“…the teacher in order to give teaching to others first himself or herself must get deep experience.” The Dalai Lama

I have to admit it; I spent much of my early life feeling like this…

That was too bad because it’s a horrible way to feel. It was also strange because it didn’t match my “success” as a young person.

I was born in Brooklyn and grew up in Syracuse, New York.  I was at the top of my class in school, received my B.A. from Harvard and my M.F.A. from the School of Visual Arts in New York.

When I was 15 I stumbled into bulimia and it took 7 years to find my way out. One memory of that time is from my high school graduation. I was the salutatorian and had to give a speech. I stood at the podium and looked out on the huge room of faces (not one person there knew I was bulimic) and asked “What does it mean to be human?” That may have been the official beginning of my journey back to self-esteem.

After school I produced educational programs for children and adults at the Museum of American Folk Art and the Museum of Modern Art.  Producing took me to CBS, where I was responsible for a daily national radio broadcast.  Later I produced for Dean Witter and other Fortune 500 companies, interviewing managers and senior executives about performance and success.  With those interviews, I created print, audio, and video communications that were distributed nationally and internationally.

I have always loved performance and while in New York I appeared in various performances including Meredith Monk's  "American Archeology #1" on Roosevelt Island.

Illness taught me a lot about self-esteem. Unfortunately, a number of my family members were ill. I was a caregiver for several people who passed away from cancer and AIDS, including my youngest brother who died at age 27. He was a singer and songwriter who taught me many things, including the power of humor and art to transform even the most difficult circumstances.

Later I was ill myself, which showed me how important self-esteem is in recovering health, and how much illness can impact self-esteem. For two years I had to sit still, and “just be” as I underwent cutting edge treatments that most people had never heard of. Being sick took me to places on the globe and inside myself that I never imagined going. I was almost gone. But then I came back and it was a joy to feel my self, to know how much I had learned and that I would survive.

My recovery from illness included many different therapies: acupuncture, nutritional counseling, chiropractic care, osteopathy, psychotherapy, family constellations, ozone therapy, neural therapy, energetic healing and more. These various modalities gave me additional ways of looking at and understanding the self and its connection to the body, family and world at large.

One day in New York City, I was walking down the street and a song popped into my head. It’s a song that I still sing today when I first walk into a classroom of children – it begins:
“I am the Queen of Self-Esteem
What does that mean?
I love myself
I love myself
I love myself!”

This song made me laugh and stopped my self-criticism in its tracks, so I decided to listen and went home to write it down. I realized that talking about self-esteem addressed some of the deepest questions in my own life and also satisfied my wish to “do good” in the world. In 2005 I founded the company "Queen of Self-Esteem LLC" to create communications that help people have greater self-esteem.

I currently live in New York City, where I serve as Personal Secretary to the Queen of Self-Esteem.

Queen of Self-Esteem® and the "Q with Crown" logo are registered trademarks owned by Queen of Self-Esteem LLC.