Carie Fox, J.D., M.S.

she/her

Thanks for all of your hard work and brilliant efforts as mediator for the Columbia River National Estuary Program. Your warmth and superb 'people skills' enabled us to complete the management plan under budget and on time.

— Carl Dugger, Lower Columbia River Estuary Management Committee Chair

Carie is a former soil scientist and lawyer who started her public policy mediation business in 1997, mostly mediating large environmental conflicts. Carie’s attention has now shifted to more focused work: coaching one-on-one to mediators, people who want help navigating a conflict (or conflict pattern) or people struggling with a difficult decision. From the beginning, Carie has been interested in the edges between mediation and related fields: everything from hard-core decision science to art therapy. With that breadth of understanding, plus a pinch of humility, Carie deftly designs her coaching/facilitating approach to fit you or your group. Maybe a nugget from Improvisational Theater will be exactly the thing you need to help you see clearly and move forward. Or maybe you need something about timing so you can discern not only how but when to move forward. Sometimes the ‘when’ is better approached by making a flow diagram—very sciency. Or—you know—no bells and whistles,—sometimes Carie just applies the time-tested method of listening with sympathy.

Carie’s interest in pain release comes from several life themes. Mediation is one of them, of course; to resolve a conflict is to agree to transform pain in some way or another. Carie used a lot of fancy conflict resolution approaches in her public policy work but she never found anything more powerful than simply being able to abide with someone’s pain when that was called for—without fuss, judgment or (in that moment) solutions. Carie also has had her own repeated bouts of intense physical pain, which have taught her a great deal. Some pain is not curable, but the relationship with pain can be changed.

Carie is studying Feldenkrais —700 hours down, 100 to go—and has incorporated this into her coaching and mediation. (If you are interested in one of her movement classes, check this out.)