Most people who want to be happier have a moment of awakening of some kind. Crisis or trauma can take us there, but it can also be a voice inside that seeks something more and wants to know how to get there.
My moment came in high school after leaving home and having to find my own way in the world. I had a special teacher/mentor who took me under her wing, and one morning I walked into her classroom to tell her about a powerful dream I’d had the night before. She said, “I think it’s time for you to see Roz”.
Roz was a Jungian Dream Analyst who lived in Newmarket. I called her right away and immediately started seeing her. I was seventeen years old, living on my own, taking a GO bus to Newmarket every Saturday to spend four hours or more with Roz, and beginning the journey of awakening consciousness.
From Jungian Analysis, I found Gestalt, then the Sweet Medicine Sundance Path, where I studied and practiced ceremony for over twenty years. My training there was focused on Spiritual-Sexuality and Women’s Teachings.
In 2017, in the midst of a life crisis, I found Radical Aliveness and Core Energetics. I knew I needed to move energy with my body and have the freedom to express my emotions fully. This work changed my life in a way that nothing else had, and brought with it a desire and devotion to become a practitioner so I could offer these tools to people. I’m now a certified Core Energetics practitioner, after completing four years of training at the Core Energetics Institute based in Connecticut. I also study and train in Radical Aliveness with Ann Bradney and her amazing team.
Core Energetics is a synthesis of body-oriented psychotherapy and spiritual development, developed by John Pierrakos, MD in the seventies. This method brings consciousness to how we block our life energy by perpetuating defensive patterns adapted in childhood which keep us limited and disempowered. Core Energetics helps us understand how our life and worldview is to a large extent a function of these blocked energy patterns. These patterns keep us recreating similar life situations and relational dynamics, leaving us trapped and frustrated. Core Energetics helps us to identify and dissolve these blocks, allowing us to experience more freedom and aliveness.
On a more personal note, I’m also a very very proud mom to two blessed humans, and when not chasing life and beauty in many forms, I’m the CEO and founder of a cookie company based in Toronto, New Moon Kitchen.