THE CIRCUIT BREAKER Story
When I was a counsellor working in the seedy back-streets of Brisbane’s Fortitude Valley, having some frustrated couple try to shout the walls down was just another day at the office.
Although it could be heartbreaking at times, for the most part I was in my element and secretly relished the rawness of it. I loved getting gritty, getting real and helping people to find the practical tools and strategies that would bring the hope and change they were looking for. That’s exactly what writing the Circuit Breaker course was all about for me.
My mate Gordon says “the best mistakes to learn from are someone else’s,” and he’s right. To be honest, although I’ve done the degrees, written the books and spent a couple of decades speaking, training people, and doing media interviews, I’m really just a big expert on making big mistakes. By far my worst mistakes have been in my marriage, which I almost lost 30 years ago due to my own temper, and domestic abuse levelled at my wife. Although I’m not proud of that, Circuit Breaker is my way of paying forward what I had to seek out, and work really hard to learn back then. The tools and strategies that have changed everything; first for me, and then for thousands of others.
ABOUT MATT
Matt Boulton is a domestic violence trainer, advocate and speaker based in Logan, Queensland. He is best known as the author of “Changing Tools” and the “Circuit Breaker” program, and as the former Counselling Director for CityCARE Counselling Centres, where he specialised in DV cases and working with abusers.
For ten years, Matt was a member of the Joint Churches Domestic Violence Prevention Project, where he represented the Australian Christian Churches movement, and produced the project’s “Not in My Church” documentary and training resource for clergy.
For five years Matt was an ambassador for White Ribbon Australia, providing workplace domestic violence training for the likes of Boeing Australia, RAAF Amberley, Enogerra Army Barracks, businesses and higher learning institutions in Australia and the Solomon Islands. He also provided media interviews on behalf of White Ribbon in every major Australian print masthead, as well as radio interviews for ABC’s Mornings program, RN Drive, PM, and Brisbane’s 97.3FM, to name a few.
Over the past 21 years, Matt has developed and delivered his Circuit Breaker program for the early prevention of domestic violence. In his current role as Circuit Breaker Program Director for Hope Ventures, he continues to build the capacity of churches and community groups to positively engage with potential abusers in their communities. for this work, he was recently selected as a finalist for the Logan Citizen of the Year award.
As a speaker, Matt's approach is disarming, honest and insightful, since he has had to first overcome his own domestic violence issues early into his marriage and an ensuing separation. Today, 30 years on, Matt's greatest thrill is to see hurting or damaged people restored to the fullness which they were designed to enjoy and, to help resource community groups and churches to make a real difference. Matt is available for seminars, men's breakfasts and training events both in Australia and overseas (see Contact page).
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