This sentiment is one that I know is common for first generation immigrants like me. Navigating a newly formed third culture unique to one's reality; a blend of your caregiver's traditions and the established norms of your new environment. As I reflect on my story so far, it is no wonder that my body was in survival mode for so long and I was ignoring its yearning for settling. I owe a great deal of this newly gifted awareness to the time that I have been a part of the SEI community.
My SE™ journey began in the early Summer of 2020. Like many of us, this was a time when our lives were turned upside down due to the pandemic. I had just returned to the US after being abruptly evacuated from Paraguay where I was serving as a Community & Economic Development volunteer with the US Peace Corps. During this early career transition, I came across a job opening on SEI's administrative team. I recall meeting my current supervisor, mentor, and friend, Krysti Giese, who introduced me to the foundations of SE during my onboarding. While I knew I was receiving a job, I did not realize I would also be receiving the beautiful gift of nervous system regulation and the opportunity to integrate it with an extended homecoming in my motherland.
While I was aware of the full time-employee benefit to take part in our professional training to enhance our understanding of SE™, I did not take the leap until recently when the first Colombian cohort was inaugurated. I was ecstatic when I was invited to be a part of the initial conversations with our tenacious Colombian training organizer, Laura Botero of Tierra Somática. To my delightful surprise, the training venue chosen by Laura’s team was located specifically in the Altiplano Cundiboyacense of the northwestern portion of the Colombian Andes, the lands of my indigenous ancestors. There was no way I could miss this professionally and personally enriching opportunity.
Upon arriving at this training, the breathtaking, natural environment of Villa Del Leyva filled me with awe and joy. Getting to engage with healing professionals from all over the nation and neighboring countries in Spanish allowed me to show up in a way that I had never experienced prior in an educational setting. One of the most memorable and embodied elements of the training was how much we danced throughout. Whether it was in the morning opening exercises, in the afternoons to combat the post lunch energy slump, or at the end of the week to celebrate our completion, moving to local music genres added that special Colombian flavor to our group. The amount of orienting and container expansion that occurred for me in my Beginning year of this training has been undoubtedly valuable to the way I show up day after day with my colleagues at SEI, cherished loved ones, and really, with any human that I get to encounter. The knowledge and skills I have learned so far have also been instrumental to navigating recent challenges.
Most notably, the teachings of SE™ have been a significant resource in supporting my resilient mother-in-law who recently survived cancer. In my early years of employment at SEI and prior to her diagnosis, she was always eager to absorb the limited, yet impactful SE™ protocols, books, and public resources that I was able to share with her as she incorporated more body-oriented approaches to ease her chronic pain. She even worked with a North Carolina based SEP™ prior to her move to Colorado. When the difficult battle with cancer began late last year, my husband and I were able to use my expanded foundational knowledge to resource us regularly as her primary support system. Meanwhile in Colombia, my loved ones grew in curiosity about the trainings I was attending. I am thrilled to share that this has helped open the conversation around the predominant culturally-taboo topic of therapeutic treatment with them, and I have begun to refer them to my local Colombian training colleagues for individual support this year. The ripple effect of SE™ is in full force in my communities, like a fruitful seed that has been carefully planted for those that are most dear to me. It is humbling to live this early phase of sacred intergenerational healing.
Professionally, one of the most profound highlights of the training was getting to understand the firsthand experience of our global community, including international students, assistants, and faculty. A special thanks to Mahshid Hager, who graciously led the initial modules of this training, and to Russell Jones who will take over the remaining ones in a few months. It is extremely inspiring to both witness SEI’s commitment to global growth by encouraging the intercultural exchange of various faculty to our non-US trainings, and to know that the growth of local faculty members is also a priority for the sustainable future of SE™ cohorts in new regions. Participating in the training has also helped me connect at a profound level with my fellow members of SEI’s Global Culture Committee. Alongside our International Programs Manager, Katie Kroll, I have had the honor to serve as the staff liaison for this committee for several years, and it is a monthly space that truly holds and contributes to global collaboration that expands our organizational mission across the world.
I will forever be grateful for the opportunity to grow as a young professional within the SEI community—a landing place that has allowed all parts of me to come home, where my intersectional identities and geographically distant cultures can coexist in harmony.
Daniela Leposa Soracá
Cultural and Operational Growth Manager
