I love to connect with what’s deeply essential and share what I’ve learned to facilitate connection, collaboration, and emergent creativity. Principles of nonviolence inform my work, and open a space of compassion, discovery, and inner freedom.

After an international dance career, I discovered yoga, Ayurveda and meditation in 1999. A new focus emerged which included my lifelong spiritual connection, the ancient tradition of yoga, and mindful creative movement. In 2003, I was initiated into the Himalayan tradition of Sri Vidya by Pandit Rajmani Tigunait. I continued to study yoga and assist my teachers through 2009, gaining a 500+ hour teaching certification. After discovering Nonviolent Communication in 2005, I completed my Certified Nonviolent Communication Trainer certificate in 2009. By 2010, I also completed certifications as a Big Leap Embodiment Coach and Transformational Leadership from The Hendricks Institute. Throughout the 2000’s to the present, I have worked with individuals and couples, led Nonviolent Communication Trainings and Conscious Living Learning Playshops, and led yearlong trainings for Yoga Teachers and Facilitators of Embodied Transformation.

I’ve been studying trauma healing since 2018. As an ongoing student of Thomas Hübl, I study and incorporate Transparent Communication and trauma healing (individual, ancestral, and collective levels) into my work. I regularly lead an emergent group we-space practice called Global Social Witnessing, a practice initiated by Thomas Hübl. Global Social Witnessing supports groups to connect deepen their embodied presence while turning towards challenging world events and topics such as racism and colonialism. To me, this quote captures the spirit of the practice:

"We but mirror the world. All the tendencies present in the outer world are to be found in the world of our body. If we could change ourselves, the tendencies in the world would also change. As a man changes his own nature, so does the attitude of the world change towards him. This is the divine mystery supreme. A wonderful thing it is and the source of our happiness. We need not wait to see what others do.” ~ Mahatma Gandhi

I became a NARM-Informed Professional in 2021 which informs my work with individuals and couples. NARM stands for Neuro Affective Relational Model for Complex Trauma.

In the last several years, I’m actively learning about the collective traumas of systemic white supremacy and colonialism. I participated in a St. Louis YWCA Witnessing Whiteness Class Series in 2019 and volunteered to co-lead sessions locally. In the summer of 2021, I received a 50-hour certificate for Embodied Social Justice coled by Reverend angel Kyodo Williams and Dr. Sara King.

Becoming more informed about the racialized trauma and actively bringing anti-racism into my life and work has inspired me to connect more with my own ancestry which is a mixture of English, Irish, Scottish, and Chickamauga Cherokee. I am a member of an indigenous tribe and am becoming more involved. Recently I started a class – the Historical Trauma Masterclass – to learn to offer an indigenous healing modality called Somatic Archaeology. The founder is Dr. Ruby Gibson of the Freedom Lodge.

Facing into my mixed race heritage has deepened my understsanding of the interconnection between inner and outer healing and restoration, and strengthened my resolve to contribute to peace. I believe each of us is sacred. We begin where we are. We all carry a piece of an answer.

"Whatever seems to be in the way is the way." ~ Thomas Hübl

My ongoing commitment is to increase my capacity to perceive oppressive systems which shape the spaces I inhabit, speak to what I see, and act in ways that dismantle collective trauma-fueled systems of oppression and contribute energy towards living systems that benefit all beings. I receive unearned privilege within systems of oppression and domination related to my identities as white-bodied, gender female, heterosexual, and able-bodied. For me, “being the change” I wish to see in the world calls me to:

• continuing to learn to recognize external and internalized systems of oppression
• willingness to make mistakes and to learn in public
• willingness to receive feedback
• humility, knowing there are things I don't know that I don't know
• regularly advance my learning on this and related subjects
• integrating what I am learning and bringing it into my daily life, relationships, and work
• directing and re-directing myself to embody a trauma healing process - recognition, re-alignment, repair, restoration
• connecting and collaborating within a community of of healers, change-makers, activists, leaders, and creators who share these perceptions and commitments

Many blessings for your sacred journey.

To learn more about my work and explore collaborating or working with me, visit my websites: Embodied Witnessing, which focuses on my group and facilitation work, and Transformation Playground, which focuses more on my coaching.