What are some things that were important to you as a small child that you can still see echoes or threads of in your life today?
I see so many threads of my younger self in my life today. I have always considered myself and activist, having started animal-rights clubs as a kid, raising money to donate to different organizations. Even though I no longer am leading my own justice groups, I still participate and donate to many rights organizations. I am also an artists, through and through. I have always been a painter. I think this one is quite common. Kids are encouraged to do arts and crafts. We lose that somewhere along the way. I never gave it up. I've always been obsessed with crafty things and continue to pursue an art practice today. I paint and do mixed media on canvas and paint large murals. A quieter thread is my introverted nature and the need for alone time to rejuvenate myself.

Were aspects of your identity celebrated or suppressed throughout your life? How did this affect you?
My parents are the most diplomatic loving people I have ever met in my life. Their kindness and compassion extends beyond our immediate family. I know with every ounce of certainty in my being that I was born into a very special situation. I feel lucky to have the parents I have. I am definitely the person I am today because of them. I'm a very sensitive person and I think that if I were in a family that squashed my feelings and desire for unique expression I would have ended up very different.

What are some things you have done in your life that you are truly proud of?
I've traveled a lot, stayed true to my creative nature, and pursued the opportunities I've been most interested in. One specific adventure that I am super proud of is my cross country bicycle trip with my older sister in 2008. We cycled from our apartment in NYC to our brothers house in Seattle. It was awesome.  I went to art school, dropped out, graduated with a degree in art & environmental studies 6 years later. I am also super proud of the murals I have painted and putting myself out there as a painter. I continue to be committed to building my coaching practice and there have been many milestones along the way that I have enjoyed.

What are a few of your favorite questions to ask people you are getting to know?  Why do you like these questions?
I love finding out where people are from in the world and where they have lived. Getting peoples travel stories. How did you come to Denver or X location? How do you know X person? What are you working on right now (just in your life)? I actually really love speed networking events because I feel like you get these glimpses into peoples life for a few minutes and then get a little taste of everyone. The speed aspect allows you to jump straight into a fun facts about you scenario and go down whichever little path pops up first. Icebreakers are always a litlte tough and awkward - giving out compliments is an easy and nice way to reach out to someone.

Are you a parent?  What has parenting taught you about caring for another person or being curious about them?
I am a parent and it is shifting everything. Taking care of little people and people in general is super hard (for me). I feel that it is a deeply undervalued and under recognized thing in the USA. I feel like my ignorance is coming into full view… that I actually know nothing and finding out news ways that I know nothing every day. What I do know is that every single humans needs the love, attention, and care from another human. And we are deeply lacking that across the world. There are too many people who are not getting the love and attention that they need. How will we change this? How will be do better for our own families? 

Lara is a certified professional coach specializing in regret and life design. Lara is certified through iPEC and the Designing Your Life methodology through Stanford University.  She has a bachelor’s degree from Western Washington University and also studied painting at Parsons School of Design. Lara’s education and background as an artist fuel her excitement for supporting people who are asking "what's next?" (professionally or personally) and helping them to design their own good life path.  Check out Lara's website: www.larabuelow.com, or connect with her on Instagram: @larabuelow

​Lara lives with her husband, two daughters, and dog in Denver, CO. She is an enthusiastic creator and a self proclaimed self help junkie.

Dr. Sharonrose Samelak is a Chiropractic Physician at Seed of Life Chiropractic in Seattle. 
​You can find her on Instagram:  ​@seedoflifechiro

My name is Jerica Green. I own Fountain of Youth, a womxn focused massage and manual therapy clinic in the Fauntleroy neighborhood of West Seattle. I mainly practice SOMA Neuromuscular Structural Integration and pre/peri/post natal Massage. These techniques have long lasting effects including - increasing: range of motion, circulation, and mind-body awareness as well as reducing: pain, anxiety, depression, tension and stress. Some common issues this work can help with are: poor posture, healing from surgery/injury, PMS, peri/menopause, preparing for pregnancy, easing discomfort/issues during pregnancy, reclaiming your body postpartum, scoliosis, chronic sinus issues, TMJD, plantar fasciitis, headaches, irregular stance, incontinence, and prolapse. You can reach me at 253-234-5734 or jerica@fountainofyouth.healthcare with any further questions. Check out the Fountain of Youth Facebook page here.​

​If we are fractured
we are fractured
like stars
bred to shine
in every direction,
through any dimension,
billions of years
since and hence.

I shall not lament
the human, not yet.
There is something
more to come, our hearts
a gold mine
not yet plumbed,
an uncharted sea.

Nothing is gone forever.
If we came from dust
and will return to dust
then we can find our way
into anything.

What we are capable of
is not yet known,
and I praise us now,
in advance.

Finish this sentence: I want to live in a world where…..?
I want to live in a world where we use our shared resources to create a thriving quality of life for everyone, where production never outpaces or ignores what is sustainable for our climate and ecosystem, where we value each other’s diversity and unique perspectives and gifts, where CARE is valued, where together we solve problems from the brilliant part of our brains instead of running from problems with the most fearful part of our brains. 


What are your personal practices or beliefs around things like decolonization or divesting from capitalism?
I love this question! This truly is a practice, and one that will never be finished. Here are a few indicators for me: 

• From connecting my worth to my income >>> To valuing myself inherently and without the need for external validation. 
• From valuing others based on a hierarchy imposed by capitalism >>> To valuing others inherently without placing them on a hierarchy. 
• From “harder faster stronger” mentality >>> To gentleness, presence, and a balance of ease and effort. 
• From seeing our ecosystem and wildlife as something to be controlled and possessed >>>To seeing our ecosystem and wildlife as something to be experienced and nurtured. 
• From seeing my body as an object >>> To awakening the consciousness and wisdom within my body.
• From a homogenous value system that reveres a “right way” of doing things >>> To curiosity, creativity and active listening that allows me to learn about the many beautiful and diverse ways that people think and operate. 
• From waiting for permission to speak and take up space >>>> To boldly sharing my voice and vision with the world because there is value in my perspective.
• From believing the scarcity myth that tells me I have no choices >>> To seeing the resources and choices that are available to me when I think outside the box. 

Ultimately, divesting from capitalism is about staying conscious, aware and connected to the vulnerable tenderness of caring about oneself and others in a real way. 

• I feel myself divest in every moment when I pause and give in to desire and gentleness and playfulness and love.
• I feel myself divest when I look at the systems and think about greater possibilities and pay attention to what is happening politically and get engaged. 
• I feel myself divest when I learn how to create a justice-oriented business that does things a different way, and when I can support other historically marginalized folks build successful businesses that are rooted in justice. 

What is your relationship to perfectionism like?
I didn’t used to think I was a perfectionist, because I don’t tend to be uptight about small details. However, over the years I have come to terms with an extreme perfectionism in me that really wants to have a “right way” of doing everything, and wants to “be right” with every move. This becomes particularly challenging for me with politics and ethics, which are fundamentally complicated and sloppy and non-binary, and it also becomes challenging when self-expression is involved, because I always want to present myself as good and right and perfect, and it turns out this is impossible. I have been working for years on discerning where I have a high standard for myself and others in a way that is positive and supportive of growth, and where I am being unnecessarily perfectionistic and unrealistic with my expectations. I have come to think of perfectionism as “getting the mask right”. As someone who learned late in life that I am neurodiverse (ADHD), I had to come to terms with the fact that I had been performing perfection because I was so terrified of anyone seeing what a disorganized mess I actually feel like I am so much of the time. Self-love has been the biggest practice in releasing perfectionism for me, along with becoming a life coach. As a coach, I have had the incredible privilege of learning how much of this conditioning is universal and damaging to all of us, and as I recognize these universal threads I am able to be more gentle with myself when they come up. 

What do you see as the cause(s) of disconnection in our lives?
I think the primary cause of disconnection is the culture of individualism and privatization that stems from colonization, white supremacy, patriarchy and late stage capitalism. 

I know so many people who have the same dream: to live on land somewhere beautiful where they can connect to nature, to create a retreat center where they can bring together community and host events and eat communally, some version of this. It’s interesting that the best dream we can create in an individualist culture is one where we privately own a bunch of acreage and have a capitalist venture like a wedding retreat venue. There is nothing at all wrong with this, but the fact that SO MANY people I know have the same dream shows me that we are missing some of the same fundamental things from our lives. We have more “wealth” than ever in private property, but less wealth than ever in community, quality of life, health and happiness. It is tragic to watch us keep reinvesting in the idea that more privatization is going to solve this problem, when it’s clear that privatization created the problem to begin with. 


Do/have you worked with a coach or therapist?  What makes this work meaningful to you?
I have worked with a variety of coaches over the past 6 years. For me, coaching is one of the most impactful tools I have encountered, which is why I ultimately became a coach myself. Coaching completely liberated my brain from limiting beliefs that I previously thought were just “how things are”. My first encounters with coaching changed my perspective deeply, allowing me to release judgement towards myself and others, shift my relationship to money, free myself from the dread of scarcity thinking, and take meaningful action on my goals. I have always been naturally optimistic and believed that people can change in any way they set their mind to, but it wasn’t until I encountered coaching that I had the tools to back up this perspective. 

​Kate Holly is a coach, facilitator and educator for creative entrepreneurs, healers and thought leaders who are building sustainable businesses that model the world they want to live in.  She is the host of “The Space Beyond Scarce” podcast, which explores how we can create more justice and prosperity by overcoming the scarcity mindset. 

She helps her students and clients to cultivate self-love, discover and live from their unique brilliance, and build the dreams that they are meant for. You can find her writings, workshops, training programs and coaching opportunities at www.kateholly.com. Connect with Kate on Instagram @katesandersonholly.

​Tracy Bates (she/her) is a Virtual Assistant and Certified Dubsado Specialist. She enjoys helping people automate and streamline their business processes so that they can focus on the fun parts of their business instead of the nitty-gritty details. Tracy lives in Austin, Texas with her partner and 3 pups. Tracy loves to read, lounge in a pool, and drink tea while playing Animal Crossing. Tracy agreed to take part in the Practicing Together project because she loves being part of a community that helps each other grow, and enjoys connecting with people she may have never met.  Her favorite way to get creative is painting, doodling, and gardening. You can connect with Tracy and learn more about her work at tracytheva.com or on Instagram @tracytheva.

What are some things you have done in your life that you are truly proud of?
Two things that I have done in my life that I am truly proud of include both ends of the life span. From 2007-2013, I was a birth doula and attended many births during that time. In 2013 and 2019, I birthed two of my own babies in amazing and empowering homebirths. Birth, however it unfolds, is a time of immense fortitude, transformation, and hope for the future. The process often requires the birth giver (and their support people), to look inward, to evaluate, and journey through doubts, before coming out the other side and being forever postpartum, forever changed. 

On the other end of the life span, I experienced being with my nana, my maternal grandmother, during her death. I was extremely close to her all my life. She helped raise me and was always an anchor for me. She taught me resilience through stories of immigrating to the U.S., having four kids in five years, and then becoming a widow suddenly while her children were still young. While I never met my late grandfather, she told me stories about him and their love, and how much they both valued education. That foundation is one of the main reasons I have two bachelors and a masters degree. She was always so encouraging about my studies and I knew how proud she was of me and who I became.  Last year, she had a fall and died suddenly, but I will be eternally grateful to have had the honor of being with her in the hours before and while she passed. I am proud of myself for having the awareness of the magnitude of those moments, and the composure to make it through them. 

Birth and death are both thought of as liminal spaces. Experiences where the distance between one side or destination and the next can be felt. A threshold. I feel proud of having crossed these various thresholds in life and of the lessons I have learned as a result of them.

When/how do you find time to play?
When I was a child, my mom would play elaborate imaginative games with me. We created entire worlds of characters and acted out scenes with a favorite doll, Annie, and each other. We went on adventures and told stories about silly things Annie could have done there. This playfulness was such a core part of my childhood and I feel grateful to have these memories.

Now as an adult and a mama of two boisterous, playful children, I think about play often. Honestly, sometimes I find it hard to get in touch with my playful side. I enjoy reading and playing board games with my children, but the imaginative stories and role playing games feel more elusive for me. I have determined that part of that is my mental load, a feeling of busy-ness. As a mom who homeschools and is self-employed, I am susceptible to feeling that I need to focus on certain areas before I can play. While I recognize and value play as the work of children, I also believe that play is good for us all.

A while back, my eight-year-old  told me how much he loves playing with me, and asked me to play with him more. In that moment, I realized that I needed to reprioritize play. Play with my children, which I dearly love once I can tune into and move through the “should” and mental resistance. And play of my own, whether that means fun, decompression activities of my choice, things I love that bring excitement and curiosity, or simply tapping into a more playful attitude.  

What are your thoughts about or relationship to grief?
I believe that grief is a part of life, inescapable for those of us who are able to connect with others and ourselves. We all experience losses and transitions in life; some big, some small. We don’t always recognize and honor these losses, and when we do they can be felt with different levels of intensity.

As I shared above, last year I experienced the deepest and most profound grief when my nana died. All my life she was an anchor, and her absence was heart-wrenching. In fact, I don’t think I understood the true meaning of the phrase “heart-wrenching” until I experienced that level of grief. My experience of grief up until then had been more superficial. Present, true, but not as deep. I’ve lived through other life events, the passing of other relatives and family friends, the death of our fourteen year old dog, loss of friendships. Those all touched me, but not to the extent that I viscerally felt like a part of me had been taken.

After some significant grief work including therapy, meditation practices focusing on grief, journaling, and writing letters to loved ones (including about and to my nana), I now have a deeper understanding, appreciation, and capacity for grief. I trust that this will serve me, and those who I support, well for the rest of my life.  

What is your relationship to perfectionism like?
Whoo, my relationship to perfectionism is complex. I often refer to myself as a recovering perfectionist. Growing up, I didn’t know about my neurodivergence. I have an aphantastic, ADHD-brain, which means I don’t have mental images and my brain likes to work fast and shift focus, along with some executive function quirks like procrastination and doubt about the sequence of events that will most effectively reach my goals. Focusing on the end goal can feel easier than figuring out what’s in the murky middle. Yet, for me, perfectionism hasn’t always felt focused on the “perfect” outcome, but about the sense that my work would never live up to some indeterminate standard.

All those memes and social media threads about gifted kid burnout, or the relief of later-in-life ADHD diagnoses, resonate with me. Because I lacked awareness of how my brain worked, and the challenges I faced because of them, I wasn’t able to advocate for support or accommodations. And because in contrast some things felt like they came very easily to me, I internalized a sense of “not good enough”-ness in some areas, while receiving kudos in others. So the manifestation of perfectionism wasn’t so much about the product of my efforts (which were almost always beyond satisfactory), but because of the crushing weight I placed on myself during the process to achieve it. 

I’ve found that the price of perfectionism is enjoyment of the process and feeling grounded in my body. And the antidote has been mindfulness, and more specifically mindful self-compassion. I’ve been able to cultivate greater awareness of how my brain works, and how perfectionism shows up in my life, the thoughts that enter my mind and and the way it feels in my body. This awareness, along with practices for gently disrupting them and centering my holistic well-being, have been truly life-changing.


How do “woo” and science interact and reconcile in your life and work?
I enjoy living within and analyzing intersections and interactions, and one that I find particularly fascinating is the intersection of “woo” and science. The phrase “woo” can mean different things to different people, but often refers to belief in phenomena that lack evidence. Common areas that come under scrutiny, and may be labeled “woo” can include acupuncture, astrology, chiropractic, energy medicine, herbalism, homeopathy, and any religious or spiritual beliefs. Some or all of these may be labeled as “pseudoscience.”

In the birth world, “woo” may be used to refer to things like breathing practices, home birth, or placentophagy (consuming the placenta after birth). There also tends to be personal or cultural associations between certain things, and dichotomies created. Some examples I’ve heard include categories like doulas and midwives, water birth, lactation, and “natural parenting,” which may then be held in opposition with things like ultrasounds, cesarean birth, and vaccination. But in my opinion, there is no need to create categorical distinctions or cultural conflicts between any of these things. Instead, we can focus on making informed-decisions for our own families, and supporting others to do the same for their families.

My two main roles professionally right now are as an International Board Certified Lactation Consultant (IBCLC) and a certified Holistic Sleep Coach. While I’m aware that for some the word “holistic” may be associated with alternative medicine or “pseudoscientific practices,” it actually refers to understanding the parts of something as being intimately interconnected and only comprehensible by reference to the whole.  In a more medical context, "holistic" is characterized by the treatment of the whole person, including physical, mental, social, and environmental factors, rather than just looking at the symptoms of a disease (or in the context of my work the symptoms of a parental sleep concern).

When I work with families for infant feeding and lactation consulting, one of the clinical competencies as an IBCLC is to “assist clients and families with decisions regarding feeding their child(ren) by providing evidence-based information that is free of any conflicts of interest.” This “evidence-based information” can sometimes become a topic of debate, as there are different criteria for evidence. From randomized control trials, to clinical experience, there is a wide range of what can be deemed “evidence-based practice.”
​
Additionally, it’s important to interrogate where racism, Western hegemony, and other ideologies are devaluing or failing to recognize the age-old and ancestral practices of other cultures or belief systems. Many things that are deemed to be “woo” can have long-held use and deeper understandings of the underlying effects and benefits. To categorically deny value to anything that doesn’t stand up under Western scientific models may be shortsighted, or even oppressive. Personally, I find value in keeping an open-mind, practicing informed decision-making, and trusting others to do the same. 

Joy MacTavish (she/her/hers), is an International Board Certified Lactation Consultant (IBCLC), Certified Holistic Sleep Coach, and Certified Babywearing Consultant. Beginning as a birth and postpartum doula in 2007, her perinatal career has evolved numerous times over the years. As a culmination of her experiences, her current offerings center on gentle, holistic parenting support with a focus on the intersections between lactation and infant feeding, optimizing sleep, and ensuring family well-being. Through Sound Beginnings LLC and the Ebb + Flow Holistic Newborn programs, she’s excited to bring new online offerings to families seeking compassionate and evidence-based information to guide them on their journey.

Joy’s work supporting other perinatal professionals spans over 10 years and includes founding and serving on the board of several organizations, as well as group facilitation and training on business development, cultural humility in the context of supporting LGBTQ+ families, and providing trauma informed care. Joy has created and delivered clinical and professional presentations and courses for Bastyr University, DONA International Conference, NW Doula Conference, GOLD Learning, and more. She has also been published in the International Journal of Childbirth Education, and served as an expert content reviewer and editor for numerous books and journals. In 2020, Joy delved into the world of online marketing and business strategy, and has been enjoying supporting other professionals to optimize their businesses to better serve their needs and reach their goals.

When not working or learning, Joy is most often exploring, homeschooling, or building LEGO with her two children.

You can connect with Joy through her website:  www.soundbeginningsfamily.com
Or on Instagram: @joymactavish
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​Be sure to check out her upcoming virtual workshops! Great topics like "10 Keys to Newborn Ease" and "Can I Make Milk?! Methods to Induce Lactation", as well as sleep workshops for many different ages and stages of babies/kiddos and so much more.