“I’m certified as an integrative wellness coach. I have my masters in integrative health studies from CIIS but I hate the word ‘wellness coaching’ because I don’t feel like it embodies what I do. It sounds so structured and methodical. I really help people get more in touch with what their body is telling them. I help them move from using the left, more analytical side of their brain, into using their right, creative, feeling, emotional brain. I’m offering people opportunities to really explore how the thoughts in their mind affect their body. Giving them the space to gain clarity from that and learning from your body and using it as a tool to help you make decisions when you’re unsure about something. To check in with your body and ask ‘what is my body telling me’? The mind forgets things, but the body doesn’t forget. The other day I picked up these Chinese medicine balls and my hands knew what to do with them from when I was a kid, but my mind couldn’t remember why. I don’t remember the story behind it as much. Our bodies remember and recognize, and hold. If we can find a way to tap into that wisdom in our body to understand ourselves more and then move outward from there we can create more compassion, well-being, and ease to move through the world in.”

“What are the ways you use to access your bodies wisdom?”

“Meditation really helps. I had gone back and forth with meditation for many years. Sitting down and having a specific practice has never been something I’ve been able to do. I do meditate throughout the day but not necessarily in a seated manner. Sometimes I do a body scan and can tap into where I’m holding in my body, and then I ask myself, ‘What am I feeling and why am I holding?’ Dancing also helps. It’s really powerful. I find freedom in those activities that take us into our bodies and out of our mind.”

“I use Sphere to meditate in the morning. Morning meditations are really powerful because they start your day off on a positive foot. I foam roll, stretch, meditate, and journal. I like using Sphere’s timer and guided sessions. I went through the body pack guided sessions and it was really useful. The guidance was very simple but very powerful. Sometimes when I do my own meditation without guidance I can be less focused so this helped me to stay focused. There’s also a feature that shows you when your friends are meditating so that helps with accountability.”

“What do you notice that different about your life when you’re meditating consistently?”

“I feel calmer. I feel more trust. I live out of abundance rather than fear. I feel more comfortable in my skin.”

“What’s something you would forget about time doing when you were a kid?”

“Sitting in the grass and picking those little white and yellow flowers. They were weeds, but I used to pick them for so long. My family had a farm in West Virginia, my whole family is from the mid-west, I’m from here, and I would just run around the farm all the time. One time my sister, my cousin, and I were in this cornfield playing some magical game, I was about 3, and we were just sitting in this patch of poison ivy. My parents found us and brought us inside. There was this picture of all of us sitting in the bath with the poison ivy soap just looking up. Yeah, I just loved being in nature. Still do now.”

“You still connect with nature in the same way?”

“Yeah, being in the city has had me a little at odds with myself. When I spend a lot more time in nature I feel much calmer, and connected to myself, and the universe, and my ancestors. Sometimes in the city I get lost in the chaos. There’s a part of me that wonders if being in the city is really the healthiest place for me to live. I wrote my whole graduate thesis on this process called Earthing, which is the electron exchange between your body and the Earth when you’ve barefoot on the Earth. We are nature too and we need nature to stay healthy and be happy. Whenever I’m in nature it reminds me that there is so much more in the world that we’re not normally aware of. Everything in nature has a purpose so it helps me to remember that I too am nature and I also have a purpose.”

“What do you think your purpose is?”

“To help people learn to love themselves. Helping people feel comfortable in their skin and knowing that whatever they’re going through it’s okay. It’s so beautiful because that’s also my purpose for myself. That’s why I’m a wellness coach and that’s why I hate calling it wellness because it’s not about wellness, it’s about love. Wellness is part of it-”

“But love encompasses all of it?”

“Yeah. A lot of people don’t think of love when they think of wellness but that’s what really lights me up. A lot of holding space for people, a lot of empathy, just meeting people where they’re at. I see people as whole beings, I’m not the expert on their health, they are. They’re just coming to me for support to have someone be a cheerleader for them and to have someone ask them questions that will help them unlock what they need to unlock.”

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