Clinical training
Learning grounded in real practice, interdisciplinary thinking, and the contexts in which care actually happens.
Behavioral health, held collectively
Care is a practice.
Creativity is how we reach it.
Elixir Austin is a creative arts led behavioral health collective. We bring practitioners, community artists, and shared knowledge together to strengthen the people who provide care and the communities they serve.
Meet the collectiveWhat we mean
More than a practice. A place to practice together.
A behavioral health collective is an ecosystem of people who learn, create, and care in relationship. At Elixir, clinical skill does not live apart from culture, creativity, or community. We support the whole practitioner, not only the services they deliver, through rigorous training, reflective supervision, practical guidance, and sustained connection with peers.
For people in practice
Support that helps practitioners deepen their work, navigate its realities, and remain connected to purpose.
Supervision
Reflective clinical supervision that holds both the responsibility of the work and the growth of the practitioner.
Practice guidance
Thoughtful consultation for clinical decisions, professional development, practice building, and the systems around care.
Practitioner community
A place for exchange, collaboration, restoration, and the kind of honest conversation that is difficult to hold alone.
Collective programs
Honest spaces for the whole person.
“This is where I’m at.”
HONEST
A men’s group for those ready to stop performing strength and start embodying it. Built on a simple belief: men were never meant to carry all of it alone.
Discover Honest Scroll
The Old Script
Every man knows the rules by heart.
For too long, masculinity has been defined by extremes. The script was handed down without anyone asking whether it was working.
IBe tough.
IIBe successful.
IIIProvide.
IVDon’t complain.
VDon’t cry.
VIHandle your shit.
The script told a man what to be. It never asked him how he was doing, and it left him alone with the rest.
Where It Began
Never meant to carry it alone.
Honest was not built from theory. It was built from what the weight actually feels like.
Honest was founded from lived experience: addiction, loss, trauma, failure, and healing. Not studied from a distance, but carried, one season at a time, by the men who built it. What that experience taught them was simple. The weight was never the problem. Carrying it alone was.
Most men learned early to perform instead of tell the truth. Fine at work, fine at home, fine everywhere: fine, always fine, right up until it wasn’t. The husband, the father, the addict, the executive, the man rebuilding his life. Each one carrying more than he says. Each one convinced he is the only one.
The work is integration: healing addiction, anger, marital strain, or a life characterized by chaos, and reclaiming the parts of ourselves we’ve hidden. Not to live in the wound, but to discover that you can lead your life, the people you love, and your community with clarity, courage, and integrity.
Honest exists to end that isolation. We don’t tell men what masculinity is supposed to look like. We create a space where they can discover what it means for themselves, in the company of men doing the same.
At Honest, we believe masculinity can hold all of it.
What We Believe
A whole man holds both.
Most men were told to pick a side: strong or soft, faithful or in therapy, successful or struggling. Honest was built on the conviction that a whole man holds both.
- Strength&vulnerability
- Faith&therapy
- Discipline&compassion
- Success&failure
- Grace&accountability
Not either, or. Both, held honestly.
The mission: an environment rich with honesty, accountability, and relational engagement, where strength is built through emotional vulnerability instead of isolation.
Heal the boy.
Face what happened. Reclaim the parts of yourself you’ve hidden. The work starts where the wound did.
Lead the man.
Carry what the healing gives you back into your life, the people you love, and your community.
Live with integrity.
Close the gap between the man inside and the man the world sees. Clarity. Courage. Integrity.
The Conversations
What men actually carry.
No small talk. No highlight reels. We talk about the shit men actually carry, and we talk about it out loud.
- Marriage
- Fatherhood
- Addiction
- Sex
- Money
- Anger
- Grief
- Purpose
- Faith
- Insecurity
- Loneliness
- Ambition
And the constant pressure to have it all figured out.
The Daily Check-In
Because sometimes the strongest thing a man can say is: “This is where I’m at.” And the room answers, every time: “We will take you where you’re at.”
Five words, said out loud, to men who are listening. The daily check-in is the heartbeat of Honest: no polish, no performance, just the truth about today. Wherever you start, the room starts with you. And it will not leave you there.
Start your first check-in
How It Works
Simple practices. Real relationships.
Honest runs on rhythms a man can actually keep. Nothing complicated, nothing performative: a daily pulse, a weekly table, and a standard of truth that turns strangers into brothers.
Where he actually is.
Every day, each man tells the group where he’s at. Not where he wishes he was. Not where he’s supposed to be. Where he actually is. Then one question to carry into the day: what’s mine to do now?
- Starts with five words: this is where I’m at
- A brotherhood that reads, responds, and remembers
- Presence first; nobody is required to fix anybody
Where the masks come off.
A standing group each week where the masks come off. Structured enough to go deep, small enough that every voice matters and every absence is felt.
- Topics drawn from what men actually carry
- Confidential, consistent, and led from within
- Show up as you are; leave more honest than you came
Tell the truth.
One rule inside every room: tell the truth. No posturing, no resume talk, no performing strength for an audience of men doing the same.
- Truth over image, every time
- Questions asked to understand, not to judge
- What’s said in the room stays in the room
Friendship that stays.
The check-ins and the groups are the scaffolding. The building is friendship: men who actually know each other, and stay when the weather turns.
- Men who notice when you go quiet
- Trust built the slow way: kept commitments, owned mistakes
- The kind of friends a man can call at 2 a.m.
The Facilitator
Safe space by design, not by accident.
Joshua Heater, LMSW
Clinical trainee, practicing under the supervision of Dr. Eboni L. Ceasar, PhD, LCSW-S
The Honest Man is a safe space by design, not by accident. Josh facilitates every group with a blend of clinical structure and personal approach: trained enough to hold the room professionally, human enough to sit in it as a man among men.
The group is HIPAA regulated. What gets said in the room is protected, so the work can go where it needs to go.
- HIPAA regulated and professionally supervised
- A clinical and a personal approach, together
- Open to men aged 28 to 55
- A blend of online and in-person meetings
From the Room
“I didn’t join this group because my life was falling apart. It wasn’t. I joined because I knew drinking was keeping me from being the man I’m capable of being, and I had never said that out loud to anyone. Saying it in this room changed things. Nobody flinched, and nobody made excuses for me either. These men show up every week, they tell the truth, and they expect the same from me. I’m sober now, and I’m a better father, husband, friend, and leader because of it. I’m grateful for this room and these men. Every man deserves one like it.”
M.H. · Member
“It’s hard to put it into words how truly important this group is to me. Before Honest Man, I struggled to have authentic relationships with other men. Since joining, I feel a deeper sense of accountability, trust, community, and faith.”
D. · Member
Letters from Josh
Written the way the room talks.
Every so often, Josh writes it down: what the room keeps teaching, what the script cost us, and what changes when a man finally says the true thing. No polish. No performance.
August 2026 · The First LetterAugust 2026 · Letter No. 2 · From the Book
August 2026 · Letter No. 3 · From the Book
August 2026 · Letter No. 4 · From the Book
Why This Room Exists
Honest was not built from a theory. It was built from what the weight actually feels like, and from learning the hard way that the weight was never the problem. Carrying it alone was.
Read the letter →The Mask Was Brilliant
Nineteen years old, a new city, and a room full of strangers screaming his name. From the book Josh is writing: the years the mask worked, and the truth he never said sober. “Being desired publicly felt safer than being known privately.”
Pour Us a Shot
The worst call of his life came at 11 p.m. on a packed Saturday, and the mask took it. About his sister, a missed message, and what it costs to hold a room when nobody is holding you.
The Man Who Asked If I Was Okay
Nineteen and wrecked, and one man didn’t rush, didn’t joke, didn’t look away. What showing up actually looks like, and why the room is built on it. “He didn’t try to fix me. He didn’t tell me to toughen up.”
A new letter lands when there is something worth saying.
“This is where I’m at.”
Strength without armor.
Honest isn’t about fixing broken men. It’s a community where men stop performing strength and start embodying it: the script gets set down, the five words get said, and every man finds out he was never carrying it alone. If that sounds like the room you’ve been looking for, it’s ready for you.
- 1Check in by text or email. Two sentences is plenty.
- 2Josh gets back to you personally, and the first conversation is private.
- 3You start where you are. The room takes it from there.
Ready to build your purpose?
Start with five words.
“This is where I’m at.”
Confidential from the first message. No commitment attached.
Coming Winter 2026
Honest Woman
A new group is taking shape. More about its purpose, format, and participation will be shared as the launch approaches.
Creative arts led
The artist is not separate from the practitioner.
Each person in our collective is a community artist. They may paint, move, write, direct, perform, or sing. Behavioral health practice is one facet of a much fuller identity; our creative lives shape how we listen, imagine, teach, and build trust.
- Visual arts
- Dance
- Playwriting
- Screenwriting
- Performance
- Voice
Community knowledge
Culture is not context. It is knowledge.
In communities that have been marginalized by systems of care, creativity can carry memory, language, humor, resistance, and belonging. We approach those forms as funds of knowledge: lived expertise already present in the people and places with whom we work.
Bringing those ways of knowing into behavioral health does more than make care engaging. It can make the work more recognizable, more reciprocal, and more accountable to the community.
Storytelling is part of that practice: lived experience becomes knowledge that can shape care, challenge systems, and help communities author what comes next.
We do not bring creativity to communities. We honor the creativity already there.
Core collective
Clinical stewards.
Shared leadership.
We practice in close relationship: caring for people, challenging one another to grow, and sharing responsibility for the communities and groups entrusted to us.
01 / Founder, clinician, convener
Dr. Eboni L. Ceasar, PhD, LCSW-S
CEO & Founder · Director of Social Work, Dell Medical School at The University of Texas at Austin
Eboni builds the conditions for people and ideas to grow together. A clinician, educator, and systems leader, she founded Elixir Austin in 2019 as a place where excellent care could remain connected to creativity, culture, and community. Her practice interests include autism, ADHD, AuDHD, resilience, burnout prevention, and the craft of clinical supervision.
Her leadership moves between boardrooms, classrooms, clinics, and communities. A BBA from the University of Florida established her grounding in strategy and organizational life; at The University of Texas at Austin, a Master of Arts in Latin American Studies deepened her study of culture and community, a Master of Science in Social Work anchored her in clinical practice, and a PhD in Education sharpened how she builds environments where people can learn and lead. Together, those ways of knowing shape a leader who holds systems and relationships in the same frame.
Eboni serves as President of NASW Texas through June 2027 and was named Leadership Austin’s 2026 Mentor of the Year. She keeps Elixir’s purpose human: Be kind, be well, be powerful. She is currently developing Honest Woman for Winter 2026.
- Clinical supervision
- Interdisciplinary care
- Practitioner resilience
- Community-rooted leadership
02 / Clinician, facilitator, truth-teller
Joshua Heater, LMSW
Honest Man program lead · Practicing under the supervision of Dr. Eboni L. Ceasar, PhD, LCSW-S
Joshua meets people with structure, honesty, accountability, and his full humanity. He earned his MSW at the University of Michigan after a successful career in hospitality, bringing a deep understanding of service, leadership, and the unseen weight people carry into his clinical work.
His approach is grounded in lived experience with addiction, loss, trauma, healing, and nearly five years of sobriety. Through Honest Man, Joshua creates a professionally held space where men can set down performance and show up as human beings on their own journeys. He has shared that work on ESPN Radio’s Austin Supper Club, but the heart of it remains the same: real relationships, practiced one honest check-in at a time.
- Men’s group work
- Addiction and recovery
- Trauma and healing
- Relational accountability
03 / CLINICIAN, COLLABORATOR, BRIDGE-BUILDER
Thomas Carter II, LMSW
Clinician · Core collective member · Practicing under clinical supervision toward LCSW licensure
Thomas believes meaningful clinical work begins with connection, trust, and meeting people where they are. He earned his Master of Social Work from the University of Houston and has walked alongside children, adolescents, young adults, and adults through many stages of life. His relational approach creates room to feel heard without judgment and without the pressure of having everything figured out; he supports people navigating depression, relationships, identity, self-esteem, family dynamics, and life transitions.
At Elixir, Thomas bridges community and individual care. He holds that trust often comes before change, and he brings curiosity, authenticity, and deep respect for the person behind the circumstances. As he completes his path to LCSW licensure, he welcomes men who first connect through Honest Man groups and want to continue the work one on one.
- Children & adolescents · Young adults & life transitions · Men's individual therapy · Relational & emotional wellness
How we lead
No one practitioner is the whole collective. We steward it together, through close supervision, honest exchange, and care that moves between individual practice, group life, and community.
Partnerships in formation
Building the circle with intention.
We are cultivating partners whose work expands access, honors community expertise, and creates meaningful places for practitioners and artists to learn from one another.
- Community organizations
- Arts & cultural spaces
- Clinical training partners
- Practitioner networks
Rooted
in Austin.
1701 Lavaca Street
Austin, Texas 78701 Our home for practice, learning, and gathering