About

 

What I Do

I help curious & creative people who identify as neurodivergent or queer... to be at peace within yourself and in the world, so you can speak your needs, co-create collective magic, and live audaciously.

I offer soft, courageous + playful spaces for you to re-imagine your life, love your mind, feel into your body, transform your relationships, step into community, and make your wildest dreams happen.

This is not coaching that separates you from the world. It's rooted in embodiment and positive collective change. It’s a practice that transforms your relationship with yourself so that you can create the good you’re here to create out there.

 

My Why

There's a different vision out there for our future earth, for the way we relate to each other in all our gorgeousness... a vision that diverges away from doom and competition and individualism and scarcity and mistrust and cultures of exhaustion. Something that reflects the values I hold close, of courage, rest, optimism, and delight.

The more space we hold to feel into that vision individually and collectively, the more action we can take towards it. And that’s what transformational coaching is all about: feeling and action.

As neurodivergent people and/or queer people, we can use so much energy just trying to be in the world… to make sense of things, to not stim too noticeably, to not sit too masc or too femme, to not be too intense or curious, to navigate trauma, to put people at ease... so much energy that it can stop us being who we're here to be.

The magic within neurodivergence and queerness is that we see things differently. When we're wholeheartedly supported, when we feel at peace within ourselves and in the world, we can rise.

I want you to experience what it feels like when it's easy.

 

One-to-one, I offer online transformational coaching, powerful conversations and workplace coaching.

I also run regular online groups with just the right balance of structure and spontaneity, that move beyond small talk, so you can make meaningful connections without cringe or confusion.

I love creating soft spaces for us to land, away from the noise. 

 

I do it for:

• the dance that happens between neurodivergent minds and between queer people, when we don’t have to start at the beginning, when we make connections between new ideas at lightning speed, when we recognise ourselves in someone else.
• the love of helping you to feel into your body, to settle into yourself, to embody your values, to feel comfortable in your own skin.
• the connection when you tell me I’m the only person you can talk with about this kind of stuff… and then grow in self-belief enough to share your truth with others. 
• the simplicity of asking you the questions no one's ever asked you before
• the delight in supporting you to make the moves you've wanted to make forever.
• the beauty and ease that lives on the other side of a big conversation.
• the excitement of helping you find the sense of belonging and purpose you've always sought.
• the joy of stepping into being the elder I wish younger me had known. 

 

I do it because transformational coaching works.

It's expansive, it goes deep, it weaves its magic into every aspect of your life, it enhances the learning and practices you’re already doing, and it generates optimistic energy and action.

 

With support from a transformational coach, psychotherapist, friends, somatic practices and more resources than I can count, I've:

• signed up for coach training, because I felt envious and judgemental of the sheer capacity for joy of the people involved in it, and I was curious to know what those feelings were trying to tell me.

• let myself move towards people who I feel happy around… even when those moves felt vulnerable and awkward.

• navigated a new understanding of my neurodivergence and my hypermobility disorder… and created a career and relationships that have space for both strength and rest as I live with a dynamic disability.
• moved towards the scariest aspects of my history, and taken a new lens to my trauma, away from approaches that focus only on the mind and towards somatics and embodiment.

• transformed a ten-year romantic relationship and a lifetime of avoidance into something more aligned, and embraced my queerness… and I’ve trusted that it’s all happened in its own sweet way, in its own sweet time. 

• advocated for my neurodivergent kiddo and created networks of support… and learned not only the power of asking for help but how to receive it.

• built a compassionate co-parenting relationship with my ex-partner… even when we had no idea what that might look like.

• moved beyond the high ACES score I thought might define my life… and learned what it’s like to feel safe to play.

• started to feel as well as think.

 

I’ve had big conversations. I’ve made bold moves. I’ve felt like I’m moving backwards. I’ve course-corrected. I practice every day.

It's felt transformational to realise that this magical body and nervous system I own at 40 is the same one I’ve had all my life through the trauma and the joys… and to commit to taking care of it, thanking it, going easy on it, paying attention, listening to its needs.

 

I love that this practice isn't binary. It isn't about perfection. There's space to practice... alone, together with me, and in community.

In the "both/and" of coaching, there's space for everything:

 

Your mind works fast, you have millions of ideas and it needs radical softness, slowness, spaciousness.

Your body sometimes experiences the world as all jagged hard edges, every injustice settling under your skin and that’s also the reason you feel drawn towards peace, why you feel motivated to help people you don’t know.

Humans feel endlessly baffling and you need to take care of your sensory environment to avoid burnout and this motivates you to become a communication ninja and seek clarity where you can.

Your internal energy can feel like pop fizzing in a too-small can because you’re always seeing the big picture and this restlessness is why you’re great at course-correcting, at changing things that no longer work, at saying “let’s try that”.

You notice all the unseen details of an environment and feel awe when you’re just trying to have a regular Tuesday and this compels you to create beauty and comfort in the world for others.

 

My approach

I’m inspired by planting seeds and seeing what grows, by people who bring playfulness into their serious work, by people who join the dots across the constellations of individual lives, social justice and our climate reality, by people who stay creative and courageous: Prentis Hemphill, Staci Haines, Beverly Glenn-Copeland, ALOK, Peter Levine, Andrew Scott, Perfume Genius, Mia Birdsong. 

Before coaching, I spent twenty years collaborating with the third sector and individuals as a freelance writer, and have a lifetime's involvement in grassroots community projects built around refugees' quality of life, advocacy for neurodivergent, BIPOC, and disabled people, and LGBTQIA+ wellbeing. I bring this passion for and experience in social justice, equity and the celebration of difference into my approach to coaching.

My ongoing professional interest lies in: 

• somatic approaches to healing trauma and collective transformation, such as Somatic Experiencing and Social Justice Somatics
• the overlap of simple living, custodianship of our earth, generational healing and collective wellbeing
• practices that both support you as an individual and enable you to feel held in community.

 

You can find more about the books I've written, the podcasts I've featured on, the events I've participated in, and the ways I show up in the world here.

 

Professional Qualifications

Qualified Transformational Coach, Dr Sarah Madigan's Spectacular School

Trauma-Informed Coaching, Susana Rinderle 

Self-Guided Embodiment Basics, The Embodiment Institute

MSc Creative Writing

BSc International Development

 

Current Community Memberships and Practice Grounds

The Practice Ground by The Embodiment Institute

The Embody Lab

 

Things I love

Voicenotes from friends, kimchi on everything, NPR Tiny Desk concerts, the buzzy energy of a playful idea, the lyrics to ‘Whole of the Moon’, looking closely at things, any performance that creates a liminal world with its own rules, lists.

 

Daily rituals

Doorstep cuppa, phone-free early morning, never-the-same-twice smoothie, strength-training for my hypermobile body, gratitude, podcasts, intentional somatic practice, the same (perfect) song 15x over.

 

Practices that support me

Qigong, loud music, Tarot, Clinical Somatics, Emotional Freedom Technique, journaling, forests, Havening, water, visioning with others, speaking to the birds, dancing.

 

Things I no longer do

Hate on my body and mind, compare my current capacity to how I used to be able to do things, consume so much media that I can’t be present in the world, push through moments and days where I need to rest, think that being playful is unprofessional, judge myself for all the ways I need help.

 

You can usually find me

Coaching clients & facilitating groups & parenting & writing & queering my life & practicing not knowing in community, always with a sense of wonder at the amazingness of humans and our earth, and imagining the texture of a world where everyone gets to thrive.