Gibbs A. Williams. Ph.D. is a psychoanalytic psychotherapist practicing in New York. His choice of profession is an outgrowth of three major interests - philosophy, depth psychology, and spirituality. He received a B.A. from Columbia University, majoring in philosophy; an M.S. in psychology from Yeshiva University; and a Ph.D. in vocational rehabilitation counseling from New York University. His dissertation topic studied the relationship among male heroin addicts, selected treatment programs, and ego weakness.

He continued his involvement with addiction, working with a number of New York substance abuse programs. He was the assistant director of Odyssey House, a therapeutic community. His duties included planning, developing, and coordinating therapy; participating in overall policy decisions and patient evaluations; administering and interpreting psychological tests; leading and supervising individual, group, and marathon therapy sessions; giving lectures and conducting educational seminars; participating in, coordinating, and leading family and marital therapy groups; organizing and administering a group home (''the pressure cooker'') for thirty addicts. Other substance abuse programs included Samaritan Village (formerly known as The Samaritan Half-Way Society) as well as the female program run by the New York State Narcotics Control Commission. He was the primary care consultant for The Lowell Institute, an outpatient program for substance abusers (drugs and alcohol).

He received a certificate in psychoanalytic psychotherapy from The Greenwich Institute in 1980 and went on to become an instructor and supervisor in the same institute. The courses he taught there included Ego Strength/Ego Weakness; Ego Psychology; and Transference/ Countertransference. He taught a course on crisis intervention to incoming interns for ten years.

Additionally he has taught at other colleges and learning centers in New York. These include New York University, The New York School For Social Research, Adelphi University, The Discovery Center, and The Open Center. He is also on the faculty of The Psychoanalytic Psychotherapy Study Center, on the alcoholism training faculty.

Other courses he has taught include: Psychopathology and Mental Health; The Addictive Personality; Psychoanalysis and The Occult; Decoding Meaningful Coincidences: Spirituality And The Agnostic Addict; Coping With Hard Times (stress management), Crisis Intervention and Psychoanalysis, and Striving For Wholeness: Preventing Substance Abuse in Pre-Teens.

He has written the following papers: ''The Demystification and Use Of Meaningful Coincidences (Synchronicities)''; ''Spirituality and The Agnostic Addict''; ''Seeking The Golden Thread: The Evolving Self, Meaningful Coincidences, and The Creative Process''; and ''Multiple Uses and Limitations of Imagery and Imaging in the Psychoanalytic Psychotherapy of a Patient Suffering from Schizophrenia and Bulimia''.

He has written an unpublished book about his experiences at Odyssey House entitled: My Odyssey: Personal and Professional Perspectives in Addiction - The Best and the Worst of the 1960s. He has also kept a personal journal for thirty five years called: ''Oedipus From Miami Beach''. Currently he is working on a book tentatively named: Climbing  Mountains in Inner Space: The Logic of Experience - A Defense of Long Term Psychoanalysis and Psychoanalytic Psychotherapy.

From the inception of his consciousness he has been searching for absolute answers to ultimate questions (e.g., who am I and what do I want?: what is the meaning of life and how can I find it?; how do I know I know?). While he believes there are no easy answers in resolving life's complex problems. at the same time he enthusiastically affirms a dedication towards attempting to seek the truth of the matter at hand. His method for seeking the truth is by challenging first assumptions, relying on personal experience as the criterion for final authority.

Gibbs specializes in working with complicated people who tend to view their life as if it were a four dimensional chess game. Although they are capable of complex perception, they often find themselves unable to make effective use of their extraordinary gifts. Though each patient is able to clearly spell out what troubles them, they are initially unable to do anything to change. Most suffer from seemingly intractable diminished self-esteem (identity issues) often expressed in the Hamlet problem: "To be or not to be" literally and figuratively. Dr. Williams describes the essence of his process as (a) providing and sustaining the just right atmosphere for inducing significant psychological change; and (b) helping the patient transform what initially is experienced as an intractable existential morass into clearly stated psychological symptoms and problems (conflicts) potentially capable of resolution. For him, the key to success is in understanding the unique idiosyncratic process each patient brings into treatment. "Each analysis is tailor made to fit the individual needs of the patient."

As far as his personal trip on his road through his life is concerned, he identifies with Joyce who says in Ulysses ''the longest way around is the shortest way home.'' He also concurs with Spinoza who in the Ethics says: ''those things worth accomplishing are as difficult as they are rare.'' He agrees with both Freud who (paraphrased) states: ''the end of a successful psychoanalysis enables a person to convert neurotic suffering into an acceptance of everyday common misery''; and with Winnicott who (paraphrased) says: ''the end of a good analysis results in the patient experiencing the consciousness of a sixth month old child who has been unconditionally loved.''

He is militantly opposed to the ''quick fix mentality'' in our nation. That mentality that tends to believe that normal feelings like anxiety and depression are to be suppressed or dismissed entirely, instead of translating their messages for personal well being. Gibbs is passionate in his conviction that significant change is possible, but it takes persistent hard work and a willingness to struggle with struggle.