Short Bio
Amanda Press, PsyD is an associate psychologist with a background in speech and language therapy. Amanda has spent the last 20 years working with children, adolescents and adults who have autism, ADHD, trauma, anxiety, depression, emotional regulation difficulties and a number of other mental health issues.
Amanda approaches psychotherapy with a compassion orientated focus. She understands that compassion is a fundamental resource that is innate yet it can be cultivated during therapy and in between sessions in the same way as mindfulness. Amanda is an experienced mindful self-compassion teacher, trained through the Center for Mindful Self-Compassion and offers regular online mindful self-compassion courses and workshops.
Amanda founded Wise Mind with the bold intention of changing the way we relate to ourselves and to each other. It is her intention to help people learn to cultivate a compassionate response to their challenges in order to bring more peace, clarity and wisdom to their lives.
Amanda is doing her post doctoral work at The Center for Connection in Pasadena.
Amanda is also a devoted student of Tibetan Buddhism and her root teacher, Lama Tsultrim Allione. She is fortunate to be able to integrate ancient Buddhist wisdom with contemporary psychological therapies. Amanda is a certified Feeding Your Demons (FYD) facilitator trained by her teachers at Tara Mandala. She is currently offering FYD sessions.
Expanded Bio +
Amanda has been interested in the science of psychology and contemplative practices since early adulthood. Seeds were planted in childhood but it wasn’t until many years later that the conditions emerged and Amanda decided to complete a masters in psychology, through Liverpool University and then a doctorate in clinical psychology from California Southern University. At the same time, Amanda’s spiritual path emerged as she found her teacher, Lama Tsultrim Allione and the community at Tara Mandala. This fusion of ancient wisdom and psychological science has been the perfect path to healing and she knew that it was what she wanted to offer others.
Amanda started her academic journey in 1998 when she went to City University in London to do an undergraduate social science degree in speech pathology. She was married at the time and had her first child during her graduate year. After qualifying and with a newborn baby, she started working as a speech pathologist registered by the Royal College of Speech and Language Therapists (RCSLT) in a London clinic and found that she had a particular affinity with children on the autism spectrum. This then started a 2-decade adventure in cultivating the skills needed to support autistic children and adolescents’ social-emotional and language development. By 2008, Amanda and her two children went to live in Toronto Canada. There she worked as an autism consultant and speech pathologist for Surrey Place Center, a non-profit organization. Her work comprised of developing educational materials, training educators and consulting alongside a range of other professionals to support specific autism programs. A couple of years later, Amanda’s travels took her to Cape Town, South Africa where she spent most of her time working with families living in the townships who had children with autism and mental health problems and providing supervision to speech pathologists working at the Red Cross Hospital.
By 2012, Amanda and her family were back living in the United Kingdom and it was after a very challenging period that her interest in meditation was rekindled. As her mindfulness and compassion practices grew stronger, she founded Kidspace Therapy, an independent business offering bespoke autism and mental health services to schools and families. A lot of Amanda’s work has been with autistic people many of whom are girls and women on the autism spectrum, and often with additional mental health disorders. Through that work Amanda developed an understanding of how important the right support is to that person and their families. As a result, a deep knowing emerged that it was through compassion-based therapies that we can move wholeheartedly and authentically towards a place of mind-body healing.
Amanda spends most of her time marvelling at the natural world while boldly bringing an intention to develop Wise Mind, a psychotherapy practice that passionately integrates wisdom and compassion to people with a range of neurodevelopmental conditions, mental health and stress-related challenges in today’s world. Amanda lives in Sierra Madre, California with her two sons.
