“Compassion is not a relationship between the healer and the wounded. It's a relationship between equals. Only when we know our own darkness well can we be present with the darkness of others. Compassion becomes real when we recognize our shared humanity.”
― Pema Chödrön
Amanda brings her experience from many years of travel, study and inner examination. A year in south India (2001) began her journey into holistic health. There she studied yoga, pranayama, reiki, and meditation. Upon moving to Latin America (2002), she began to study other traditional approaches to health and life. In Costa Rica she learned about herbs and plants with shamans in the rainforest, practiced Qi Qong, martial arts and latin dance. In Peru (2003), she studied with a curandero at a shamanic addiction treatement center in the amazon called Takiwasi. And in Cuba, she studied the creative and adaptive methods of alternative medicine that has been developed due to their lack of outside resources (and further experienced the joy of latin dance).
With a B.A. degree from the global college at Long Island University in Health, Education & Spirituality (a study-abroad major she composed herself through the school), she returned to her home state of Texas. There Amanda went through a year-long Kundalini Yoga Teacher Training program in Austin as well as attended a year of accupuncture and Traditional Chinese Medicine school. After two years of rest and integration in Texas from her travels, she moved to Boulder, Colorado (2005) to get her Masters degree in Contemplative Psychology from Naropa University. |
Amanda Aguilera, PsyD
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After graduating with her Masters degree (2008), Amanda began working as a parent-infant psychotherapist in the Community Infant Program of the Mental Health Center of Boulder and Broomfield Counties. She has managed restorative justice programs, facilitated restorative processes and has been training groups in restorative practices since 2008. Currently she works with the Right Use of Power Institute, and has a Doctorate of Psychology focusing on the dynamics of power and shame in the justice system. To gain experience in the criminal justice system, she worked with inmates (diagnosis, suicide assessment & therapeutic intervention) as well as people on probation for several years in Boulder County. When she can, Amanda practices ninjutsu, meditation, yoga, and dance.