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Lee Conger
Certified Integral Qigong and Tai Chi Teacher

Hello. Lee here. I am a Certified Integral Qigong and Tai Chi Teacher, currently providing several weekly sessions in the Inland Empire (Claremont and Ontario, California) and twice-monthly sessions in Silver Lake (Los Angeles, California). You will find my current schedule at Qigong and Tai Chi (Moving Meditation). 

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​BACKSTORY

Until recently, the work I did for pay was as a psychotherapist. That extended project began in 1997. In the fall of 2023, I discontinued providing sessions and supervising, when my husband and I began preparing to move from our home of 32 years in Silver Lake (Los Angeles, California) to an intentional/retirement community in Claremont (30 miles east).

While I am in the process of retiring from that profession, I maintain a keen interest in helping alleviate suffering. To that end, I will continue providing Integral Qigong and Tai Chi sessions (forms of "moving meditation"), along with other resilience practices and community-building activities. As my original Qigong/Tai Chi teacher Roger Jahnke used to regularly exclaim, "Socialization is part of the medicine!" Ergo, "community-building" is my jam.

MORE ON MEDITATION PRACTICES

My earliest experiences in leading guided imagery meditations were the outcome of training in 1999 with the Southern California Society for Clinical Hypnosis (SCSCH). In 2004, I began facilitating weekly meditation workshops and relaxation techniques workshops for Kaiser Permanente members enrolled in the Los Angeles Medical Center (LAMC) Addiction Medicine Department’s Intensive Outpatient Program.

 
In 2011-2012, I completed training as a Certified Integral Qigong and Tai Chi Teacher with Roger Jahnke, O.M.D., through the Institute of Integral Qigong and Tai Chi (IIQTC). I immediately began offering instruction in IIQTC’s Tai Chi Easy™ to members of the Arroyo S.E.C.O Network of Time Banks. Based on material from my IIQTC training, I developed the curriculum “Mind-Body Recovery Techniques” and began offering those classes in 2011 at Kaiser. Those classes continued until my COVID-prompted, precipitous departure from Kaiser in early July, 2020. Through the most critical three years of the pandemic, I offered several weekly online Integral Qigong and Tai Chi sessions. (It gladdens my heart that some participants in those—and even now in in-person sessions—began with me back in 2011!) 
 
I expanded my repertoire via continued studies with Dr. Jahnke (The Vitality Enhancement Method, The Nine Phases of Qi Cultivation, The Seven Precious Gestures, ​Chinese Medicine Wheel Meditation, Microcosmic Orbit Meditation), Meg Flynn (Wang Ji Wu Sixteen Longevity Exercises, Guigen Qigong, Baduanjin Qigong aka “Eight Pieces of Brocade”) and with Susan Quon and the late Marvin Smalheiser, founder in 1977 of Tai Chi Magazine (Yang 108-Move Long Form Tai Chi).

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My 2014 “Intro to Tai Chi” workshop helped inaugurate Trade School Los Angeles (barter-based instruction). In 2015, I launched Mind-Body Los Angeles (Facebook page and Google calendar) to track and promote free, low-cost, or donation-based meditation, Tai Chi, Yoga, or other so-called "complementary" / "alternative" practices.

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Venues for my sessions have included: Kaiser LAMC (Addiction Medicine Department and all three of the hospital's "Healing Gardens," the Ortiz Taylor House (Los Angeles Historic Cultural Monument 1144), the Anabolic Monument (Los Angeles State Historic Park), the Metabolic Studio, and the current location that I dubbed "The Silver Lake Wilderness Chinese Elm Qigong Dojo" (TSLWCEQD "for short").

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It was in 2015 that I began regular attendance at a (now closed) secular Theravadan (Thai Forest tradition) Buddhist meditation center in East Hollywood and took up the study of and personal practice of Vipassana (the cultivation of mindful awareness). The marriage of Integral Qigong and Tai Chi with Vipassana has been a happy one.

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When that particular center closed in 2018, two teachers created Meditation Coalition. I now serves on the board of directors with a special interest in continuing to support the Black Indigenous People of Color and Allies Sangha, a group that gathers on the first Sunday of every month "for Black, Indigenous, AAPI, Latinx and all people of color and their allies interested in using the Buddhist principles of mindfulness and compassion to help work with and understand better the many painful issues that people of color encounter in America."

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One Saturday in September, 2019, I convened a meeting at his home of a number of Kaiser clinicians of various licensures (LMFTs, LCSWs, RNs, MDs) who either personally valued or provided or readily referred patients to so-called "complementary" or "alternative" healing modalities — folks from various departments whom I had come to know by merit of my meditation offerings in the Addiction Medicine Department. But none of them knew each other. It was a love fest. An MD from Infectious Diseases gifted us with what she called "a ghetto sound bath." We continued with monthly meetings for the next 5 months as the (unofficial) "Kaiser Integrative Medicine" team, until COVID diverted everyone's attentions and energies elsewhere.

Months before I could have guessed that I would be leaving Kaiser employment, with hopes of providing opportunities for stress reduction to Kaiser hospital workers, I volunteered via Human Resources' free Healthy Workforce Program to lead an early morning walking meditation practice in the Healing Garden at 4867 W. Sunset Blvd. on Thursday before my shift, with the proviso that visitors to the hospital be allowed to join in.

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In the final weeks before the pandemic (again, before we knew it was coming), I was invited to join a remarkable (and official) team over the Kaiser's LAMC Hospital: the newly-formed LAMC Wellness Council. The initial focus was on employee health, while also considering how hospital patients and their family members might be more fully supported. My project was to institute a series of Death Over Dinner events. While scheduling a first one, COVID swept in. It took a while, but I was able to facilitate only one virtually (on June 19, 2020), just two weeks before terminating my employment with Kaiser. 

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As I mentioned above, I led several weekly online Qigong sessions for the better part of three years. (My venue was the living room of my home, where I also provided individual psychotherapy sessions as my newly-formed private practice.) In September, 2021, I inaugurated in-person Integral Qigong and Tai Chi in a stretch of undeveloped "wilderness" near our Silver Lake house.

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Now we're in Claremont. Turns out, here at Pilgrim Place (the intentional/retirement community I moved to in 2023), there are residents (some in their 90s) who have been practicing various forms of Tai Chi and Qigong for decades. Currently, there are four weekly half-hour Qigong meetups, using Shibashi Qigong, a form that was introduced here in 1991. So, my repertoire continues to expand!

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​​CURRENT OFFERINGS

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HIC SUNT DRACONES

If you have read this far, well, g_d luv ya! As of the time of this writing (March 31, 2025), I am still in the process of rewriting every page of this long-neglected website! From this point down on this page, there are redundancies and obsolete information: dragons, as it were. Continue at your peril!

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AHEAD

2022-2023


HISTORY OF MY PSYCHOTHERAPY CAREER

"Beginning in 1999, I grew increasingly captivated by the idea that '[w]e become the stories we tell each other and ourselves, producing effects that range from the ridiculous to the sublime' (Jay S. Efrans, Michael D. Lukens, Robert J. Lukens; Language, Structure and Change: Frameworks of Meaning in Psychotherapy) and found myself enthralled during conversations and conjoint studies with a community of Narrative Therapy practitioners. Through the years, clients and I have benefitted from locating problems that we humans experience as entities apart from ourselves."

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In subsequent years, Lee's work has been increasingly informed by various meditation practices he has explored.

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Lee is an EMDRIA-trained provider of Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing (EMDR) and incorporates that modality in his work for the treatment of trauma, when doing so is indicated.

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SUPERVISION

Over the course of his 18-1/2 years as a psychotherapist in Kaiser Los Angeles Medical Center's Addiction Medicine Department, his responsibilities included supervising LMFT trainees and Associate LMFTs. From 2016 to 2020, he provided pro bono supervision for Southern California Counseling Center. Soon after leaving Kaiser in July, 2020, and opening a private practice, Lee employed and supervised two associates (both of whom are now licensed). His current supervisee is Soren Nilsson, aLMFT.

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PROFESSIONAL COMMUNITY

Since 2002, when he found his way to the Larchmont Salon, Lee has treasured the support of the Los Angeles Postmodern Psychotherapists community and is occasionally called upon to lead Definitional Ceremony reflecting teams of "outsider witnesses" for LA "PoMo" trainings. 

My undergraduate degree is a Bachelor of Music (Vocal Performance). My hoped-for career as professional opera singer never materialized. In 1996, I enrolled in Antioch University Los Angeles' Master of Clinical Psychology program, and saw my first clients while a trainee at Family Service Agency in Hollywood. My internship journey took me to three different sites (Kaiser Permanente Los Angeles Medical Center Addiction Medicine Department, then two non-public schools). In 2002, I completed my 3,000 supervised hours, passed both the Board of Behavioral Science's written and oral licensure exams, and received my license: MFC 39107.

When I created this website in 2014, I wrote, "Beginning in 1999, I grew increasingly captivated by the idea that '[w]e become the stories we tell each other and ourselves, producing effects that range from the ridiculous to the sublime' (Jay S. Efrans, Michael D. Lukens, Robert J. Lukens; Language, Structure and Change: Frameworks of Meaning in Psychotherapy) and found myself enthralled during conversations and conjoint studies with a community of Narrative Therapy practitioners. Through the years, clients and I have benefitted from locating problems that we humans experience as entities apart from ourselves."

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In 2018, I completed EMDRIA-training to become a provider of Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing (EMDR) and incorporated that modality in my work for the treatment of trauma.

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SUPERVISION

Over the course of my 18-1/2 years as a psychotherapist in Kaiser Los Angeles Medical Center's Addiction Medicine Department, my responsibilities included supervising LMFT trainees and Associate LMFTs. From 2016 to 2020, I provided pro bono supervision for Southern California Counseling Center. Soon after leaving Kaiser in July, 2020, and opening a private practice, I employed and supervised three associates. Both Farah Zerehi and Ryan Levin are now licensed. Soren Nilsson is an Associate Marriage and Family Therapist, completing their clinical hours now with other supervisors.​

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PROFESSIONAL COMMUNITY

In 2002, I found my way to the Larchmont Salon and, for the duration of his professional life, treasured the support of the Los Angeles Postmodern Psychotherapists community. I was occasionally called upon to lead Definitional Ceremony reflecting teams of "outsider witnesses" for LA "PoMo" trainings (a dozen of these, 2009-2019). 

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"THE GREATER SANGHA"

Roger Jahnke is known to declare that "socialization is part of the medicine!" One aspect of the work of Narrative Therapy is often that of finding or creating an audience for the preferred stories of ourselves that we are in the process of re-authoring. In a sort of neo-animistic way, Lee extends community and sangha to encompass all living beings (and can we please include even trees and boulders?). An ardent promoter of the restoration of native habitat, Lee had a few pre-pandemic opportunities to fold that interest into Integral Qigong and Tai Chi sessions by organizing "Urban Wilderness Qigong + Native Habitat Restoration"! Select 2nd, 4th, and 5th Sundays, beginning 10:30AM, in a sycamore-and-yucca grotto on the "paper street" (which is to say, unpaved and undeveloped) stretch of Adelbert Ave. in Silver Lake. Attendees were encouraged to help with native habitat restoration along any one of three more or less contiguous "paper streets" and along the Corralitas Red Car Property, a startling 10-acre, 50 ft. wide by 1 mile long strip of undeveloped land where the Pacific Electric Red Car trolley ran, 1904-1955, connecting Burbank and Glendale with Downtown L.A. (At the time of this writing in fall, 2020, most of the area where we worked is no longer accessible, due to illegal fencing. Ask me!)

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HIGHLIGHTS

2025

  • March 1. My new Silver Lake "Wilderness" Integral Qigong and Tai Chi schedule now adds the first Saturday of every month (in addition to continuing with sessions on third Saturdays, too).

  • February 18. Invited to provide a 60-minute presentation on Integral Qigong and Tai Chi at "Mind Lunch," a semi-monthly meeting of neuroscience students at The Nucleus of the Claremont Colleges (formerly the Keck Science Building). I included 40 minutes of Qigong practice.

  • January 24. My first meeting as a new member of Pilgrim Place's Worship and Spirituality Committee.

2024

  • December 5. Invited to provide a 90-minute presentation on Integral Qigong and Tai Chi at The Hive of the Claremont Colleges. I included 60 minutes of Qigong practice.

  • June 9. As a gesture of reparations, I present a Pilgrim Place visitor from China with items (including a silk brocade robe and a pair of Lotus Feet shows) that were shipped to the United States from China by my great-great aunt, a missionary there (1902 until her death there in 1911), so that she might return them to their place of origin. I also gave her chunks of roof tiles I had collected from an abandoned site of ruins outside Xian, during our trip in 2000.

  • April 27. As part of the Pomona College Reunion weekend activities (my husband is an alumnus), we went on a tour of the Pomona College Organic Farm. (We had been there a decade earlier.) Weeks before, I had scoped it out as a possible Qigong venue. On the tour, I spoke with the farm manager about the possibility. She was agreeable.

  • March 12. The beginning of a 3-week trip to the South, that was prompted by an invitation to inaugurate the Mississippi Center for Yoga and Health in Ocean Springs, Mississippi, with a Qigong session at the Grand Opening! But we began with a social justice-focus tour of Atlanta, Georgia; proceeded to rural central Alabama, where I undertook ancestral energy-healing and meditation practices in areas that were once home to my great, my great-great, and my great-great-great grandparents. One site in particular was the now-desolate acreage of the former Alabama State Penitentiary, where, according to the 1910 census, my great grandfather Parker was employed as a prison worker. If he himself did not perpetrate atrocities, he certainly witnessed or colluded with them. I also visited what remains of the once-grand, now-disentegrating home in the Algiers area of New Orleans, where my mother spent her youth and young adulthood. Near the end of my trip, I traveled to rural North Louisiana where I grew up to seek out for the first time (though it was 10 miles from my hometown) the land grant awarded to my great grandfather Jeptha Conger for his participation in the Battle of Monterey. (Born in Mississippi, he was the first Conger to arrive in Louisiana, my state of origin.) 

  • February 5. Inaugural Integral Qigong and Tai Chi session at Bethel Congregational Church, Ontario, California. After a few weeks of Monday sessions, we changed the day to Thursdays, a schedule that is still in place.

2023

  • December 8. Two months after moving to intentional/retirement community Pilgrim Place in Claremont, I was asked to lead Qigong for the first time, in lieu of the peer-led practice that was established in 2011 (now at four, half-hour sessions per week). My curriculum: Vitality Enhancement Method (warmups), followed by the Opening and the Water and Metal Element sections of the Guigen Qigong form. It was agreed that I would lead on the first Friday of every month.

  • July 18. Filmed with husband as Gay elders in long-term relationship by Aron Dahl for his music video "Lock&Key."

  • March 26. Co-facilitated Outs and Ins of Ecotherapy, an online Law and Ethics workshop, under the aegis of Educational Narratives, with former associate Kevin O’Bryan, LMFT.

2022

  • July 3. Meditation Coalition's first Sunday of the month Black, Indigenous, People of Color and Allies gathering resumes in-person meetings, now at a new (and still current venue: Clockshop, 2806 Clearwater St., Frogtown (Los Angeles), 90039, with facilitator Sydney Reece.

2021

  • September 11. Inaugural in-person Integral Qigong and Tai Chi session at "The Silver Lake Wilderness Chinese Elm Qigong Dojo" (TSLWCEQD "for short") on an accessible stretch of the Corralitas Red Car Property. These will continue weekly for two years, will change to monthly after our October, 2023 move to Claremont, and will change to semi-monthly in January, 2025 (the schedule that remains in place a the time of this writing: March 30, 2025).

  • July 23. Inaugural "Tai Chi Therapy" classes at two venues South Los Angeles, under contract with the County of Los Angeles Department of Health Services' Office of Diversion and Reentry. More venues will become available over time. These classes will continue for 23 months.

  • May 11. Discovered the newly-erected illegal fencing, blocking access to the Corralitas Red Car Property (preventing continued native habitat restoration.) (See December 29, 2021 below.)

  • May 10. Maintained COVID-imposed social distancing, while singing with twenty other members of the Wagner Ensemble members in a video-recording of Victoria's “Ave Maria” and Thomas Morley's “Now is the month of Maying” for the Sunday, May 23 “Meet the Artists” screening.

  • March 20. Accepted invitation to join Meditation Coalition's board of directors.

  • March 15. Participated in “A Time to Grieve, a Time to Heal” event at Kaiser Los Angeles Medical Center Hospital Healing Garden, contributing a set of Gregorian chant, Handel, and traditional "Shalom aleichem" (vocals), British Isles folk tunes (Appalachian flute) and a Vivaldi concerto movement (alto recorder).

2020

  • November 30. My guest presentation to Michael Anthony-Nalepa’s undergraduate course 3310B Postmodern Approaches to Addiction at Antioch University on integrating “alternative methods (outside of the medical model and even traditional therapy) to renegotiate addiction,” which is to say, meditation (with an emphasis on Tai Chi and Qigong).

  • November 17: I was invited to be a guest online presenter on Narrative Therapy as a modality in substance use treatment in an undergraduate social work class, Thompson Rivers University, Kamloops, B.C.

  • September 28: I increased my online Qigong sessions to five per week.

  • July 2: Last day of my employment at Kaiser Permanente Los Angeles Medical Center Addiction Medicine after 18-1/2 years.

  • June 21: Inaugural meeting of the Los Angeles Postmodern Therapists' White Cultural Activism Committee (to address racial tensions within community). 

  • June 19: Hosted the inaugural Kaiser Wellness Council's "Death Over Dinner" online event, attended by eight Kaiser providers)

  • April 1: Opened my business and launched my private practice as Mind-Body Los Angeles (three months before fleeing Kaiser employment).

  • March 24: While still on a 3-1/2 week vacation (that began before the World Health Organization recognized COVID-19 as a pandemic and extended just past the shutdown of all in-office patient contact at my Kaiser workplace), I initiated daily online Qigong sessions from my home. Once my vacation ended and I had to return to the clinic, my online sessions from home continued once per week. After I fled employment at the clinic (due to non-compliance of COVID protocols), I was freer to provide more weekly online Qigong sessions. 

  • February 28: By invitation, joined the Kaiser Permanente Los Angeles Medical Center Wellness Council for their second ever meeting.

  • February 23: Led an "urban wilderness hike" along the Corralitas Red Car Property for the monthly gathering of the Los Angeles Postmodern Therapists.

2019

  • December 29: Inaugurated an "Urban Wilderness Qigong + Native Habitat Restoration" series. Qigong participants (from KCAM, the Time Bank, Trade School Los Angeles, Los Angeles Eco-Village, and our neighborhood intentional community "Mixville Heights")  stayed after the session to help with the removal invasive, non-native grasses around and within drifts of native blue-eyed grass (Sisyrinchium bellum), milkweed (Asclepias eriocarpa), goldenstar flowers (Bloomeria crocea, and miniature lupines (Lupinus bicolor) along the Corralitas Red Car Property. The intention was that the series continue on an on-going basis. After a third round on February 9, 2020, the COVID crisis put an end to it. (In April, 2020, a developer put up illegal fencing, obviating any resumption of native habitat restoration. Complaints to the City of Los Angeles resulted in a written reprimand by the City Attorney's Office, with insistence that the fencing be removed and that unpermitted grading be restored. The developer took no action. As of the time of this writing—March, 2025—the City has taken no further action.)

  • November 10: Fourteenth time to participate in a Postmodern/Narrative Therapy Definitional Ceremony, this time as facilitator of the "Outsider Witness/Reflecting Team" at the 5th Annual Los Angeles Postmodern Psychotherapists's Gathering, USC

  • October 10: Began offering Kaiser Healthy Workforce Walking Meditation at the Los Angeles Medical Center Hospital, 2nd Floor Healing Garden, 4867 W. Sunset Blvd., Los Angeles, CA 90027. To continue on select Thursdays. See details and schedule here.

  • Sept. 14: Co-organized and hosted the inaugural gathering of Kaiser Complementary and Alternative Medicine (KCAM) providers: Kaiser physicians, pharmacists, social workers, and psychotherapists, who are interested in further development of integrative medicine at Los Angeles Medical Center. We members supported each others' personal and professional interest in and use of meditation, Pranic Healing, Qigong and Tai Chi, Reiki, sound baths; while also strategizing how how best to advocate for their official inclusion at Kaiser. (The group met monthly on a volunteer basis, until the COVID crisis demanded that we direct our attention and energies elsewhere.)

2018

2017

  • October: Didactic presentation on Narrative Therapy to Kaiser Permanente Los Angeles Medical Center Addiction Medicine trainees and associates, that included a Postmodern/Narrative Therapy Definitional Ceremony (my thirteenth)

  • August 7: Twelfth time to participate in an eleventh Postmodern/Narrative Therapy Definitional Ceremony (as co-provider of a Southern California Counseling Center supervision group at the Karsh Center

     

  • June 11-16: East-West Zen Sesshin (six-day silent retreat), facilitated by Fr. Gregory Mayers, C. Ss. R (Redemptorist), authorized in Sanbo Zen tradition; Mercy Center, Burlingame, California

  • March 20: Eleventh time to participate in an eleventh Postmodern/Narrative Therapy Definitional Ceremony (as co-provider of a Southern California Counseling Center supervision group at the Karsh Center

  • ​March 11: First of two cranio-sacral treatments from a resident of the Los Angeles Eco-Village

  • March 6: Tenth time to participate in a Postmodern/Narrative Therapy Definitional Ceremony (as co-provider of a Southern California Counseling Center supervision group at the Karsh Center

  • January 23: Ninth time to participate in a Postmodern/Narrative Therapy Definitional Ceremony (as co-provider of a Southern California Counseling Center supervision group at the Karsh Center

     

​2016-2017

  • ​​Organized an Integrative Medicine lecture series for Kaiser Permanente Los Angeles Medical Center Family Medicine Resident MDs, including Candace Elliott, MN, FNP-BC, PMN-BC, SEP (Tai Chi and Qigong practitioner, presenter), Hannah Kapp (certified yoga therapist), Kristin Ebbert, L.Ac. (acupuncturist), James Adams, PhD (Associate Professor, School of Pharmacy, Chumash Healer, co-author with Cecilia Garcia of Healing with Medicinal Plants of the West)​

  • October 29: Eighth time to participate in a Postmodern/Narrative Therapy Definitional Ceremony, a didactic presentation at the Southern California Counseling Center's annual retreat

  • October: Didactic presentation on Narrative Therapy to Kaiser Permanente Los Angeles Medical Center Addiction Medicine trainees and associates, that included a Postmodern/Narrative Therapy Definitional Ceremony (my seventh)

  • May 22: The nickname "Mixville Heights" for our (modified) neighorhood intentional community was born at a potluck in the courtyard of our Silver Lake home. (See August, 2014.)

  • January 3: Inaugural conjoint sit of two affinity groups at Buddhist meditation center in East Hollywood: 1) Black, Indigenous, and People of Color Sangha and 2) White Allies for Social Justice. This gathering will continue on the first Sunday of every month, until the meditation center closes almost 3 years later. At the point, these meetings will continue under the aegis of Meditation Coalition.)

​2015

  • November 28: First of several visits to Kanzeonji Non-Sectarian Buddhist Temple and Shiva Ashram Yoga Center for Zen Yoga with Rev. Watanabe

  • November 20: Introduced Integral Qigong and Tai Chi (IQTC) to Kaiser Permanente Los Angeles Medical Center Family Medicine Resident MDs, Hospital Healing Garden​​

  • November 12: Accompanied friends to Shambhala Center in Eagle Rock, who wanted to investigate that tradition of meditation

  • November 2: First visit to All Saint's Church Pasadena's Monday Night Meditation (Zen)

  • October: Didactic presentation on Narrative Therapy to Kaiser Permanente Los Angeles Medical Center Addiction Medicine trainees and associates, that included a Postmodern/Narrative Therapy Definitional Ceremony (my sixth)

  • August 30: Co-organized and hosted the inaugural Los Angeles Postmodern Psychotherapists's Gathering at Kaiser Permanente Los Angeles Medical Center (now an annual event hosted by USC).

  • June 3: On or around this day, I began learning The Eight Pieces of Brocade Qigong form from a DVD.

  • May 26: Launched Mind-Body Los Angeles (Facebook page and Google calendar) to track and promote free, low-cost, or donation-based meditation, Tai Chi, Yoga, or other so-called "complementary" practices.

  • April 19. Return to Buddhist meditation center in East Hollywood, 4-1/2 years after one and only previous visit. I returned the next week and the next, etc. I became a regular until the center closed 3-1/2 years later.

  • March 15: ​Led Qigong session as a component of a self-care workshop for Los Angeles Postmodern Psychotherapists  ​

  • March 4: First experience of a sound bath (individual), provided by Time Bank member Britta Gudmunson

2014

  • May 23: Helped inaugurate the newly-founded  Trade School Los Angeles (barter-based instruction) with an “Intro to Tai Chi” workshop that moved between the Ortiz Taylor House (Los Angeles Historic Cultural Monument 1144) and the Corralitas Red Car Property in Silver Lake

  • April 27: Officially enrolled in and attended Marvin Smalheiser's Tai Chi classes at Los Angeles City College

  • ​April 26: Coordinated World Tai Chi and Qigong Day Observation at Kaiser Permanente Los Angeles Medical Center and co-taught with Meg Flynn and Walter Rodriguez 

  • January 12. Return to Wu Style 108-Move Tai Chi classes

  • January 6. First visit to DeDe Nardini's Yang 108-Move Tai Chi classes at Griffith Park Adult Community Center

​2013

  • December 21. First visit to the Yang 108-Move Tai Chi classes in Griffith Park, as taught by Marvin Smalheiser, founder (in 1977) of Tai Chi Magazine (and neighbor in Silver Lake).

  • August 14: Led Guigen Qigong (Earth Element and Fire Element only) for Series Studies #1 Yellow/Red​

  • August: Created a database populated with information about backyard fruit trees in our neighborhood, a document that ultimately provided the structure for the formation of our (modified) intentional community, that we nicknamed (in 2016) officially as "Mixville Heights."

  • June 19: Led Tai Chi Easy™ session for Heal One World

  • June 18: Was profiled at "Urban Healers: A chronicle of the every day heroes that enhance the urban collective experience" 

  • June 16: Fifth time to participate in a Postmodern/Narrative Therapy Definitional Ceremony, on behalf of a therapist friend's private practice client

  • April 10: Having already (unofficially) accepted referrals to my Mind-Body Recovery Techniques sessions in Kaiser Addiction Medicine from providers in Psychiatry, I was officially authorized to accept referrals to Kaiser members who where not enrolled in addiction or so-called "codependency" treatment, provided there was some kind of intake form in their electronic medical record. Accordingly, I created an intake form.

  • ​February 3: Led Integral Qigong and Tai Chi mini-sessions at Armory Center for the Arts, Pasadena; as part of a special “Repair Yourself Cafe” edition of Transition Pasadena's bi-monthly Repair Cafe events  ​

2012

  • November 9: Completed Integral Qigong and Tai Chi Teacher Certification Training (Level 3) in Santa Barbara, with Roger Jahnke, and received certificate of having completed 200 hours.

  • ​November 8: Presented at Institute for Integral Qigong and Tai Chi (IIQTC) Level 3 Training, La Casa de Maria Retreat Center, Montecito, CA

  • August 29: Began Integral Qigong and Tai Chi Teacher Certification Training (Level 2) in Santa Barbara, with Roger Jahnke. 

  • July 25: Began leading Integral Qigong and Tai Chi sessions, Anabolic Monument / Under Spring / Metabolic Studio, Downtown Los Angeles

  • June 11: I added Spanish language Mind-Body Recovery Techniques (Técnicas de Recuperación Mente-Cuerpo) as my third weekly series to my schedule at Kaiser Addiction Medicine. Ultimately, there were not enough monolingual Spanish speaker enrollees. I tried switching to bilingual, but found that—while I could sustain either Spanish or English alone in a session—I did not have the facility to switch back and forth. The last of these sessions was in July, 2013.

  • March 28: Presented at Institute for Integral Qigong and Tai Chi Teacher Certification Training (Level 1) Training, Wimberly, TX 

  • March 23: Began Integral Qigong and Tai Chi Teacher Certification Training (Level 1) in Wimberly, TX, with Roger Jahnke. 

  • March 5: Fourth time to participate in a Postmodern/Narrative Therapy Definitional Ceremony, Los Angeles Postmodern Therapists' First Monday Reading Group

  • February 6: Third time to participate in a Postmodern/Narrative Therapy Definitional Ceremony, Los Angeles Postmodern Therapists' First Monday Reading Group

     

  • January 6: On or around this day, I experimented again with learning a traditional Tai Chi form; specifically, the Yang 108-Move form, as taught by Susan Quon at the Silver Lake Recreation Center (for $2 per class)! I experienced no queasiness as I had years before! I persisted with Susan's weekly classes (and my own daily practice at home) and had memorized the form after two years.

2011

  • October 8: Tai Chi Easy™ at Flash Mob Meditation, Pershing Square

  • October 7: First visit to and acupuncture treatment at Emperor's College of Traditional Oriental Medicine, Santa Monica, California. This turned out to be the beginning of a four-month period of treatment and dietary consultation, prompting me to take up the anti-inflammatory, alkaline-acid balance diet (that I more or less maintain to this day, >13 years later), and resulting in my losing 55 lbs in 3-1/2 months).

  • October 1: Led 30 minutes of Tai Chi Easy™ during the midmorning break at the California Time Bank Conference 2011 at the Armory Center for the Arts, Pasadena, California.    

  • September 20: Offically began Mind-Body Recovery Techniques (my version of Tai Chi Easy™) classes, Kaiser Permanente Los Angeles Medical Center Addiction Medicine Department. (They continued for 8-1/2 years, until COVID arrived and I fled unsafe work conditions.)

  • September 16: At the Echo Park Time Bank's Park[ing] Day pocket park on Sunset Blvd. in Silver Lake, I exchanged Qigong moves for Sevillanas moves, as led by a dancer member.

  • July 19: Began offering Tai Chi Easy™ classes via the Echo Park Time Bank​

  • July 6: First time to incorporate Tai Chi Easy™ instruction as a form of "moving meditation" during Day Treatment at Kaiser.

  • June 11: First time to attend Meg Flynn’s Qigong practice sessions in Hollywood. Over time, she would lead Guigen Qigong, Wang Ji Wu Sixteen Longevity Exercises, and Zhong Yuan Qigong (Part One). I memorized each sequence. Per Roger Jahnke's dictum "The minute you learn something, begin to teach it," I incorporated these additional Qigong forms into my sessions for the Time Bank and at Kaiser.

  • April 10: After two months of ambivalence, I enrolled in and attended a five-day Tai Chi Easy™ Practice Leader Training with Roger Jahnke, OMD through his Institute of Integral Qigong and Tai Chi in Santa Barbara, California. I arrived there with no interest in leading a practice, instead only hoping to benefit personally and to come away with a routine I could do to enhance my well-being. About two hours into the first training session, I found myself terrifically excited about leading others in the practice! (Such are the persuasive powers of Roger Jahnke!)

2010

  • October 17: Inspired by the meditation practice of a Kaiser trainee I was supervising, I paid a visit to the Buddhist meditation center that was her sangha. I benefited greatly, intended to return regularly, didn't. I did maintain a daily, personal practice of a 20-minute sit for the next 1-1/2 months.

  • March 31: Second time in a Postmodern/Narrative Therapy Definitional Ceremony, this time both conducting the interview with "the person in the center of the circle" and also interviewing the outsider witness/reflecting team, Kaiser Permanente Los Angeles Medical Center Addiction Medicine Department's Codependency Education Class Topic #7: Family Dynamics

  • March 7: First time facilitating an outsider witness/reflecting team in a Postmodern/Narrative Therapy Definitional Ceremony, Malibu Participants Conference

2008

  • September 28: During a 3-week trip to India, I allow my husband (a yoga student of several years) to lead me through the series of asana that he used in his personal practice. Later, I wrote that the routine, "allowed me to survive the trip in significant ways."

2007

  • July 8: After ruling out yoga as a mind-body practice, I explore the Wu 108-Move Tai Chi form, but last only six classes, due to a sense of queasiness after each class.​

2005

  • February 1: Returned to employment (after 5-1/2 years away) at Kaiser Permanente Los Angeles Medical Center Addiction Medicine Department, where, among other services, I inherited the Tuesday and Thursday Day Treatment relaxation techniques and meditation workshop that were introduced into the curriculum in 1997 by my Antioch University Los Angeles classmate Dee Clark!​​​​

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