I am a queer, nonbinary, polyamorous, neurodistinct (neurodivergent), naturally systems-thinking human who lives in Southeast Portland, Oregon. I grew up in a combination of small-town central New South Wales, Australia, and Tucson, Arizona in the States. I have a beautiful support network of loving and incredible family members, two loving partners, friends, mentors, and my chosen family. I have lived in Portland since 2011.
I studied English literature, math, and physics in college. The class I remember most from my undergraduate study is a philosophy of science class about the Copernican paradigm shift, as illuminated by Thomas Kuhn. This was the first time I was in contact with what would become my life’s passion and a part of my life’s work. I also attended law school, became an attorney, and worked for a national animal rights organization for several years. This was a wonderful experience for me in many ways, though there also came a point when I needed to move away from this career because it was not truly my life’s work – not really what I felt called to do.
During the time I was an animal rights lawyer, I experienced the catalysis and integration of an ongoing spiritual awakening process into my own conscious evolution. The process truly had already begun, and there is a way in which I can trace my awakening process back to the moment of my birth, but there were a couple of moments of key importance – when I crossed certain thresholds, that are essentially impossible to un-cross. First, in 2016, I was laid off by the organization I worked for. I spent a painful and beautiful three months with the picture I had painted in my head of my life – the identity I had created and convinced myself was me – shattering all around me. I re-connected with the truth I held that I had never actually wanted to be a lawyer and that there was no way to be a lawyer and be my true self in this life. Yet, I was uncertain as to what I wanted to do – I had no idea at all, in fact. While feeling utterly lost, and in a sense at a type of existential “rock bottom,” I began to truly find myself. I began painting. And I began journaling – a LOT. These continue to be integral parts of my process. I got a different position at the same organization that had laid me off three months later, but I was permanently changed by my experience of those three months, and my process would lead to ongoing healing and spiritual evolution over the years to come.
Beginning in about 2014, I started working with psychedelics as a continuing and integral part of my process of healing and evolution. In 2016, this work increasingly began to show me information about my life path and purpose and brought me into ever more consistent contact with my energetic (or spiritual) guidance system. With time, psychedelics have become a smaller, yet still important, part of this process. I was shown how energy works and given information about the nature of the universe. Mushrooms assisted me in healing many of my own past traumas including childhood and teenage trauma from moving between countries, sexual trauma, teenage suicidality, self-medication, addiction, bullying and othering, and being nonbinary. Furthermore, this psychedelic work assisted me in being able to understand and work with my recent diagnoses of autism and ADHD–previously misdiagnosed as bipolar disorder.
In 2017, my work with psychedelic medicines began to take me more and more into ancestral healing, larger patterns and visions of potential futures, and deeper understandings about myself and my highest life purpose. I was guided by synchronicities, I was learning in my dreams as well as in psychedelic journeys, and I was journaling and meditating regularly. I found my first teacher and mentor, Laura Rowe. As we worked together, my awakening intensified, until late in 2018 I was in a state of spiritual emergency, as identified by Stanislav and Christina Grof.
Thankfully, I had a therapist who knew about the spiritual awakening journey I was on, and about all of my work with psychedelic medicines, and she was able to work with me to understand my experience through this lens, rather than that of being bipolar (which she had also worked with me to get out from under this label and diagnosis over the years). I also had Laura as a spiritual mentor, and I began working with Paul Levy around this time as well, who was able to further assist me in understanding and integrating my experiences – so my awakening continued, though it has continued in an ever more stable and integrated way.
Ever since, I have lived an ongoing spiritual integration and awakening, which continues, I believe, until the end of this lifetime and beyond. I have healed layers upon layers of personal and ancestral trauma. I have studied many spiritual pathways, integrating these with my own direct experiences and knowledge, principles of systems science and my understanding of the dynamics and qualities of living complex adaptive systems to develop my own metaphysical framework – one which is compatible with most spiritual belief systems. As a part of continuing to learn about how I work with energy through my hands, I studied Reiki and am certified at levels one and two. To learn more about systems science I audited two graduate-level courses at PSU – one in agent-based modelling (of complex adaptive systems), and the other in organizations (as complex adaptive systems). This work also brought me back to the paradigm shift and the concepts that I had first seen in my undergraduate philosophy of science class. I found that I still owned the books from that
I studied English literature, math, and physics in college, where a philosophy of science course on the Copernican paradigm shift first connected me with ideas that would become part of my life’s work. I later attended law school, became an attorney, and worked for a national animal rights organization. Though meaningful, I ultimately recognized the path was not aligned with my deeper calling.
An ongoing spiritual awakening shaped my conscious evolution, reaching a turning point in 2016 when I was laid off. As the identity I had built dissolved, I reconnected with the truth that I never wanted to be a lawyer. While feeling lost, I began painting and journaling extensively—practices that remain central to my life.
Beginning around 2014, psychedelics became an important part of my healing, offering insight into my life path and supporting the integration of childhood and sexual trauma, addiction, bullying, and the challenges of moving between countries and living as a nonbinary person. This process also helped clarify my autism and ADHD after a prior bipolar misdiagnosis.
By 2017, my journey deepened through ancestral healing, meditation, dreamwork, synchronicities, and mentorship. A spiritual emergency in 2018, supported by skilled guides and therapy, ultimately led to greater stability and integration.
Since then, I have continued an ongoing path of awakening, studying spiritual traditions alongside systems science to develop a metaphysical framework bridging science and spirituality. I am certified in Reiki I and II and have completed graduate coursework on complex adaptive systems.
In 2021, I left legal work to focus fully on spiritual mentorship and integration coaching. I completed trauma-informed psychedelic integration training with Plant Spirit School and the “Healing the Wounded Healer” program with Jai Medina. Called into service by cannabis as a healing ally, I hold containers for others and have co-facilitated ceremonies with Sacred Heart Medicine Sanctuary, where I serve on the board.
Today, I work as a psychedelic and spiritual integration coach and transformational mentor, holding trauma-informed, nonjudgmental space for healing and awakening. I support clients in person in Portland and virtually, while continuing my own path through meditation, journaling, painting, and plant medicine.