CURRENT MISSION

Living in SF and Austin, working as a consultant for conflict mediation and emotional intelligence training, in part aiming to get emotional & relational skills into sectors that could use them but wouldn't seek them out... Including the Effective Altruism movement. Side things: Design and styling work, professional speaking, and beginning to create an awesome Bay Area community for myself (we'll see how it does vs my incredible Austin community of friends!)

I feel endlessly grateful for the people in my life. I love people in general, and my close friends include some of the most incredible, inspiring, brilliant, adventurous, interesting, open-hearted, deeply kind, generous, and down-to-earth people I know.

ABOUT ME
If it helps, here's a one-minute video I did as an application for a travel show hosting competition, circa 2013:
https://docs.google.com/file/d/0B1wjYt5hwfZ6QmptaGtVel9UaWM/edit?usp=sharing
(there are some tech glitches, but this is a version of the video... for the record, I personally don't do much social media at all, but it was relevant to the app :) And fortunately, it wasn't a videography competition!!)

...And a video I did on the fly about Copenhagen (again, with dodgy equipment and software): https://docs.google.com/file/d/0B1wjYt5hwfZ6TDZLU1ZnaDhWRTg/edit?usp=drive_web

I like many, many things! Here's some stuff about my travel background:
Community is important to me, plus I travel when I can. I've traveled through 45 countries (mostly in developing regions) and have lived for short stints in Paris (rented a flat for a summer--five people in a two bedroom), Australia (semester of uni), Bangkok (worked at UNESCO), and Tuscany (I was a "tuttofare"/handyman intern at Spannocchia, an organic farm, for three months). After undergrad, I spent 15 months traveling solo on an around-the-world ticket. I also lived in Manhattan for about a year and a half. I usually travel alone; I like that I get to meet more people that way!

PHILOSOPHY

"One thing we know for certain, chasing meaning is better for your health than avoiding discomfort. So I would say that's really the best way to make decisions: go after whatever it is that creates meaning in your life, and then trust yourself to handle the stress that follows." - Kelly McGonigal

Why I’m on Couchsurfing

COUCHSURFING EXPERIENCE

I've only used the site a cluster of times in 2013, and loved the people I met! Finally back on. I'm very, very familiar with staying with new friends met traveling, and I've hosted loads of people when I'm at home. I love hosting (plus I have plenty of generosity karma to pay forward), and I love getting to know locals while traveling--it's WAY better than just staying at a hostel in terms of getting to know a place. ("Locals" could be legit locals or expats... at least someone who actually lives in the area!)

Interests

I feel like people make sense in the context of their friends and how they spend their time, so here's an attempt to convey that:

My close friends and I are very playful, curious people!

In the realm of playfulness: One of my good friends started "Foam Sword Friday" at UT (it's on youtube) when he was in grad school. Close friends also conceived and hosted a series of site-specific film screenings, including showing "Koyaanisqatsi" in a storm drain tunnel beneath downtown. About 25 of us spelunked blocks through tunnels to get to it, which is about as much as I'm willing to break laws, ever. Last weekend, a friend requested that a group of us all act like dinosaurs as we crossed the room from wherever we stood (of course we will, no questions asked). Ooooh, and a dear friend of mine hitchhiked on private airplanes from Seattle to Austin once (her dad's a small plane pilot, and gave her the idea), so I did my own air-hitching adventure this past fall.

Re: curiosity: We go to lectures as group outings or sometimes host lectures at each other's houses. Three friends and I briefly had a book club on an Austin radio station. We covered "Nightwood" by Djuna Barnes. Then KPWR went off the air for a spell, so instead we did "Theory Club" amongst ourselves (we read Sassure, Lacan, etc.). I love theory. I also love going to the Center for Maximum Potential Building Systems (a famous green building think tank) open houses once in a while, especially with my architect friends who can geek out with the directors. A good friend and I did the semester-long Travis County Sherrif's Citizen's Academy out of curiosity... we got to visit their training facilities and tour the county jail and downtown prison.

When there's not a fun, creative/art or academic event on, I'm much more of a dinner party/potluck/house party person than a night life person.

• arts
• books
• architecture
• potluck
• yoga
• traveling
• adventure travel
• adventures
• lectures

Music, Movies, and Books

Books:
Virginia Woolf, "A Room of One's Own"
Walter Benjamin, "The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction"
Pierre Bourdieu, "Distinction"
Edward Said, "Orientalism"
Ferdinand de Saussure, "Course in General Linguistics"
Max Horkheimer and Theodor Adorno, "The Culture Industry as Mass Deception"
Roland Barthes, "Mythologies"
Steinbeck (esp. "Travels with Charley")
Nabokov

Music varies hugely and includes misc jazz and classical, but:
Alt-J and Andrew Bird (love!)
Clap Your Hands Say Yeah
"Airline to Heaven" by Billy Bragg and Wilco
"Johnny Appleseed" by Joe Strummer and the Mescaleros
"All This Time" by the Heartless Bastards
"Car" by Built to Spill
"King of Carrot Flowers" by Neutral Milk Hotel
"When My Time Comes" by Dawes
"Need You Now" by Cut Copy
"Church" by Lyle Lovett

One Amazing Thing I’ve Done

While camping on the beach in Australia, skinny dipping late at night when phosphorescence filled the water with bursts of light, while the Milky Way shone brilliant overhead.

One of my favorite parts about that... I deplore feeling cold; it was freezing out for my Texan self. I hesitated on going in, then thought: When I'm 90, I won't remember having been cold.

Teach, Learn, Share

I'm a certified yoga teacher (200 hour); I'd be happy to teach you some yoga!
Also, lots of relational skills, if you'd like to try out some skill-building exercises or whatnot :)

Countries I’ve Visited

Austria, Bahamas, Belgium, Cambodia, Canada, China, Costa Rica, Cuba, Denmark, Dominica, Egypt, Estonia, Finland, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Iceland, India, Indonesia, Ireland, Jamaica, Japan, Latvia, Malaysia, Mexico, Morocco, Netherlands, New Zealand, Peru, Singapore, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain, Sri Lanka, Sweden, Thailand, Turkey, United Kingdom, Vatican City State, Viet Nam

Countries I’ve Lived In

Australia, France, Italy, Thailand