Also, Beer Tub Girl. Yes, cringe—leather chaps, crop tops, padded bras—& also, great cash. I worked late nights & weekends while finishing my BSc so I could study during the day. It was gritty, weirdly efficient, & taught me how to connect with people in loud, messy spaces.

For 15 years, I held a range of roles at the University of Calgary, including teaching Introduction to Mind Sciences: Health & Exercise Psychology to 250 students fresh out of my MSc.

From there, I shifted into research in organizational change, leadership, stakeholder dynamics, & how teams thrive in complex systems like healthcare. The technical term for it is “implementation science,” but really, it’s the study of human behavior on a big scale.

Later, I also coached, trained, & consulted for professors & graduate students on best practices in research — & won multiple awards for coaching, leadership, & teaching.

Fun fact: one of my research articles has been viewed & downloaded over 1.5 million times.

At 32, I had it “together” on the path to a PhD, married, brand-new home. But inside I was burned out & unravelling with chronic pain, panic attacks that sent me to the hospital, medicated for depression, & a marriage unraveling.

The PhD kept me chasing gold stars, thinking they’d fix the emptiness. Spoiler: they didn’t.

So I walked away—from the PhD, the marriage, a life that no longer fit. It was truly a universe ass-kicking. Thank God for my mentor, who helped me believe in myself again when I was devastated & starting over from scratch.

In 2013, I met my now-husband & launched a blog called Academic Soufflé. Somewhere between blogging & rebuilding life, I “accidentally” signed up for a 2-year ontological coach training program (ICF accredited), thinking it was simply a leadership program.

That blog turned into a coaching practice, then into a coaching podcast, Art of Being.

I became obsessed with how we shape our reality through language, body, & meaning, & went deep into learning from the best (& still do!), including years with the OG of coaching, Tony Robbins & his Platinum Partnership events.

The week I turned 39, my heart went crazy. Literally. A mysterious condition took me out for months & doctors had zero answers.

It was energy work — pranic healing, through Master Stephen Co — that restored me, symptoms never to return. My husband & I both became certified pranic healers, not because we planned to, but because it changed everything.

This experience rewrote what I knew about healing as well as power, purpose, & the way we create our reality. While spirituality was already part of me, this fork in the road opened a much greater calling.

A year later, at 40, I left academia for good.

Through my spiritual & professional pivot, two teachers changed everything: Donny Epstein (Epienergetics) & Sheila Kelley (S Factor).

Donny’s work in quantum energetics helped me experience energy in radically new ways. I trained as an AlchemE Mentor® & now offer FieldSpeak™ sessions for mastering your personal energy.

Sheila’s work in feminine embodiment reconnected me with power & versions of myself I’d tucked away. I became an Advanced Licensed S Factor® teacher — because this work doesn’t just change your how you feel about your body or your access to the feminine, it changes your life.

When women pivot their lives, their outer identity often lags behind: how they talk about project & gifts, their online presence, even in their personal style & closets.

I’ve lived this: feeling that my buttoned-up academic closet & online intellectual image were boxing me in a version of myself I’d already outlived.

Now as a Groundswell Certified Brand Strategist (& longtime web designer), I help women to embody & articulate their essence through personal aesthetic: brand, voice & presence.

Brand isn’t about marketing or being an influencer. It’s a spiritual journey to map your highest self to impacting others.

When I’m not on Zoom connecting to my friends & clients or co-creating with my husband at our family brand agency, you’ll find me in the backyard drinking golden mylk lattes under a fleece blanket. Chaka, our 9lb Brussels Griffon, keeps watch.

I cherish dinners with our kids (26 & 28) & babysitting my nieces, who think I’m silly. I like to think they’re right 😜