Ryan Samples, LPC

About Ryan

Ryan Samples is a Licensed Professional Counselor (LPC) at Life Discovery Counseling Services in Clackamas, Oregon. Before becoming a counselor, Ryan spent approximately fifteen years working in emergency rooms — an experience that shaped not only his understanding of acute stress, trauma, and burnout, but also his deep respect for the people who show up in crisis, day after day, often without a place to put it down.

Ryan specializes in working with men, first responders, and healthcare workers — people who are often far better at taking care of others than at asking for help themselves. His work with law enforcement officers, EMTs, firefighters, dispatchers, and ER staff centers on the cumulative weight of occupational stress, the challenge of leaving work at work, and the slow erosion that comes from years of high-stakes caregiving without adequate support.

His approach to anger and emotional regulation is rooted in curiosity rather than correction. Ryan sees anger not as a problem to be eliminated, but as information — often signaling unmet needs, unprocessed pain, or long-held patterns that have outlived their usefulness. The work isn't about suppressing what you feel. It's about understanding what it's telling you.

Ryan also works with adult men and male adolescents navigating anxiety, depression, life transitions, relationship difficulties, and identity questions. He sees couples as well, and provides both in-person therapy at the Clackamas office and telehealth services throughout Oregon.

Education & Training

Ryan holds a Master of Arts in Counseling from Western Seminary in Portland, Oregon, and a Bachelor of Science in Community Youth Services from Corban University in Salem, Oregon. His graduate training included coursework in human growth and development, psychopathology, family systems, crisis intervention, trauma-informed care, vocational counseling, and multicultural counseling.

Ryan's primary therapeutic orientation is Solution-Focused Brief Therapy (SFBT), which he integrates with Internal Family Systems (IFS), Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT), Narrative Therapy, and Person-Centered approaches. He draws from whatever fits the person in front of him rather than applying a fixed protocol.

My Approach

"What is hard to find is a space that is quiet and safe — one that allows you to recognize your own feelings and align them with your thoughts."

Ryan's work is built around creating exactly that kind of space. He believes most people are more resilient than they realize — and that therapy works best when it helps people see and build on the strengths they already carry, rather than cataloging what's broken.

For men especially, that means meeting clients where they are. Ryan doesn't expect anyone to arrive fluent in therapeutic language or immediately comfortable with vulnerability. That takes time, and he's patient with that process.

Ryan works from a Christian faith perspective and integrates spiritual values when they are meaningful to the client. He is equally comfortable working with people from other worldviews or no faith background at all — and will follow the client's lead on whether and how spirituality enters the work.

A Note on Perspective

Ryan has lived with a visual impairment throughout his adult life. That experience has given him a particular appreciation for what it takes to navigate a world not always designed with you in mind — and for the resilience required to do so without making it the center of your identity. It shapes the way he listens to clients who are facing limitations, adjusting expectations, or working through the kind of slow, unglamorous adaptation that doesn't get enough credit.