A Radical Therapy for Turbulent Times: Social Therapeutic Clients & Practitioners Explore Building Environments for Growth

We invite you to glimpse the practice and promise of emotional development as performed on an array of social therapeutic “stages.” Join us for an uncommon conversation led by two leading social therapists, Jennifer Bullock and Murray Dabby, joined by 3 creative colleagues (Lea Csikós, Evelyn Doughtery and Thecla Farrell) and their clients.

We explore how social therapeutic group-building process in its various incarnations rejects diagnostic boxes and clinical endpoints, focusing instead on the group activity of collective environment building. Learn more about this radically-relational development approach that helps people of all ages and social spaces become more grounded, relationally responsive and improvisationally creative in our turbulent and often stultifying world.

Leader Biographies

Jennifer Bullock Licensed Psychotherapist, M.Ed, M.L.S.P., L.P.C is a group and relationship therapist with 35 years of experience who brings a playful and compassionate approach to the therapy process. In addition to her psychotherapy practice, she is a workshop leader and consultant helping organizations, work collaborators and communities cultivate improvisation and play to improve communication, team work and relationships at home, work and community. Jennifer is a licensed professional counselor.  She holds a Master’s Degree from Temple University in Counseling Psychology and a Master’s Degree in Law and Social Policy from Bryn Mawr College. As well, she teaches psychology courses at Community College of Philadelphia and offers innovative personal growth workshops. Jennifer is committed youth advocate with expertise in child abuse trauma and treatment.

Murray Dabby is a community builder, youth organizer, educator, advocate for racial equality and social justice, musician, and social therapist. He is the founder and director of the Atlanta All Stars and the Atlanta Center for Social Therapy, where he works with groups, individuals, couples and families. Murray co-developed The Couples College training for couples on relationship building in a group context, and Curtain Up, Anxiety Down, a therapeutic improv workshop for people with social anxiety.  Murray has a history in the performing arts: as a musician, community theatre director, and using performance and improvisation in his teaching methods. His work is featured on the podcast All Power to the Developing. He is co-author with Carrie Sackett of Social Therapeutic Coaching: A Practical Guide to Group and Couples Work (Routledge, 2024). He received his MSW from Columbia University.

Lea Csikós is a social therapeutic practitioner, a developmentalist, an intercultural trainer in non-formal education, community organizer, mentor, activist and a world traveler. She was born and raised in today's Serbia, Novi Sad, and has lived and worked all over Europe, currently residing in Antwerp, Belgium. Lea is a staff member and an associate of the East Side Institute (ESI), an alumna of the International Class and a graduate of the Social Therapeutic Group Study program with ESI. She leads and co-leads several Developing Across Borders groups weekly. Most recently exploring the topics of health and life teams with her clients and on building life with grief. She is one of the founders of Volunteers Centre of Vojvodina, an organization based in Novi Sad, Serbia that has been working to bring opportunities for development to communities and youth in the region since 2004. She is a member of the trainers pool of the French-German Youth Office, has studied Environment and Romology and is a Veterinary nurse who loves the sea and riding bikes.

Evelyn Dougherty, LCSW grew up in a small town in Delaware and has lived in Boston, Massachusetts for over 30 years. She got a BA in Sociology from the University of DE and an MSW from University of Pennsylvania. Evelyn became a social therapist in 1991 having studied at the East Side Institute. She has worked at the East Side Institute, as well as numerous hospital and community based health centers in New York, Pennsylvania, Delaware and Massachusetts, working with people struggling with mental health and addiction issues. Evelyn currently has a therapeutic practice in Boston where she runs groups and sees individuals and couples.

Thecla Farrell, known for her work producing and performing political theatre with the Castillo Theatre in NYC and certified with master coach university, jumped at the invitation to study a social therapeutic approach. An emotional interplay with social therapeutic writings and an inquisitive cohort of trainees ensued, alongside the support of many friends. Thecla has since joined a coaching practice where she co-leads groups several times a week with Joyce Dattner, Fanny Suarez and Randi Wilson, as well as individual, family and couples coaching. The art of co-creating an environment to grow and see new choices for one’s life excites Thecla to tears.