My Call to coaching

After a hard fall into motherhood filled with trauma and confusion, I returned to work as quickly as possible and tried to “suck it up.” I pressured myself to do it at all and live up to my self-imposed expectations. But I didn’t feel like myself. How could I?

During these dark hours, I discovered Dr. Brené Brown’s life-changing work about embracing vulnerability and responding to fear with curiosity. Dr. Brown’s research gave me the toolkit I needed to begin honoring painful emotions as natural (and necessary!) parts of the healing process. I started making an effort to treat myself with the same compassion I would extend to others, and I learned that vulnerability is not weakness—it’s courage.

A few years later, my mother was diagnosed with terminal lung cancer. My brave and beautiful best friend was slipping away. Engulfed in grief, I returned to Dr. Brown’s framework for emotional support while serving as my mother’s caretaker leading up to her death in spring 2020.

Instead of numbing my grief, I leaned into the discomfort. What I learned in the process has changed my life and deeply impacted my approach to teaching and coaching. These two practices have melded together beautifully, and I’m particularly passionate about supporting high school students, fellow teachers, and faculty members. I’ve learned so much from my students over the years, and I believe that classrooms offer a natural space for deep listening and finding common ground through humor and storytelling. 

By exploring these concepts and other tenants of social-emotional learning, we help make sure that students are emotionally available to learn, and that teachers, faculty, and individuals are emotionally available to work, lead, create, and thrive.

I facilitate grief workshops and coaching because we were never meant to do grief alone. My devotion to this work comes from the intention to help normalize grief - how we heal it and how we express it.

“Grief is tremendous, but love is bigger. You are grieving because you loved truly. The beauty in that is greater than the bitterness of death. Allowing this into your consciousness will not keep you from suffering, but it will help you survive the next day.”

- Cheryl Strayed