Graceful
Coaching
Areas of Expertise
Living Joyfully in a Disabled Bodymind
Learn to meet yourself where you are, define what living joyfully means to you, set realistic goals and intentions, choose how to respond and adapt to life's circumstances, learn crip hacks, self-advocacy guidelines, how to navigate the ableist world skillfully, and more.
Life contains pain. Suffering is optional.
Mindfulness Practices
Allow and trust yourself to be guided in mindfulness practices, including taking a single breath, 30 second Sanity Break, body scans, chosen anchor meditations, walking meditation of one step to twenty minute sojourns, inner tea date and more. Learn to cultivate and create your own daily practice.
Mindfulness is awareness that arises through paying attention, on purpose, in the present moment, non-judgementally [sometimes adding] in the service of self-understanding and wisdom.
~Jon Kabat-Zinn
Embodied Present Moment
Welcome to the magical moment called now, the only moment we truly have. Embodying can happen through any of the 5 koshas, the external environment, or any plane of existence that resonates. Learn to be present, feel present, and if possible, stay present.
Intrinsic Health
The innate goodness in ourselves that is always available to us, wherever we are in our journeys. Also called intrinsic sanity, my interpretation combines the 5 koshas and 3 brain levels (hind "lizard" brain, cortex "mammalian" brain, neocortex "thinking" brain). As long as we are alive, there is more innate goodness and health in us than dis-ease. Learn to define and connect with your intrinsic health.
Nervous System Education & Hacks
Learn the basics of the nervous system, neuroplasticity, Dan Siegel's hand model of the brain, recognize your own patterns, states and traits, and apply practical tools and toys to keep you in your evolving window of capacity.
A note on terminology
I am a bit of a wordsmith, contemplating the meaning, intention, etymology, and impact of the words I use. I honour the language, people, and communities, especially DQTBIPOC (disabled, queer, trans, Black, Indigenous, people of colour) folk who developed the language that is true to my heart and is used in my day to day. I first came across several terms through Leah Lakshmi Piepzna-Samarasinha's Care Work: Dreaming Disability Justice and Sins Invalid. I have lived, experienced, spoken, listened, felt, thought, behaved, etc., in alignment with these concepts, philosophies, and values before learning the terminology. Therefore, I consider myself to be adding to movements in appreciation and gratitude, and not appropriating their words and ideologies. With that, I offer my understanding of some words.
Crip doula: reclaiming the word "crip" (short for "cripple"). A disabled person who helps a newly disabled person come to terms with their new reality by means of holding space and sharing resources. Crip doulas mentor, coach, and model the inherent worth of disabled people by continuing to live full, joyful lives.
Access need: what a person needs in order to be safer, supported, and
more comfortable in order to take part in their community (may be activity,
event, homespace, etc.). Access needs take many forms and can be
physical, mental, emotional, spiritual, and/ both relational, and may include assistance, accommodation or modification for mobility, communication, transportation, safety, health maintenance, education, etc.
Bodymind: Attributing to the interconnectedness of body and mind as well as their interrelatedness. Aka as mindbody, this term depicts the intuitive eagle view of wholeness and includes the synergism of physiological, mental or psychological, emotional, and spiritual. Body and mind interact with one another in such a way that cannot be broken into parts; although the components can be intensified for explorations.
