Sufi Ibrahim’s Personal and Spiritual Counselling
Background: Joel Ibrahim Kreps practiced psychiatry for over 46 years- 12 as a general practitioner and 34 as a certified psychiatrist. During this period he had occasion to learn a lot-beyond medical and psychiatric science to an understanding of the nature of the life process itself, with all its challenges-ups and downs. He has also been practicing the discipline of Sufism- the inner aspect of the Islamic tradition – for over 40 years beginning with Pir Vilayat Khan in the mid seventies. During that period, he has maintained a deep and extensive interest in other spiritual traditions including various forms of Buddhist meditation, Hinduism, Yoga and most recently the Chinese tradition of Chigong. One of his earliest spiritual teachers was actually a Tibetan Buddhist sent as a delegate by the Dalai Lama to the Tibetan refugee community in Longueuil, a suburb of Montreal.
Through all this study and practice, Sufi Ibrahim has tried to extract the essential wisdom of each tradition and synthesize them in a manner that both aids in the overall understanding of life and can be practically applied to managing one’s life process- in a way that is both grounded AND uplifting. He is motivated to share this knowledge with anyone who is interested, whether they choose to do so through his books, his blog at sufipilgrimsprogress.com or through counselling of the sort being offered here.
Goals and Methods:
So what can we do together? Here is a brief list of some of the activities that I think could be both interesting and beneficial:
1) Dream-interpretation (a life-long passion of mine)
2) Specific decision-making (the use of the Istikhara prayer and its proper interpretation being one of the essential tools).This part of the process has the potential to teach people good judgment and discernment as we look at our lives unfolding and try to manage them properly. No University course or even advanced management seminar will teach you that and we know how expensive those can be.
3) Accompanying and managing through periods of crisis, of whatever nature, so as to minimize harm and maximize benefits
4) Working to get your life back on track when you feel that you are lost and floundering( one of my favourite and most satisfying activities) and
5) Related to the latter, following your personal and spiritual process together. For the believers, this is about learning how to decipher the will of God in your lives and for the agnostics it is about getting in sync with the flow of the Universe.” Stay open to the unfoldment of your destiny” I like to say.
6) Management of the medical system. Since I have worked for over 45 years in the medical system I have a pretty good idea of how it works and where the appropriate resources are for particular problems.This can save people a lot of time and money.For example, if someone is suffering from PTSD they can waste a lot of time by seeing a regular psychologist who has no specific training in that area.And that is often exactly what occurs.I have seen people waste years in such an endeavour.That’s just one example.There are many more.
So that is a brief summary of this work.
I’m sure there are a lot of other possibilities of what can be done in these consultations, but those are the ones that came most frequently to mind.
Logistics: We will communicate either by telephone or Skype or Facetime videochat depending on what is most practical.
For more information:
sufiibrahimcounselling@gmail.com