Meet Christopher Kilbourne
Why I Became a Psychotherapist
I had already begun to find myself by coming out of the closet in my personal dealings, striking out as an entrepreneurial craftsperson and starting to become an activist involved in trying to change the world, when, just turned 21, I met my long-time cherished partner, Mitch Walker, who happened to be the innovator of gay-centered psychology. I was definitely ripe for the gay spiritual and psychological turn things took then. His devotion to gay love as a legitimate spiritual path was contagious and I soon found myself on a remarkable personal journey that continues to this day of initiation into the mysteries of gay Eros and psyche. He turned me on to the psychology of C.G. Jung as a theory powerfully useful for understanding gay ensoulment, among many other wonderful ideas, as well introducing me to Harry Hay and the Radical Faeries, and also to a fiery passion for gay liberation organizing. By 1991 I became licensed as a therapist as a most effective way to share with other seekers the kind of meaningful, psychologically genuine, and visionary gay-centered life reflected in my practice to this day.
The first in a long history of gay consciousness groups I’ve facilitated was with Mitch Walker in 1981 in San Francisco, called Gay Voices and Visions, whose format had been previously developed by Don Kilhefner, who was a co-founder with Mitch, Harry Hay and John Burnside, of the Radical Faerie Movement in 1979 and with Walker of Treeroots in 1981, a non-profit dedicated to the development of and education in the theory and practice of gay-centered depth psychology. Since then, I’ve led or co-led a wide variety of gay consciousness-raising groups, workshops, gay empowerment therapy groups, and conferences, with titles such as “Gay Soul-Making, “Gay Soul Talk,” and “Gay-Centered Inner Work Club.” I also co-founded a gay psychology school in 1995 called The Institute for Uranian Psychoanalysis, for which I was a director and trainer for fifteen years.
The various occupations I’ve had specifically in the health or mental health fields started in 1984, with my work as an outreach health educator for the Gay and Lesbian Community Center in Los Angeles (now the L.A. L.G.B.T Center), in which capacity I engaged with sex workers and homeless individuals, educating them about AIDS, handing out condoms and encouraging them to get check-ups at the Center’s health clinic. As educator, I also worked in various group home settings that cared for foster and probation supervised youth, many of whom suffered from serious conditions as conduct disorder and major depression. After several years of that, I became a children’s social worker for four years, during which time I also gained a Marriage, Family Therapist license in 1991. Then I was a therapist at and eventually a director a high school-based clinic for ten years which prominently included L.G.B.T. group and individual therapy and internship training programs.
In my private practice, established in 1995, I’ve provided individual, couples’ and group psychotherapy for people of varied backgrounds, interests and needs. As an analysand myself, I participated in a Mahlerian form of psychoanalysis for twelve years. See My Professional Background page for a little more detail.
Let’s Go!
Whether you are an activist yourself or not, or you’re gay, lesbian, straight, bi, trans or questioning, I invite you to investigate further how realizing your own true, vital and unique sense of self within a gay-centered context can mean for you, while I sensitively, warmly and as effectively as possible help solve your problems and improve your life!
Imagine opening the door to Oz and call me!
Welcome to my outdoor/indoor office space and waiting area!
