Free Your VoiceGriefLGBTQIAMusic makingSingingWritingComing Home to the Body (When it’s the last place you want to be)

In 2011, I was hanging out with a friend in Dolores Park in San Francisco when a disc ruptured in my lower back. I almost threw up from the pain and held onto a tree, my head spinning and floating away. My friend kept asking, Are you okay? I cursed and said, I’m fine, but I wasn’t. I had battled back pain for years, using a cane and eventually a wheelchair. Crippling pain and shooting fires down my legs brought me back into my body, this body I had tried to escape my whole life. These identities I did not want, that made me feel different, that I didn’t belong. Queer. Trans. Asian. Outsider.
During this period, I entered a 3-year expressive arts program to find my way back home in my body, re-story myself, and rewrite my life narrative. Through movement, drawing, writing, and improv performance, I was able to make art, beauty, and meaning out of the stories in my body. I was able to express and release and be held with love by others as they witnessed me. Through play, I found healing, joy, and celebration.
13 years later, I have come home to my body. I find pleasure in movement and singing and creative expression with others. I trust my body’s wisdom and resilience. I have a heart broken open by love. I have experienced first hand the healing power of ritual and community and know we don’t heal in isolation. The medicine of our times is community where we can hold the 10,000 sorrows and 10,000 joys of being human.
Come home to your body with other QTBIPOC, BIPOC and LGBTQIA+ folks. I’m launching my 2nd cohort of Free Your Voice and Body Stories, a 108 hour 9 month training Sept 30th-June 2, 2025 in Berkeley. We meet 2 Mondays a month 630-930pm and 1 Sunday 10am-5pm. We explore a different body part each month through voicework, movement, drawing, writing, and theater. This training is half singing/voicework and half embodied expressive arts. We create a strong love field of belonging and acceptance where we can all transform together.

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Photos by Alison Christiana, Stani Photography, Gaby Esensten, Graham Holoch, Rucha Chitnis, Jamil Hellu, Awake Storytelling, Caitlin Hannan, Kai Lai

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