I have a somewhat unusual background. I began training at 11 to become a professional classical ballet dancer with the National Ballet of Canada. However, with an opportunity to attend university and my recognition of the shortness of a career in dance, I shifted careers at 17 to study theater and music. I remained in the acting profession for eight years, several of them with a small theater company. After moving from Toronto to New York City, I had to work at something that allowed me some freedom to attend auditions which was restaurant work, of course. During this period I met many famous actors and saw the struggles of the not so famous. I discovered just how uncertain an acting career can be. I also have many interests, so I left the acting career and went into restaurant work full time. I moved from waitering to back office, and eventually to sous chef at a small French restaurant on the upper east side of NYC. That career lasted about 6 years before burnout pushed me to retrain in Information Technology (IT) which I had originally studied back in 1973 at the urging of my father, who had suggested I needed a backup in the event the acting career didn't work out. Wise words, indeed. I remained in that career for 20 years. I had been looking for a way to combine my spiritual (Buddhist) life and work life together. That opportunity came in the form of a Reduction In Force (RIF) when I was laid off from a large investment bank. Working with a life coach, I discovered I could bring those two elements together as psychotherapist and began training at Naropa, a Buddhist informed university in Boulder, CO. It has been a wonderful change in my life and I'm so grateful to have found this career path at a time when so many are in need.