This work changed my life. It's how I show up for yours.
Aaron Petrie
LPC-MHSP-Certified Meditation Facilitator
I didn't come to this work from the outside looking in. I came to it through my own experience with anxiety, overthinking, and the pressure that follows you everywhere when performance is tied to your identity.
As a competitive athlete myself, I learned firsthand what it feels like when your mind becomes your biggest opponent. The thoughts that won't quiet down. The weight of expectations. The way anxiety can hijack everything you've worked for.
Working through that, through mindfulness, meditation, and learning to notice a thought without giving it power, is what eventually pointed me toward this work professionally.
MY BACKGROUND
I spent nearly a decade in addiction and substance abuse treatment, work that teaches you quickly how deep the connection runs between performance, identity, and pain. I served as Clinical Director at Lotus Wellness Center in Nashville, leading a team of clinicians through complex, high stakes cases. I've worked at Nashville Treatment Solutions and helped build three companies from the ground up, so I understand the pressure of leadership and entrepreneurship from the inside, not just the therapy room.
Along the way I found my way to athletes. College competitors. International level performers. Olympians. Professionals. What I found across every level is that the mental struggles look remarkably similar regardless of how high the stage is. The anxiety, the self-doubt, the burnout, the loss of identity. These aren't signs of weakness. They're signs that something important needs attention.
HOW I WORK
I'm a certified meditation facilitator through Wild Heart Meditation in Nashville. Mindfulness and Buddhist principles around presence and non-attachment are woven into how I work, not as an add-on but as a foundation. When there's past trauma or old patterns driving current struggles, we go there. We look at it, we work to heal it, and then we bring that healing into the present so it stops running the show.
My approach brings together sports psychology, trauma-informed therapy, and evidence-based methods including Cognitive Behavioral Therapy and Motivational Interviewing. Every session is built around you specifically, your goals, your history, your performance context. This isn't a program you follow. It's a process we build together.
WHO I WORK WITH
I work with athletes at every level, from high school competitors to Olympians and professionals. I also work with executives, entrepreneurs, and high performers outside of sport who carry the same pressure in different arenas.