Robert's Story
A LITTLE MORE ON ROBERT SO YOU KNOW ABOUT THE PERSON SUPPORTING YOU
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As a result of the client offering up that trust, Robert feels it is fair, and indeed helpful, for them to know a little bit about his personal history. A therapeutic trade off so to speak, that will help to build on the alliance that is so vital for successful outcomes.
Robert was born in Malaysia, due to his father taking up work and living in that country. His mother unfortunately died in a car accident over there when he was just 4 years old, but aside from the initial devastation and upset of this loss, Robert's early years allowed him to focus on other exciting and new experiences that a young boy of this age tends to absorb in life, therefore he was gradually able to move on from this tragic event.
Robert continued to live in the Far East until the age of 8 years when, as was the custom for expat children overseas, he was sent off to boarding school in England, returning initially only for the summer vacation, spending the remaining holidays with family and friends either in the UK or sometimes in the USA. It seems that boarding schools can either make or break you, however apart from a natural sense of homesickness for the initial few days of his first term, Robert really enjoyed his time at school, making new friends, while learning and absorbing the new British culture in which he found himself .
At 13 years Robert moved to a secondary educational boarding school in the UK. By this time he was able to return to Malaysia for every school holiday. There he would meet up with old friends who similarly flew backward and forward from different schools around the world. In essence it created two secure but totally disparate lives, where he would have close friendships with various people in two different countries, but because these two sets of social communities never came together, he oscillated between the two cultures. Robert finally finished his secondary schooling at 18 years, having taken and passed his A Levels.
These parallel lives, along with the diverse cultures and experiences that shaped Robert's world, created within him a wide comprehension and acceptance that life, backgrounds and attitudes come in many varied forms. He learnt understanding and tolerance, as well as a respect for different values. Although he was not to go straight into personal development work, Robert's life so far had created an ideal foundation for the career that was yet to come.
After leaving school Robert wanted to travel and explore the world during his late teens and early-20s, going to Europe, USA, Asia and Australia, taking up gap year work along the way, this included being a farmhand, jobs in activity centres, bar work, water ski boat driving and various other casual employment positions to fund his travels. At 23 years he finally embarked on tertiary education, undertaking a 3-year course in Rural Estate Management at the Royal Agricultural University, Cirencester, UK with a view to joining the family tea growing business in Malaysia, BOH Plantations, after graduating.However, upon graduation Robert decided instead to work in Singapore, joining international real estate company Jones Lang Wootton, now known as Jones Lang LaSalle. He married in 1984 and returned to the UK in 1985. Robert started a family and continued in property until the 1989 crash. At this stage he thought he could either ride the economic downturn storm or consider a completely new career. He chose the latter after having become more and more interested during the preceding 5 years in studying, reading and attending seminars covering the field of mindset and personal development.
He retrained in hyphotherapy, stress management and analaysis at the College of Stress Management in Derby, which now ceases to exist under that name, as it has merged into other educational establishments over time. During his 2-year period of training, Robert worked as a financial advisor in the evenings for Allied Dunbar, which was subsequently acquired by Zurich. This allowed him to attend lectures and study during the day and thus helped provide an income for his family. During the latter part of his course, Robert took on occasional practice clients as a student therapist. He finally commenced working full-time as a professionally qualified personal development consultant by end-1991, initially under his own trading name of Robert Russell, offering Hypnotherapy, NLP, CBT, Stress Management and EMDR.At this stage Robert had three young daughters and a new career, which although was totally absorbing, also needed to prove successful so that he could continue to look after his family. He quickly threw himself into his new passion and started taking further relevant courses, particularly certified courses in Eye Movement Desensitisation and Reprocessing (EMDR), in order to advance his knowledge and ability to help clients. By 1995, as well as seeing clients for personal wellbeing issues and developing mindset, Robert was also lecturing students in Hypnotherapy, NLP, CBT, Stress Management and EMDR.
After taking on numerous celebrity clients at The Hale Clinic in London, Robert managed to showcase and discuss his work in the media through TV, newspapers and magazines. It was a busy and rewarding time but placed a strain on his marriage and unfortunately he divorced in 2001. In moving forward Robert still maintains a closeness with his children and is now happily remarried to a Jordanian of Palestinian ancestory. This has added a further cultural assimilation for him and he now has many Middle Eastern clients.
Robert runs his therapy businesses through Mindset Synergy, providing Hypnotherapy, NLP, CBT, Stress Management and EMDR, along with Business Motivation and Development, Goal Setting, Team Building and Sport Psychology. This is conducted at The Prager Clinic in Knightsbride, London and also online sessions.He also delivers excellence in Hypnotherapy, NLP, CBT and Personal Development training for those wishing to study to become therapists through professionally recognised and accredited courses through Training Alliance Group, which additionally runs Executive Coaching programmes to several companies, of which Flight Centre was one of the main clients. TAG provides a broad range of Professional Development and Business Coaching courses designed to meet the specific needs of corporate organisations by offering bespoke programmes on motivation, goal setting, presentation skills, team building and business development.
All of the above are now coming together under TAG Mind Skills. Robert is also now spending much of his year in Malaysia and Jordan overing services in person or online from there, in addition to the UK.
Through his various personal development ventures, Robert is enthusiastic about his work and his future in the years ahead, along with the support he can bring to others aided by his life experiences and training. As such, Robert really welcomes helping you move forward on any issue where you have reached a road block or wish to gain mindset skills to achieve some goal.