Meet The Cheetah House Care Team

We help meditators suffering from adverse effects.

The people on this page have been trained and approved by Cheetah House as Peer Support Care Team members. This includes trainings led by Dr. Willoughby Britton, founder of Cheetah House and world expert in meditation-related adverse effects. Care Team members evaluate symptoms, provide frameworks for understanding, and suggest practices for resolving adverse effects.

Our team has a wealth of experience in a wide range of meditative and spiritual traditions. Many of us come to this work because of our own challenges with meditation.

Scheduling a Consultation

Review the Care Team members below and find the best fit for your needs. Peer support consultations with Care Team members last 50 minutes and are priced based on Care Team member’s experience working with meditators in distress for Cheetah House. Cost for Care Team members ranges between $100 - $150 USD. Consultations with Dr. Canby and Dr. Britton have a higher fee. Consultations with Dr. Canby are $130 and $185 and consultations with Dr. Britton are $100, $150, $200 and $250 USD. If finances are a barrier, we encourage you to request funding through the Cheetah House Care Service Fund for a reduced fee during the booking process.

Partnerships Update: The Contemplative Studies Centre (CSC) at the University of Melbourne (UoM) is subsidising 80% of the standard cost of selected services for Australia and New Zealand meditators in distress over 18 years of age booking services from Cheetah House under the pilot CSC Subsidy Scheme until 30 June 2025. Click here: https://www.cheetahhouse.org/um-disclaimer for information about accessing this scheme including important terms and conditions.

Willoughby Britton

(she/her)

Rhode Island, USA

    • PhD in Clinical Psychology

    • Associate Professor of Psychiatry and Human behavior, Brown University Medical School

    • Associate Professor of Behavioral and Social Sciences, Brown University School of Public Health

    • Director of Brown University’s Clinical and Affective Neuroscience Laboratory

    • Licensed Clinical Psychologist (RI, VT)

    • Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction teacher

    • Mindfulness-Based Cognitive Therapy teacher

    • Somatic Experiencing Practitioner (SEP);

    • Mindfulness and meditation researcher, with expertise in meditation-related adverse effects, practice specific effects

    • Meditation, psychedelic or trauma-realted changes in sense of self, especially depersonalization type dissociation

    • Neuroscientific mechanisms of meditation-related adverse effects

    • Practice-specific effects; practice modifications

    • trauma-informed and person-centered approaches

    • Buddhist philosophy + mindfulness ideology, especially around self and no-self

    • Meditation induced changes related to

      • sense of self

      • depersonalization

      • dissociation

      • fear/panic/terror

      • perceptual changes and hypersensitivity

    • Involuntary movements/convulsions

    • Harmful advice from teachers and negative responses to disclosure

    • Meditation-induced changes in sense of self, especially depersonalization type dissociation;

    • Making sense of or working through no-self teachings;

    • Questioning or loss of faith; deconversion; betrayal trauma;

    • Sorting out interpretive frameworks

    • Neuroscientific explanations

    • OCD-like struggles (unless they are related to depersonalization)

    • Client with acute psychosis or current inpatient hospitalization. I am happy to meet with caregivers or family members if the main client is acutely psychotic and/or hospitalized.

    • Clients seeking only a spiritual or Buddhist approach

    • Trauma approaches, especially Somatic Experiencing

    • Neuroscience

    • Clinical Psychology

    • Social Psychology (influence)

    • Social and Disability Justice

    • Feminist Philosophy

    • Institutional courage

Nicholas Canby

(he/him)

Rhode Island, USA

    • Ph.D. in Clinical Psychology

    • Licensed Clinical Psychologist (RI)

    • Post-Doctoral Research Associate in the Clinical and Affective Neuroscience Laboratory at Brown University, Department of Psychiatry and Human Behavior

    • Visiting Assistant Professor, Department of Religious Studies, Brown University

    • Completed extensive trauma training among Veterans with PTSD (CPT, PE)

    • Trained in a variety of evidence-based therapies, including ACT, DBT, CBT, and IBCT

    • Completed Cheetah House Care Team Training

    • Personal experience with Vipassana, Zen, and Tibetan Buddhist Practice, as well as other contemplative/spiritual traditions (e.g., Peruvian Curanderismo)

    • Researcher of meditation and psychedelic-related adverse effects, changes in sense of self, altered states of consciousness, trauma/dissociation, and interpersonal relationships with spiritual teachers/communities

    • Meditation-induced changes in sense of self

    • Non-ordinary states of consciousness

    • Trauma responses and symptoms of PTSD

    • Interpersonal challenges related to spiritual teachers or communities

    • Difficulties with meaning making, values, and worldview

  • -Disorientation or distress related to changes in sense of self or other non-ordinary states of consciousness

    -Trauma responses, dissociation, and symptoms of PTSD

    -Depression and anxiety

    -Interpersonal challenges related to spiritual teachers or communities

    -Difficulties with meaning making, values, and worldview

    • Acute psychosis

    • Substance use

    • Eating disorders

    • A person-centered functional-contextual approach: focusing on what works for your particular set of values and goals in your particular context.

    • Listening with warmth, attentiveness, curiosity, and compassion

    • The use of tools from various evidence-based therapies: Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT), Dialectical Behavior Therapy (DBT), Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT), Cognitive Processing Therapy for PTSD (CPT), Scaffolding, Motivational Interviewing (MI), and more. 

    • An integrative, flexible, and whole-person orientation

Nathan Fisher

(he/him)

California, USA

    • PhD in Religious Studies, concentration in Cognitive Science

    • Scholar of Contemplative Studies

    • Meditation researcher with expertise in meditation-related adverse effects

    • Engaged Compassion facilitator (certification through the Center for Engaged Compassion)

    • 15 years of contemplative practice in Buddhist, Chinese, and Abrahamic traditions

    • Jewish, Christian, and Islamic contemplative traditions

    • Western Buddhist contemplative traditions

    • The “Dark Nights” of the soul in Abrahamic traditions

    • Some Taijiquan and Qigong/Neigong traditions

    • Jewish and comparative mysticism

    • The Varieties of Contemplative Experience (VCE) and VCE-Abrahamic (VCE-A) research studies

    • Fear and anxiety

    • Headaches and head pressure

    • Depression

    • Energy-like Somatic Experiences (ELSEs)

    • Involuntary movements

    • Re-experiencing of traumatic memories

    • Worldview changes

    • Wrestling with western Buddhism/Buddhist modernism

    • Wrestling with worldview confusion

    • Exploring religious or spiritual frameworks and worldviews

    • Exploring secular or scientific frameworks and worldviews

    • “Safe and sifted” approaches to re-engaging with contemplative practices traditions

    • Jewish, Christian, and Islamic contemplative practitioners

    • OCD-like struggles

    • Acute psychosis

    • World-negating (acosmic) spiritual frameworks

    • Yogic practitioners

    • Person-Centered Care

    • Social and Cultural Psychiatry

    • Enactive Psychiatry

    • Embodied, Embedded, Enacted, and Extended (4E) Cognitive Science

    • Psychological Anthropology

    • Attachment Theory

    • Social-Baseline Theory

    • Internal Family Systems Approach

Mandy Johnson

(she/her)

South Africa

    • Undergraduate: Organisational Psychology

    • Masters Level Coach

    • Postgraduate Certification in Mindfulness Based Interventions (2 years)

    • Enneagram Certified

    • HeartMath Certified

    • Mindfulness

    • Mindfulness Based Stress Reduction

    • Mindfulness Based Relapse Prevention

    • Mindfulness of Feeling Tone

    • Adult Children of Alcoholics or Dysfunction

    • Codependency & Addiction

    • Reigniting Childhood Trauma

    • Severe Tinnitus

    • Dissociation

    • Anxiety and Panic

    • Early developmental childhood trauma

    • Hyperarousal and Anxiety

    • Mild Dissociation and Depersonalisation

    • Loss of meaning and existential crisis

    • Mindfulness crisis - retreats

    • Acute Dissociation

    • Delusions

    • OCD (Obsessive Compulsive Disorder)

    • Attachment and Trauma

    • Grief and Loss

    • Compassion Focused Coaching

    • Recovery and 12 Step Frameworks

    • Mindfulness

Scott Lippitt

(he/they)

Utah, USA

    • A ten year vipassana meditation practice and 5 years of lived experience with adverse effects of meditation.

    • Training from Cheetah House on the mechanisms of meditation induced adverse effects and how to facilitate healing through multiple modalities.

    • Cheetah House Care Team Scaffolding / Resourcing Trainer

    • Cheetah House's Scaffolding / Resourcing Modality

    • Meaning-Making

    • Dealing with anhedonia and depression

    • Dealing with a loss in world-view

    • Getting back to oneself and one's life

    • Changes in sense of self

    • Dissociation

    • Fear/Panic

    • Depression

    • Anhedonia

    • Changes in visual perception

    • Involuntary Movements

    • Energy-Like Somatic Experiences

    • Changes in cognition (mainly memory)

  • Folks who

    • Would benefit from a friend with lived experience who understands what they're going through

    • Need help feeling meaning in their life

    • Need help finding practices, objects and activities that align with their original practice goals

    • Would like to learn and practice Cheetah House’s Scaffolding / Resourcing modality

  • Folks who

    • Are seeking help from someone with an educational/professional background in psychology/therapy.

    • Are seeking help for OCD (Obssessive Compulsive Disorder) type struggles

    • Are not open to non-spiritual explanations for the effects of meditation

    • Person centered care

    • Cheetah House’s Resourcing / Scaffolding Modality

    • Nervous System Regulation

    • Internal Family Systems

    • Neuroplasticity (No such thing as a 'point of no return')

    • Meaning Making

Christen Kramer

(she/her)

New York, USA

    • Certified crisis counselor with 10+ years of work with people in a variety of crisis situations and states of being

    • Training from Cheetah House on scaffolding/resourcing and the mechanisms of meditation induced adverse effects

    • 2 Master’s degrees and a Bachelor’s degree with focus in Psychology

    • Non-dualism and ideological/ belief related adverse effects

    • General meditation-induced adverse effects

  • Extreme and varied traumatic dissociative effects from non-dualism and meditation

  • Anyone who has experienced negative effects related to non-dualism, belief/ideology or meditation

  • Meditators experiencing psychosis or mania

    • Non-ideological

    • Trauma-informed,

    • Curious & compassionate

    • Focus on individual interpretation of experience

Doug Tielli

(he/him)

Canada

    • 2 years of gestalt psychotherapy training

    • 1 year shiatsu training

    • 19 years of meditation and yoga practice

    • Cheetah House care team training

    • The teachings of Thich Nhat Hanh and Plum Village

    • Ashtanga yoga

    • DPDR

    • Dissociation

    • Psychosis

    • Involuntary movements

    • Hyper-sensitivity

    • Energetic porousity

    • Long-term adverse effects

    • Those who are in Cheetah House Support Groups:

    • For 1-1 Consultations, those who are:

      • Referred to me by another Cheetah House Care Team member.

      • In a reintegration phase

      • Open to challenging and exploring their belief systems and the impacts of those belief systems on their lives

      • Interested in creativity and art and exploring how these modalities can be part of a re-integrative path

      • Experiencing long-term symptoms

      • Have various relationships to the practice of meditation, including: discontinuing, re-engaging, modifying, and continuing

    • Those in acute or crisis situations

    • Those experiencing psychedelic or other plant-medicine based difficulties

    • Those experiencing OCD like systems

    • Person-centered, relational approach - influenced by Gestalt

Peter Warren

(he/him)

Massachusetts, USA

    • 25 years meditation practice, Theravada and Adyashanti

    • 5 years dealing with personal adverse meditation effects

    • Cheetah House training on meditation-related adverse effects: how they arise, and multiple methods for helping distressed meditators recover

    • The danger of uncritically following powerful teachings and frameworks that promise awakening (Buddhist, non-dual, awareness-of-awareness, etc)

    • Institutional betrayal: the heartbreak of losing one’s community, teachers, and worldview

    • Recovery from adverse meditation effects and losses

    • The Cheetah House approaches for helping recovery, including Scaffolding/Resourcing

  • Meditation-induced symptoms

    • Major unintended weight loss (50 lbs)

    • Depression

    • Dissociation

    • Emotional flattening

    • Cognitive impairment, especially memory loss

    • Dizziness

    Loss of my former beloved meditation-related community and teachers, and being gaslighted, disbelieved, and ignored by them

    • Those who need someone:

      • whom they can tell their story to without fear of judgement or shaming

      • with many years of meditation experience before the wheels came off

      • who learned how to rebuild their life and found meaning and healing

    • Those who need support with institutional betrayal, disbelief, shaming, rejection

    • Those who need help finding what practices work for them and help them feel safe and grounded

    • Psychosis

    • Depersonalization/derealization

    • OCD

    • Those unwilling to question their spiritual teachings

    • Window of tolerance model of nervous system regulation

    • Person-centered, trauma-informed approach to recovery

    • Humanist

    • Belief in the power of creative endeavors (music, art, writing) for healing and finding meaning

    • Belief in the inherent good in all people

Michael Yonkovig

(he/him)

    • B.S. in Psychology

    • B.S. in Nursing

    • Master's in Social Work, Concentration coursework in neuroscience and philosophy

    • Licensed Clinical Social Worker (LCSW)

    • Registered Nurse (RN)

    • Research collaborator in Clinical and Affective Neuroscience Laboratory at Brown University

    • Psychoanalytic fellowship training

    • Undergoing Somatic Experiencing Practitioner (SEP) training

    • Experience with cortical mapping, TMS, and neurofeedback

  • Altered states of consciousness and alterations in sense of self

    Intersections between psychedelic use and contemplative methods/philosophies

    Western Buddhist and Christian contemplative practice

    Aspects of western esotericism

    Chronic illness

    • Existential/metaphysical concerns

    • Depersonalization/derealization

    • Sensory and perceptual changes

    • Transpersonal experiences

    • Institutional betrayal

    • Eating Disorders

    • Neurobiology

    • Existentialism

    • Psychoanalytic theories

    • Somatic approaches