Growing up Asian and in an immigrant family, survival and success meant adaptation. I could fit in, even excel, in any environment you put me in. I was (and still am) a master at reading a room and perceiving what other people might want or need. These were essential skills during a childhood where I struggled for acceptance and they helped me navigate the elite institutions I studied and worked in as an adult.
What I lost along the way was my sense of what I actually desired, what my own voice sounded like, what it felt like to be grounded within myself. All my attention was directed outward.
It wasn’t until my 40s that I let go of what I thought I needed to be and turned toward becoming myself. It was terrifying and ultimately miraculous. I was afraid I’d have nothing left to hold onto. Instead I found beauty, love, freedom, and belonging.
We can be comfortable in our own skin. We can experience the power of speaking in our own voice. It won’t sound like anyone else’s, and this is precisely where its power will come from. We can feel the exhilaration of our own creativity. We can stand in our own authority. We can create belonging on our own terms. It starts with belonging to ourselves. We can live a life that is truly our own.
If you know it’s time to live into this, I want to work with you. You may not feel ready. That’s OK. We’re never perfectly ready. What matters is that you know it’s time and that the alternative is no longer tenable.
My role as a coach is to walk alongside you, to help you see what needs to be seen, to help you believe in what’s possible when you forget, to be a midwife for the parts of you that want to emerge, and to support you as your life—inward and outward—begins to change.
If this resonates with you, contact me to schedule a time to talk.
“I started working with Hyeon-Ju during a time of intense emotional learning and transformation. A supremely gifted and compassionate listener, she created the welcoming, safe container I needed to tap into my own knowing. Hyeon-Ju’s immense capacity to be present to her clients in an accepting, open-hearted way enabled me to explore long-seated fears — as well as dreams — that I’ve long been afraid to scale on my own. She also has a magically intuitive way of working, and always seems to ask just the right questions at the right time.
My work with Hyeon-Ju has allowed me to put an old conception of myself and my life to rest, and to create a bright new narrative for myself in its stead. And if all this sounds a little self-serious, Hyeon-Ju also has a wicked sense of humor, and we laughed a lot together along the way!”
“[W]e all begin the process before we are ready, before we are strong enough, before we know enough; we begin a dialogue with thoughts and feelings that both tickle and thunder within us. We respond before we know how to speak the language, before we know all the answers, and before we know exactly to whom we are speaking.”
- Clarissa Pinkola Estes