’The best compliment I’ve ever received is, “You have good energy.”

I like to think that’s because I’ve spent a lifetime learning how to create it—not by being endlessly positive or having everything figured out, but by learning how to come home to myself.

I’m a holistic nurse coach, Reiki practitioner, educator, facilitator, and lifelong student of what it means to live with purpose. I bring more than 20 years of experience in critical care nursing, education, management, leadership, healthcare simulation, and debriefing. Before entering healthcare, I traveled throughout the United States as an insurance catastrophe adjuster, helping homeowners navigate the aftermath of natural disasters. And now, I’m an early retiree globetrotter, traveling full-time. You can find us at TravelSabbatical.com, Facebook, Instagram, or TravelMap.

Across all of these very different roles, one thing has remained constant: my ability to see potential in people and connect vision to action. I have a knack for identifying talent, simplifying the complex, creating order from chaos, and helping people and teams function in healthier, more meaningful ways.

My organizational superpower became so well known among my colleagues that they turned my name into a verb: “Akiko-fy.” To Akiko-fy something is to streamline it, organize it, simplify it, and make it work better.

But somewhere along the way, I realized I had become very good at improving almost everything—except myself.

For much of my life, I was a relentless overachiever and perfectionist. Traditional success was seductive. If I worked hard enough, accomplished enough, became good enough, surely I would eventually feel… enough.

Except it didn’t work that way.

As a nurse I spent years caring and advocating for others, sometimes at the expense of my own wellbeing. Eventually, I unlearned the belief that self-care is selfish. To the contrary, self-care is the foundation of healthcare, especially for those of us who are in service to others. It is essential,—not a luxury—to serve from a place of fullness rather than depletion!

After 50 years of looking outward for validation of success and constantly asking, “What’s next?”, I finally confronted something I had spent a lifetime avoiding: stillness.

Beneath the exterior veneer of accomplishments was a lot of pent-up dissatisfaction and a deep longing to feel at home inside myself.

I had spent years trying on different roles, identities, interests, and experiences to answer the question, “Who am I?” Eventually, I realized the answer wasn’t about choosing one version of myself over another.

They were all me. And they were never meant to be compartmentalized. They were meant to be integrated.

That’s where my own Integrative Living journey towards wellbeing began.

I’m still on it.

I don’t believe in preaching a perfect formula for wellbeing. I practice what I share, and I share what I learn.

After decades of professional experience, personal exploration, and learning how to create my own version of a fulfilling life well lived, I feel called to pay it forward.

Through holistic nurse coaching and Reiki, I bring my whole, authentic self to the work:

• A first-generation Asian American

• A recovering overachiever and perfectionist

• A curious life wanderer with a wayward past

• An early retiree

• A full-time globetrotter

• An aspiring Buddhist practitioner

I will be fully present, curious, and non-judgmental as we discover what a more integrated life might look like for you.