About Ross A. Laird

Ross A. Laird is an interdisciplinary scholar, consultant, teacher, and creative artist. He is a best-selling author, psychotherapist, university professor, addictions and trauma specialist, consultant in the psychology of leadership, poet, and craftsman in wood and stone. Whether he's giving a keynote address at a psychology conference, working with heroin addicts in Vancouver's Downtown Eastside, or discussing his ideas about creativity on radio and television, Laird offers a unique blend of the arts and sciences. He is a storyteller, a philosopher, and an engaging speaker. He has appeared on CBC's Tapestry and North by Northwest, on Bravo's Book Television, and has been profiled in the Vancouver Sun. His first book appeared on Macleans national best-seller list.

Laird is a recipient of the Union Institute's Sussman Award for Academic Excellence for "ultimate academic achievement at the doctoral level." His doctoral dissertation, which subsequently was adapted into book form as Grain of Truth: The Ancient Lessons of Craft, was shortlisted for the 2001 Governor General's Award (the highest literary award in Canada) and the BC Book Prize. Grain of Truth was voted one of the 100 most important books of 2001 by the Globe and Mail and by Spirituality and Health magazine. Laird is also the recipient of the 1997 Cecilia B. Lamont poetry prize.

Laird's second book, A Stone's Throw: The Enduring Nature of Myth explains the origins of the mythologies of Egypt, Israel, Iraq, and Saudi Arabia. Laird demonstrates how these mythologies have become the source of the most pressing conflicts in the contemporary world, from the Palestinian uprisings to September 11 to the war on terror. A Stone's Throw continues the themes of creativity and spirituality explored in Grain of Truth: The Ancient Lessons of Craft. Traversing five thousand years of history, and from the perspective of Laird as a craftsman sculpting stone in his shop, A Stone's Throw follows the evolution of sacred mythologies from the pharaohs and their pyramids to the Temple Mount in Jerusalem, the sacred Kaaba stone in Mecca, the Washington Monument, and the World Trade Center. A Stone's Throw offers readers a means of understanding the contemporary world with greater depth and clarity. Laird lays bare the shared heritage of religions, of peoples, of the essential themes of human nature.

Dr. Laird is a professor and instructor in counselling, psychology, and creative writing. He has taught at the following institutions:

• Simon Fraser University
• Vancouver Community College
• Kwantlen Polytechnic University
• The Union Institute and University
• Antioch University

He also provides consulting services to professional artists and graduate students in multiple disciplines, to addictions counsellors, to social service agencies and to corporations and educational institutions. He is a frequent speaker at conferences, is a registered member of the BC Association of Clinical Counsellors, and is the 2003 recipient of the Association's Communications Award.

His essays have appeared in The Globe and Mail, Canadian Geographic, and Pacific Yachting, for which he is a regular contributor.

A new book on addictions will be published in 2010.

Ross Laird's professional resume is attached below.