Erin’s Story

Like so many empaths and healers, I came in as an intuitive and a highly-sensitive child. Raised in the mountains of the remote High Sierra until my teens, a deep connection to Nature became my lifeline. At the ripe old age of five, I discovered spirituality in the form of a small group of mountain folk studying scriptures and contemplative practices. In addition to losing myself in books, scrambling across hillsides and swimming in streams, I found that the spiritual folk in the community were the most interesting, inspiring humans to be around. Thus began my lifetime spiritual journey.

I come from a maternal lineage of healers and psychics, and knowledge of herbs, energy medicine, indigenous practices, and Eastern wisdom traditions permeated our alternative household. Nomadic travelers, sweat lodges, prayer ceremonies, yoga and meditation informed my childhood counterculture cosmology. This, combined with the genetic influence of my German intellectual-engineer father, made for a nicely integrated balance of divine feminine and masculine energies.

At the age of sixteen, my aunt introduced me to the intuitive arts of the Tarot, and by seventeen I was reading for friends and family. At the age of twenty, I began a sincere and voracious study of astrology, learning to cast charts the old way – by hand – drawing upon complex mathematics skills and persistence alongside the ancient ephemeris tables.

At U.C. Davis, I studied environmental policy and planning, earning a Bachelor of Science with Highest Honors. After solo backpacking across Europe for three months I realized a deep connection to humanity; my focus on the natural environment broadened to include interpersonal relationships and psychological development. As a result, my professional course was entirely altered post-university with a move to Southern Oregon. I began working for several green businesses as business manager, bookkeeper, managing editor, sales representative, and marketing manager, forming the foundations of an entrepreneurial mindset ever since. This training informs the work that I do with executives and professional influencers worldwide.

Already married – and divorced – by age 28, I heeded a vision to relocate to San Francisco at the peak of the dot-com boom. Landing on my friend’s couch with two suitcases in the back of my car, within five days I was working as a headhunter in the Financial District – on straight commission. Driven by necessity, energy, and a sincere desire to serve, within a year I was earning six figures and enjoying a fantastic chapter in the beloved City by the Bay.

Thus began a foray into alternative and intersecting worlds: annual sojourns to Burning Man, the underground rave and art scenes, running marathons, and The Artist’s Way – all the while deeply devoted to transformational healing practices, Vipassana meditation, recovery, yoga asana, personal psychotherapy, and a deeper spiritual calling that wouldn’t let me go. This grip forced me to realize that the fast life was unsustainable and ultimately unfulfilling; I admitted defeat, quit my career as a recruiter, gave up my apartment, and walked away from the “high life.” Living off savings, I commenced a six-month solo trip through India, resulting in the material for my first book, The Adventures of Bindi Girl: Diving Deep Into the Heart of India.

After that first trip to India, I lived in New York City for a short period, working at a five-star luxury hotel, letting the Big Apple work its magic and trying my hand at acting and performing. But California and West Coast healthy living had my heart, thus I returned to friends, family and the familiar of San Francisco. In 2006, while working as a producer for a leading global astrology and tarot website, I started having spontaneous kundalini activations that were disruptive and disturbing. My energy field was unwieldy, often blowing out lightbulbs and electrical circuits. The kundalini rising from the base of the spine up to the crown was crackling hot, and insomnia was frequent. I couldn’t peel myself off the ceiling. When I would dream, I had visions of cobras lighting up my spinal column and exploding the crown chakra.

Finally, I got the message: the only thing that would help the activated shakti was to start using my spiritual and intuitive gifts to read for others. I resigned from my profession at the astrology website – the last time I worked for another company – and heeded the call. I opened my doors to giving psychic readings to others, and the kundalini energy began to quiet down and flow easier when it was being used as it was meant to be used.

As mentioned, I had begun traveling to India in 2002, commencing a passionate love affair with a nation, culture, and bevy of wisdom traditions. Over the next ten years, I would spend a combined five of them on the subcontinent, off the beaten path. While based in India, I worked remotely as content producer and product developer for the astrology and tarot website. I also wrote for a luxury business travel magazine, Global Traveler. For years, I lived out of a backpack, toggling back and forth between megalopolises, ashrams, jungles, mud huts, and guest houses.

I continued to use my intuitive gifts on the road, reading for travelers wherever I went, as well as online for folks around the world. I created a home in the South of India, and I would travel back and forth to Mumbai, where I visited my spiritual master, Ramesh Balsekar (1917-2009), regularly. The wild story of meeting my Teacher can be found in the book How I Met Ramesh: The Way Existence Mysteriously Led Spiritual Seekers to Ramesh Balsekar.

Ramesh, one of the great sages of Advaita Vedanta (non-dual wisdom) had been a translator and disciple of Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj. Receiving the teachings and transmissions from Ramesh was a pivotal, defining moment, possibly the most important plot-turn of my life. There are no words for the grace received from both jnana (wisdom) and bhakti (devotion) combining to explode in the heart. In 2011, there was a falling away of the egoic identification. It was the end of suffering, the end of belief in a separate “me” thought that has since never returned.

Returning to reestablish a life back in the U.S. in 2012 was beyond challenging. The culture shock of the San Francisco Bay Area busy lifestyle, the difficulty of recreating a home and a professional life after being nomadic, hermitic, and austere – essentially on pilgrimage for five years – was like the pain of being birthed, plunged into the world. It was necessary to reintegrate and embody the spiritual wisdom gained, on the ground, in the material realms again. It was painful, grueling, and for a long time I grieved my life in India, as well as the loss of my guru, Ramesh.

I continue to work with others all over the world, online and in person, as a spiritual counselor, intuitive consultant, and teacher of non-duality. This is embodied liberation, and this is what I offer You.

The journey continues.