Our Team
Martha Golden, PsyD
Founder, CEO, & Whole Skills Coach
I created the Whole Skills Coaching program and launched the business Whole Skills, LLC because I’ve seen what emotional well-being skills can do. Helping people learn and practice the skills, and witnessing the profound effect it has on their lives, has been the gratifying heart of my professional life.
The pandemic highlighted the great desire and need for people to strengthen their emotional well being. I created Whole Skills to bring life-giving skills to high-functioning people and groups who might not know what they are missing. I am eager for a broader audience to learn Whole Skills, more than just those who may seek traditional psychotherapy.
Before I was clinical psychologist, I was a third-grade teacher. I loved the classroom, but I found myself most drawn to what happens outside of the classroom. Many of my students had difficult home lives and I wanted to help more than I could. I decided to go back to school myself and earned masters and doctorate degrees in clinical psychology.
For my post-doctoral fellowship, I was mentored by a brilliant psychologist who was among the first to study with Marsha Linehan, the creator of Dialectical Behavioral Therapy (DBT), a skills-based, empirically validated treatment. In 2005, my mentor inspired and encouraged me to create my own psychology private practice with an emphasis on DBT work. In 2014, I was in the first international cohort to become a DBT-Certified-Clinician™.
Early on in teaching the skills, and incorporating DBT in my clinical work, I quickly discovered that I benefitted from the daily use of DBT skills as much as my clients. There’s no role in my life that doesn’t benefit from years of daily practicing these skills. My own experience taught me anyone and everyone can benefit from learning and practicing the skills of emotional well-being.
My vocation to teach never went away. Thankfully, I’m still a teacher. I believe everyone has the ability to learn, grow, and change. Over the past 26 years, as an educator, therapist and coach, I have worked with thousands of people and groups. I’ve seen lives transformed and enriched through the DBT skills. Whole Skills Coaching allows me to draw on my love of teaching, my work as a clinical psychologist, and my own experience with DBT skills, to equip high-functioning individuals and groups to learn skills, and with work plus commitment can transform.
In addition to my face-to-face work in Durham, I am licensed to provide tele-health services across 39 states. You can check out my psychology practice website here.
“Martha stands out in how approachable and personable she is. Her humor, rapport, and lack of judgment make the sessions always feel welcoming. Martha’s knowledge and real-world examples of the application of skills make the material easy to understand and implement. ”
Sammy Banawan, PhD
Whole Skills Coach
In addition to my roles at Durham DBT, Inc, I serve as a freelance coach for Whole Skills Coaching, providing both individual and group skills coaching. I founded my psychology practice Durham DBT, Inc. in 2006 after completing my post-doctoral fellowship at the Duke University Medical Center. I completed my internship there in 2003 and in 2004 I graduated from UGA with master and doctorate degrees in clinical psychology.
I have been intensively trained in DBT and have provided DBT services since the beginning of my career. Mindfulness has been at the center of my professional and personal lives, having experienced first hand its benefits myself and wanting to share it with others. I am a certified mindfulness instructor, having completed Jack Kornfield and Tara Brach’s Mindfulness Meditation Teaching Certification Program.
I have taught and coached skills to thousands of individuals, groups, and teams for over 20 years. A consistent part of my weekly routine for the past 20 years has been working side by side with Martha. Together we have co-taught and co-coached skills to groups of young adults weekly since 2006, benefiting and improving the emotional well being of over a thousand participants.
Martha’s vision in creating the Whole Skills program is meeting a dire, current cultural need. These skills are life-giving and more people, outside of a clinical setting, need to be given the opportunity to learn and apply them. Individuals and groups can learn to become more skillful and effective in life, not just those seeking psychotherapy. There is really nothing else quite like Whole Skills, LLC on the market! I’m excited to be part of this responsive initiative.
“Sammy excels in prompting reflection and curating a safe space for the group sessions. He holds people accountable in an empathetic and non-judgmental way. His examples of problem-solving and application of the skills are memorable and comprehensive.”
“I am forever grateful to Martha Golden for teaching me these skills because it has literally saved my life! She has such a passion for teaching skills and does it with immense compassion and empathy and humor.”
— J.M.
“Sammy leads skills group session with a very laid back, easy going, and kind presence. He is funny and keeps the group lighthearted.”
— E.R.
“Martha and Sammy have a good working dynamic when teaching skills. They complement each other very well. Martha excels in introducing and teaching skills, and Sammy is good about relating skills to real life situations.”
— A.K.
“Sammy and Martha together as a team are absolutely incredible - they work together in a yin and yang balance. I cannot speak more highly of the two of them, there is not a better team.”
— G.D.