Better Together Training
Better Together at Chico Hot Springs
Working with Mistrust, Distance, and the Full Range of Human Experience
Lori Marchak
Experiential Workshop for Mental Health Professionals
Chico Hot Springs, Pray, Montana
Tuesday morning-Friday afternoon, October 27-30, 2026
21-24 Credit Hours*
Limited to 32 Participants, 8 Assistants
Most therapy models teach us what to do.
This training focuses on something more fundamental: the conditions under which anything we do can actually work.
Drawing from—and moving beyond—Emotionally Focused Therapy (EFT) and Internal Family Systems (IFS), this experiential training introduces a different clinical orientation. One that treats mistrust, distance, and even the most difficult emotional states not as problems to overcome, but as intelligent responses to the conditions people have lived in.
Rather than focusing on technique or outcome, we will explore what becomes possible when therapists shift their role—from helping clients achieve their desired outcomes to helping create the conditions where experience can safely emerge.
What This Training Offers
This training will not present a new model to learn.
It is a way of seeing—and working—that allows you to move more freely within and beyond the models you already know.
Together, we will explore:
- Mistrust as intelligence
How to recognize and work with mistrust as an accurate assessment of safety—not resistance to overcome. - Distance as data
How to track presence, absence, and relational distance in real time—and respond without forcing closeness. - Working with “cold” states
Emptiness, collapse, fog, and disconnection—states that are often missed, pathologized, or prematurely managed. - Reclaiming “fire”
Anger, disgust, contempt, and protest—not as problems, but as forms of protection, dignity, and emerging selfhood. - Aliveness and emergence
What becomes possible when experience no longer has to be managed, explained, or resolved. - Therapist responsibility, redefined
Moving from outcome-based responsibility (fixing, regulating, progressing) to condition-based responsibility (what can actually be supported here, now).
Who This Is For
This training is designed for therapists who:
- Have training in experiential, relational, or parts-based models (EFT, IFS, etc.)
- Feel both supported and constrained by those models
- Want to deepen their capacity to work with what feels stuck, distant, or unreachable
- Are ready to move beyond technique into a more intuitive, responsive clinical presence
- Are in active pursuit of their own growth
What Makes This Training Different
Many trainings offer new interventions.
This one focuses on what happens before intervention matters.
We will not be building toward mastery, certainty, or a set of correct moves.
Instead, we will:
- Slow down enough to see what is actually happening in the room
- Work directly with what therapists often override—mistrust, distance, collapse
- Explore where responsibility has been misplaced—and what changes when it is realigned
- Create conditions where both therapists and clients can experience something new
This is not about doing more.
It is about seeing differently—and trusting what follows from that.
What’s Included
This is a 4-day experiential training combining:
- Teaching and conceptual framing
- Live clinical demonstrations
- Small group process work
- Dyadic and group experiential exercises
- Handout materials
- Breakfast and lunch each day, provided by the resort
- Mid-day breaks to soak, nap, or explore the area
- 21-24 CE’s (application in progress)*
Afternoons will include structured process groups, allowing participants to integrate the work personally and clinically.
Lori Marchak, MS, Ph.D, LMFT, LCPC
Lori is a psychotherapist, teacher, and writer whose work explores how nervous systems adapt to impossible conditions—and what becomes possible when those conditions change.
Drawing from decades of clinical experience and training in Emotionally Focused Therapy (EFT), Internal Family Systems (IFS), and neuroscience-informed approaches, she has developed a relational framework that centers mistrust, distance, and the full range of human emotional experience as intelligent and necessary.
Her work focuses less on changing people and more on shifting the conditions that make change possible.
She lives and practices in Bozeman, Montana.
More Details
Learning Objectives
Participants will be able to:
- Differentiate between outcome-based and condition-based therapeutic approaches
- Recognize and work with client mistrust as adaptive intelligence
- Track and respond to relational distance in clinical interactions
- Work more effectively with dissociation, collapse, and “cold” emotional states
- Distinguish between defensive and protest anger and respond appropriately
- Apply a therapist stance that supports safety without overriding client protection
- Integrate these principles into their existing clinical framework
Is This Couple or Individual Therapy Training?
Both.
While many demonstrations and exercises may involve couples (to make relational dynamics more visible), the principles apply equally to individual therapy. The focus is not on a specific modality, but on how experience is met in the room.
For Those Returning
This training represents a continued evolution of this work.
Participants who have attended previous Better Together trainings will find:
- A more clearly articulated and independent model
- Expanded focus on mistrust, distance, and cold states
- New experiential exercises and process group structures
- Greater emphasis on therapist orientation and responsibility
Staying at Chico
Chico Hot Springs
Pray, Montana is 30 minutes north of Yellowstone National Park.
Check-in is Monday afternoon or evening. Call Chico directly to book your room—there are a variety of options. Please mention “Better Together” when reserving as we have a block of rooms set aside for the training.
This training includes extended midday breaks to rest, reflect, and take in the surrounding landscape.
How experiential is the training?
Highly experiential.
Each day includes demonstrations, dyadic exercises, and small group process work. Participants are invited—but not required—to engage at a personal level.
There is no expectation to share beyond what feels appropriate. Respect for individual pacing and boundaries is central to the structure of the training.
The group size is limited to 32 participants and 8 assistants.
Schedule
Tuesday, October 27
Prerequisites
To get the most from this training, participants should (1) understand the Emotionally Focused Therapy model and have practice working with either individuals or couples in that model. Ideally, participants will have completed an EFT Externship. Likewise, participants will have (2) basic understanding and experience with the Internal Family Systems model through formal or informal learning or personal therapy. Experience using IFS in your practice is not required.
Interest and curiosity in exploring emerging ideas in experiential therapy is more important than prior training and experience.
EFT and IFS
How is this different from EFT or IFS training?
This work is informed by both EFT and IFS, but it is not a combination or comparison of those models.
The focus here is on areas that are often underdeveloped across models, including:
- working directly with mistrust
- tracking relational distance in real time
- supporting “cold” states such as collapse and emptiness
- redefining therapist responsibility around conditions rather than outcomes
Getting to Chico Hot Springs
For those traveling from outside the region, plan to fly into Bozeman or Billings, Montana, airports. Plan for an additional driving time of 1 hour from the Bozeman airport or 2 hours from Billings.
There is no public transportation to Chico; a car ride will be necessary. As the date approaches, we will use email announcements to promote ride-sharing.
Visiting Yellowstone National Park
Chico Hot Springs is 30 miles from the north entrance to Yellowstone National Park. As the park is roughly the size of the state of Connecticut, it is ideal to plan a multi-day visit if you go. Lodging in the national park fills up well in advance. Nearby Gardiner, Montana, has many private lodging options.
Policies and Procedures
Confidentiality of Participant Information and Breaches of Confidentiality
Trusted Journeys, Inc. will ensure that participant information, including name, contact, and payment information, will be kept confidential. In the case of a breach of confidentiality, Trusted Journeys will contact the participant.
Program Complaints
If a participant or potential participant would like to express a concern about Lori Marchak or a continuing education program provided by Trusted Journeys, the individual may email Lori Marchak at trustedjourneys@gmail.com, Laura Spiller, drspiller@lauracspillerphd.com, training coordinator, or Tahlia Rainboldt, t.rainboltphd@gmail.com, training coordinator. Although we do not guarantee a particular outcome, Trusted Journeys will consider the complaint, make any necessary decisions, and respond within 30 days.
Fees, Refunds, and Cancellation
The fees, refund, and cancellation policy are located on the registration form, below.
Attendance
Credit will be given for live attendance only. Partial credit will be given based on hours in attendance, when the participant attends at least 6 hours of the live training.
Disclosure or Use of Client Information in a CE Program
Client information must not be disclosed by a presenter or participant unless proper informed consent has been obtained for use in a continuing education program.