About Me
This has not been easy, yet it has been incredibly rewarding. Building spiritual and emotional muscles, similar to exercising my body, is an ongoing journey. As a mystic and an artist, I have found creativity to be a powerful and intuitive tool in my own healing process. The gift of the work is that I feel more and more authentically myself and enlivened.
I've come to realize that transformation happens slowly in fits and starts, with slips and falls and with beautifully integrated times. I’ve learned again and again to surrender to paradox, nuance, and possibilities of this moment. It’s amazing to me how much I’ve grown to love the person I am still becoming and how much I’ve come more fully alive!
In order to create a space for you,
I've first had to learn to create one for myself.
As a member of a family system that spans middle-class, working-class, and the trauma of generational poverty and addiction, I grew up with very low self-esteem and a lot of anxiety. I have had to learn to accept where I am powerless, to step into my own sense of agency and to rely on my sense of the Divine for comfort and guidance.​
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As a white person I've discovered many ways that I've been conditioned to unconsciously maintain oppressive systems even though I consciously value justice. As an anti-racist educator I've learned how to tenderly and truthfully reflect with other white people on our whiteness and intersections of oppression.
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As a queer person in order to feel safe living in a society that erases and threatens my existence, I made myself small and invisible for a long time. Risking unmasking my pain and learning to trust that I am a beautiful divine being just as I am, I have courageously manifested my own sacred journey towards healing.
​I never would have been able to do all of this without support and community. This has come in many forms: from my Quaker faith community; my deepening relationship with the Divine, that I sometimes call Spirit or God; from friends and colleagues; and from my own therapy and spiritual direction.
We all need accompaniment and support on our life-long journey’s to embrace and live as our truest selves. ​As an interfaith chaplain and educator, with my training and experience, I listen deeply; create collaborative, curious and celebratory spaces that invite deep reflection and healing.
Related Current Employment
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Humanist Chaplain, Amherst College
Education & Training
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Master's in Divinity from Starr King School for the Ministry
- Master's in Education from Humboldt State University
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Interfaith Chaplain with 4 units of CPE at Alta Bates Summit Medical Center in Oakland CA.