Born and raised in Malaysia, I came to study actuarial math and economics in the United States. Working as an actuarial analyst, I struggled to find deeper meaning and engagement outside of work. I began volunteering with Tzu Chi Foundation, a global Buddhist humanitarian charity organization based in Taiwan with missions in charity, medicine, education and culture. I started learning about engaged Buddhism, a philosophy where serving and going among people to actualize spiritual teachings is the best way to cultivate compassion and wisdom. I began Dharma translation and editorial work, volunteer recruitment and organizing various initiatives to inspire compassion and deepen our wisdom.
After 6 years of corporate life, volunteering and real estate investment, I retired at 29 and began traveling the world through couchsurfing and hitchhiking with my former partner. During this time, I got to work briefly in a coworking space WORQ in Malaysia for my good friends as a community manager, attempting to bring my organizing passion to the startup scene. It was a fulfilling challenge but I soon realized that the hustle of the startup life was not sustainable for my health in any dimension.
After this meandering adventure around the globe, I realized my true desire to put down roots and commit to a greater purpose. I decided to become an acupuncturist and delve deeper into my ancestral roots of healing through food, lifestyle, herbal medicine and acupuncture. I studied Thai yoga massage in Chiang Mai for 4 weeks and volunteered with Tzu Chi in Mexico city serving the post-earthquake communities with a lot of acupuncturists. Seeing these healers in action strengthened my resolve to bring traditional healing medicine to the world, across cultural and geographic barriers.
As I started graduate school in acupuncture, a friend told me about systemic constellation and urged me to attend a session. After a lifechanging weekend with Dan Cohen and Emily Blefeld from Seeing With Your Heart, I realized how healing in the physical and emotional dimensions is insufficient when we are trapped in systemic entanglements and generational trauma. Holistic healing requires us to look at the family and community systems that we live and breathe in day by day. This reminded me of the frustrations I felt when I used to attend anti-racism and social justice circles that mostly illustrated the pain of inequality and oppression without a clear path to reconciliation or healing.
Inspired by the transformation I experienced in my heart and life, I completed an immersion program with Dan and Emily (Seeing with Your Heart throughout the pandemic that was extended to a two year journey) and began facilitating constellation/ancestral healing circles that leverage our heart-intuition and presence to resolve entanglements around money, power, sexuality, oppression, grief, guilt and shame in our family systems.
With my two soul sisters Kit and Dinese, we organized a healing retreat in Chiang Mai, Thailand right before the Covid pandemic shut down the world in 2019. We experienced the nurturing energy of the land, the kind hospitality of Thai people and were able to witness the healing and homecoming of our clients. Since then, organizing transformational retreats where participants get to experience healing modalities and mindful practices of various countries while coming together as humans witnessing each other became our professional goal.
During the pandemic, as we all retreated into isolation, the vision had to be paused. As I went deeper within, I realized that I can live my every day life as if I am in my transformative retreat every day. There is so much room to infuse mindfulness into a slow-life, radically loving myself, reaching out to nurture soul connections with the many beautiful souls I have known in this lifetime and curate virtual immersions for my clients.
As Thomas Hubl described in his book "Healing Collective Trauma," when each of us heals ourselves, we can better attune to the needs of our loved ones and heal our family systems, our communities and eventually, the collective humanity can also recover as we confront the climate crisis and the real risk of a world war.
As a budding healer and lifelong organizer, I cherish every opportunity to connect and find ways to create nurturing collaborations. Let's talk if any part of my journey speaks to your heart and if there's anyway that I can support your journey.
My email is huiying237@gmail.com
From my heart to yours, peace and love.
