Our Story
The Flourishing Way came to fruition accidentally on-purpose. Founders Jessica Pass Haskell and Jill Ahrens Tucker combined several siloed experiences from their cumulative 30 years of practicing therapy to create a new, more effective type of therapy: The Flourishing Way, previously known as Truth Tribe.
Early in Jess’s career, she counselled teens. Day in and day out, she would sit across from her client, typically a 13-year old who had trouble opening up and communicating during their session. She found the power dynamic created by her client sitting in a chair while she looked upon from behind her desk wasn’t conducive to open, authentic communication. She found her office was just another place in these teens’ lives where they felt like subordinates to an authority figure, another place they felt like they were messing up. This dynamic got in the way of the teens’ willingness to communicate openly and honestly.
Meanwhile, across the country, Jill was working to try to provide therapy and solutions for high-risk adolescents. She had to be creative in finding ways to engage her clients and de-escalate their anxiety during high stress situations. She found teaching her clients what they wanted to know rather than what adults thought they should know was powerful and impactful. It kept her clients engaged and brought flow into her sessions. It was key information that she would take with her as she continued to work with adolescents.
Jill viewed adolescents as the expert of their lives and addressed them that way as well. While working with teens in an outpatient addiction center, she quickly found most teens didn’t want to be there. Again, Jill got creative in her approach and found ways to engage her clients.
Aware of all of the gaps within therapy and teen education and the urgency needed to reform them, Jess started exploring other models of therapy for clients in ways that didn’t look like the normal, stigmatized talk therapy.
That’s when The Flourishing Way was born.
The Flourishing Way is built on key aspects of positive psychology. Well being, not happiness, is the goal. Happiness is the pursuit of “what I want will make me feel good.” This is often fleeting and conditional. Well being is the pursuit of how we feel in the context of our environment, relationships, and selves.