My Approach
I believe you are powerful and uniquely gifted.
I’m here to support you in living and leading from your wholeness. We do this through centering the wisdom of the body and getting to know how the body communicates. Our bodies carry us through life and can offer us endless teachings. When we become aware of our survival strategies (fight, flight, freeze, appease, dissociate), we can see how these creative strategies have evolved to protect us. And even though they’ve evolved to protect us, they may be getting in the way of who we want to be, what we want to create, or where we want to go. Through awareness and practice, we can begin to engage in a process of intentional adaptation. This gives us more choice in how we respond under pressure, and ultimately more agency in our lives.
“Work is love made visible.”
-Khalil Gibran
I work with people of all identities and social locations. I believe everyone deserves support in their healing journeys. My coaching practice is also a contribution towards collective liberation and a just world. For this reason, I prioritize supporting community change makers, social justice movement leaders, and folks who identify as Queer, Trans, Black, Indigenous, and People of Color (BI&POC), including people of mixed ancestry.
Systemic oppression directs and concentrates trauma onto bodies of culture (Resmaa Menakem) and can be devastating to the mind, body, and spirit. It can leave us feeling disempowered, alone, and confused. Somatic coaching supports us in healing from the impact of trauma and reclaiming parts of self through embodied practices so that we can move through the world in an empowered, capable, and effective way.
My work is also culturally centered, meaning it integrates the culture and language of all involved in service of delivering care. I recognize that culture is present in every interaction, and I am committed to being present along my own journey of cultural humility.
About Me
Hi there, I’m Namiko (she/they). I’m so glad you’re here! I’m passionate about feeling, healing, and doing brave things. I live in the question of how we change individually and collectively, and how we shape that change to be in alignment with what we care about.
I value courage, abundance, integrity, love, liberation, and joy.
I love guiding people through cycles of change so they can experience their brilliance, take effective action, and have a healing impact on their communities. This change work is much bigger than just you or me, and yet, we’re an important part of it. My coaching style is warm, direct, intuitive, and collaborative.
I identify as a bi-racial, cis gender, queer woman of color, with white-passing and able-bodied privileges currently residing on Ohlone land (Oakland, California). My path to coaching has been winding and nonlinear, much like my own healing journey. The throughline has been my love of people, placemaking, and the very human need for both safety and freedom.
My passions have led me to live and work in North America, Europe, and Africa across a variety of sectors such as international relations, the arts + social justice organizing, tech, and mental healthcare.
The most potent and transformative healing modalities that I’ve explored have always led me back to the wisdom and energy of my body. It’s through somatic coaching & bodywork, meditation, breath work, conscious movement, ancestral healing, and yoga that I have been able to move through my wounds into a space of possibility. I am deeply grateful that somatics has allowed me to feel my wholeness, and to practice remembering it in each moment.
When I’m not nerding out on the nervous system, or studying attachment styles, you can find me practicing QiGong, hiking in the forest, swimming in a body of water, dancing with loved ones, befriending random dogs, or resting as an act of revolution (The Nap Ministry).
Lineage
I acknowledge that my personal and professional lineages hold many contradictions and have evolved within the context of systemic oppression and inequity. I seek to hold these contradictions with care and honor their complexities.
I am an ICF credentialed professional somatic coach and somatic bodyworker trained through Strozzi Institute. This somatics tradition integrates Polarity Therapy, Gestalt, Vipassana meditation and Aikido. I am also on the Teaching Team at Strozzi Institute. My politicized somatics approach is deeply informed by the interplay of trauma, somatics, social justice and collective healing (generative somatics). Learn more about this living lineage here.
I hold a MA in Development and Gender Studies from the University of Leeds, England, and a BS in Graphic Communication, Psychology, Ethnic Studies, and Industrial Technology from Cal Poly, San Luis Obispo. My love of movement, self-study, stillness, and Spirit led me to become a 300-hour trauma-competent yoga teacher in the vinyasa, restorative, yin and nidra traditions.
I’d also like to acknowledge my Uno family mon, or crest, which inspired my logo design and has shaped my lineage.
Curious? Let’s connect for a chemistry call.
“Namiko held me with grace, adapting to whatever internal state I arrived in. She always guided me gently back to my intention and declaration. I would leave feeling more centered and equipped to take grounded action steps.”
-Robin C.