Meet Me
Helping you belong without losing yourself, connect without abandoning your needs, and become more fully who you are.
I'm a Registered Clinical Counsellor and coach who works with adults navigating questions of identity, relationships, belonging, emotional wellbeing, and personal growth.
My work has been shaped by a life spent crossing cultures, communities, and different ways of understanding what it means to live a meaningful life. I've lived in countries shaped by both collectivist and individualistic values, spent time within religious communities—including a monastery and seminary—and live within an intercultural family system.
These experiences have deeply influenced how I understand people.
I've seen the strengths that both individualism and collectivism can offer. Individualism can nurture autonomy, self-expression, independence, and the freedom to become who you are. Collectivism can foster connection, responsibility, belonging, interdependence, and a sense that our lives are deeply connected to one another.
I don't believe we have to choose between them.
I believe there is something powerful in learning to hold both: the freedom to be yourself while remaining connected to the people and communities that matter to you.
For many of us, learning how to balance authenticity with belonging is at the heart of our emotional and relational lives.
Who I Work With
I work with adults from diverse cultural, social, and life backgrounds, both through counselling in British Columbia and coaching internationally.
Many of the people I work with are thoughtful, caring, and capable individuals who may find themselves navigating questions such as:
Who am I outside of other people's expectations?
How do I stay connected to my family or community without losing myself?
How can I set boundaries without feeling selfish or guilty?
Why do I struggle to trust myself?
How can I communicate what I need while still maintaining connection?
How do I build relationships that feel mutual and authentic?
How do I navigate cultural differences in my relationships?
How can I feel more confident in who I am?
I have a particular interest in working with people navigating intercultural identities, relationships, belonging, people-pleasing, boundaries, self-trust, communication, emotional regulation, and the tension between individual needs and collective expectations.
I also work with people who may feel caught between different worlds—whether that means different cultures, generations, family systems, communities, identities, or ways of understanding themselves.
You don't have to fit neatly into one category to have a place here.
My Areas of Focus
Relationship With Self
Developing self-awareness, self-trust, confidence, and a more compassionate relationship with yourself.
Relationship With Others
Exploring communication, boundaries, attachment, belonging, intimacy, friendship, family dynamics, and intercultural relationships.
Emotional Regulation
Understanding your emotions, recognizing patterns, and developing healthier ways of responding to difficult or overwhelming experiences.
These areas are interconnected.
The way you relate to yourself influences how you relate to others. Your relationships influence how you experience yourself. And your ability to understand and regulate your emotions affects both.
My work brings these pieces together rather than treating them as separate parts of your life.
A Cross-Cultural Perspective
Living across different cultures has taught me that there is rarely one universal answer to what a healthy life or relationship should look like.
Ideas about independence, family, success, boundaries, communication, responsibility, and emotional expression can vary enormously across cultures and communities.
What may feel like healthy independence in one context may feel like disconnection in another. What looks like self-sacrifice from one perspective may represent love, loyalty, or responsibility from another.
At the same time, cultural expectations can sometimes make it difficult to recognize our own needs and desires.
I believe the goal isn't to reject where we come from or simply adopt another culture's way of living.
It's to develop the freedom to thoughtfully decide what we want to carry forward, what we want to change, and how we want to live.
This is especially important for people navigating intercultural families, immigration, diaspora experiences, international relationships, or multiple cultural identities.
My Education & Professional Background
My professional background brings together counselling psychology, sociology, women's studies, community outreach, and cross-cultural experience. Together, these areas have shaped how I understand emotional wellbeing—not only as an individual experience, but as something deeply influenced by our relationships, identities, cultures, families, and communities.
Counselling Psychology
I completed graduate studies in Counselling Psychology, developing a strong foundation in psychotherapy, psychological theory, assessment, and evidence-informed approaches to supporting mental and emotional wellbeing.
This training led me to become a Registered Clinical Counsellor (RCC) with the British Columbia Association of Clinical Counsellors (BCACC). My counselling practice follows BCACC ethical standards and serves adults residing in British Columbia.
My counselling work focuses on creating an individualized therapeutic space where clients can explore their experiences, develop greater self-understanding, work through emotional and relational challenges, and build healthier ways of relating to themselves and others.
Sociology & Women's Studies
Before entering counselling, my studies in Sociology and Women's Studies shaped my understanding of how deeply our individual experiences are connected to the social and cultural worlds around us.
These fields gave me the opportunity to explore questions of identity, gender, culture, power, inequality, relationships, belonging, and social systems—and helped me develop a perspective that looks beyond individual behaviour to consider the broader contexts in which people live.
This background continues to influence my work today. I believe that understanding ourselves sometimes requires looking not only inward, but also at the expectations, values, relationships, and systems that have shaped us.
Community Outreach & Diverse Populations
My experience in community outreach and working with underserved and underprivileged communities deepened my commitment to equality, inclusion, dignity, and accessibility.
Working with people from diverse backgrounds has reinforced my belief that there is no single definition of a healthy or meaningful life. People's experiences are shaped by their cultures, communities, identities, resources, relationships, and circumstances.
These experiences have taught me to approach each person with curiosity and respect rather than assumptions about what they should value or how they should live.
My Approach
My approach is grounded in the belief that people are not problems to be fixed.
There are often understandable reasons why we develop the patterns we do. The ways we protect ourselves, relate to others, respond to conflict, or seek approval may have once served an important purpose.
Rather than judging those patterns, I believe in approaching them with curiosity, compassion, and courage.
My work draws from evidence-informed approaches while remaining individualized to the person in front of me. I believe that effective support should account for the whole person—including their history, relationships, culture, identity, values, and the environments in which they live.
I also bring a feminist and sociological perspective to my work. This means recognizing that individual wellbeing exists within larger social and cultural contexts, and that power, privilege, gender, culture, and social expectations can influence how we understand ourselves and our relationships.
At the same time, I believe strongly in personal agency.
We can acknowledge the systems and communities that shape us while still exploring the choices available to us.
What I Believe
I believe equality and individuality can coexist with connection and community.
I believe you can love your family without losing yourself.
You can belong to a community without abandoning your individuality.
You can care about harmony without silencing your voice.
You can have boundaries without becoming disconnected.
You can be independent without having to do everything alone.
And you can honor your culture while deciding which values you want to make your own.
For me, emotional wellbeing isn't about becoming completely independent or completely selfless.
It's about developing the ability to belong without disappearing, and to be yourself without having to disconnect from others.
That balance—between authenticity and belonging, autonomy and connection, individuality and community—is at the heart of much of my work.
Counselling & Coaching
While counselling and coaching share some foundational themes, they are distinct services.
Counselling
I provide individualized clinical counselling for adults residing in British Columbia who are looking for professional mental health support. Counselling may involve exploring past experiences, emotional difficulties, relationships, self-esteem, anxiety, patterns of behaviour, and other concerns affecting your wellbeing.
Coaching
I provide individualized coaching for adults internationally who are focused on personal growth, confidence, communication, relationships, emotional confidence, and creating intentional change in their lives.
A Place to Begin
Whether you're healing from something you've experienced, trying to understand yourself more deeply, or simply ready to grow into a more confident and intentional version of yourself, you don't have to navigate the process alone.
My hope is that our work can give you space to explore who you are, where you've come from, what matters to you, and how you want to move forward.
You don't have to choose between belonging and being yourself.
There may be a way to create a life where both can exist.