three of these are separate, there is often an overlap during sessions, where to work on executive coaching sometimes there may be a focus on life balance and external factors.
One of my main strengths in my relatability, in Ireland to be a therapist we had to attend therapy for four years both in group and individual therapy, so I have got to know a lot of myself, my strengths, struggles – what we call our shadow parts, the parts that we don’t want to admit are there. I’ve also failed and made mistakes, which allows me to humanize struggle not just conceptually. Equally, my meandering journey helped me connect to people from many different walks of life.
I can also be quite direct, practical and at the same time compassionate. I love understanding the science and helping client understand how their brain works and understand how the process of therapy has solid evidence supporting growth and change.
What do you like best about our city? What do you like least?
My favorite thing about Austin is the easy access to nature. I even wrote my thesis on the benefits of practicing psychotherapy outdoors—largely because I love spending time outside. Austin has so much to offer, from Barton Springs and Zilker Park to the many trails and Town Lake. I also try to go camping as often as possible.
The one downside for me is the summer heat. As an Irishman, I’m not used to it, and it makes being outdoors much more challenging. Barton Springs is absolutely essential for my summer survival!
Contact Info:
- Website: https://www.kinshipwellness.com
