At Mosaic Counseling of Florida, Scott Welch helps to restore what was once broken.

Long driven by an unwavering desire to help others, Scott Welch has dedicated his life to making impactful impressions on the lives of many. As a youth pastor for more than 20 years, he showed a tremendous passion for working with children and having the ability to help guide their adolescence. Then in September 1999, he further cemented his commitment to his faith when he went on to found FreshStart Church in Tampa, where he continues to serve as lead pastor.

Welch’s meaningful work has also included his more than 25 years of counseling experience. A licensed mental health counselor, he is the founder of Mosaic Counseling of Florida where he uses his refined ability to help couples, families and individuals deal with a myriad of issues. Thanks to his personalized approach, Welch is able to connect and engage on a level that makes people feel comfortable while also addressing difficult issues head-on. It’s a big reason why he’s witnessed so many real breakthroughs, no matter how improbable they may have once seemed.

Some of the most influential moments in his counseling journey came from time spent in Hillsborough County jail, where he facilitated drug treatment groups for men. He saw firsthand how vulnerable and open these men were to sharing—free of judgment—and wondered if he could make this work outside of jail.

Using this model, he invited 12 men he knew, from various walks of life, to meet at a local restaurant and asked them to participate in an open, comment-free, listening session guided, Welch says, “by specific questions designed to elicit raw vulnerability.”

“Initially, no one wanted to speak, but then a 55-year-old, brawny ex-football player started sharing. By the end of his turn, this rugged man was openly weeping. Then another man took a turn … and another. That group is still meeting 15 years later,” he says.

Counseling men is about 25 percent of Welch’s client base. “I work with a lot of men who are struggling in relationships. They want to be better at life, to learn how to emotionally connect,” he says. “Normally people think that men don’t want to open up, but that’s changing. Once men find out there are other men they can share openly with and trust; they experience the truth behind the proverb, ‘As iron sharpens iron, so one man sharpens another.’ One of the clients in my men’s group says it saved his life.”

Welch is a dynamic public speaker who has presented nationally and internationally. He is a national trainer with Prepare/Enrich, the world’s leading pre-marital and marital inventory. He speaks nationally as a Stronger Families Master Level Trainer and currently teaches marriage and family counseling and adolescent counseling courses at Trinity College.

Adding to his unique skill set, Welch is a certified family mediator with the Supreme Court of Florida and a Qualified Parent Coordinator. His expertise with pre-marital, marital and post-marital endeavors provide him with a plethora of methods and resources to guide families in improving communication, working through differences, partnering with one another, and parenting more effectively.

To further his evolution as a counselor, Welch is taking part in elite training with The Gottman Institute. He is currently Gottman level 3 trained and is working toward certification, a highly coveted title that only a handful of others in the entire state share. “John Gottman is one of the leading couples’ researchers in the world,” explains Welch, “Employing his researched methods, I guide couples through an evidence-based, individualized roadmap of interventions that aid them in compassionately managing conflicts, deepening intimacy, and sharing their life purpose and dreams.”

When you couple those credentials with his prior experience leading one of the largest youth groups in Florida for two decades, Welch has gained a deeper understanding of the multi-layered issues families today are faced with. Moreover, the years Welch spent as a single father raising his two children alone, combined with his experience blending a family later in life, gives him the ability to not only empathize, but directly relate with so much of what his clients are going through.

“Many people come to me feeling broken,” says Welch. “Sometimes communication breaks down, passion erodes, trust may appear to be irreparably shattered. My life’s work is about helping people pick up all the shattered shards of life and find purpose in the pieces. When you look at a hand-crafted mosaic it’s hard to fathom how all the bits and pieces came together to make up a masterpiece. The same can be true of life. With the right mindset, skills, and strategies, you can use all the pieces of your life, even the broken, messy, painful pieces, to create a meaningful mosaic masterpiece. Every experience in life can be used as an opportunity to grow more into the person you were meant to be.”

Welch serves clients in the Central Florida area at the Charis Counseling Center in Baldwin Park.  In addition to meeting face-to-face, Welch is also offering his specialized services via virtual sessions. As a result, he is able to see patients in Orlando, Tampa, Jacksonville, West Palm Beach and other parts of the state.

“My clients have really appreciated the opportunity to connect virtually,” Welch notes. “Virtual counseling sessions allow my clients to interact more naturally in their home environment, rather than the clinical setting of my office, so it can actually provide me with even better insight into their world. Many people are finding it easier to carve out time for counseling sessions as they don’t have to leave work or home to travel to the office for a session.”

Scott Welch M Div.; MA, LMHC MH10603
Mosaic Counseling of Florida
Serving Orlando, Tampa, and all of Florida
407-777-5679 | MosaicCounselingFL.com

This article originally appeared in Orlando Family Magazine’s June 2020 issue.