Sonora Thomas laid out patterned scarves along her office floor. Each acted as a checkpoint along the road of life. Thomas stood beside a scarf, acting out a technique she uses with her clients at MCLAs Counseling Services.

They get more information if they do it versus just talking about it, Thomas said. So, I find getting up and being active, is helpful, as you start to learn more information rather than just thinking hypothetically.

When students come in and talk about the possibility of switching majors, Thomas pulls out her plastic bin full of scarves and has students practice the different aspects of deciding to do a career in a certain field. They start out from doing ten years down the road, to 20, and so on. Sometimes students realize the difficulties that may come with a different major, and they may decide to just stick it out with their current major.

Thomas enjoys working with college students because many are beginning to understand themselves and forming ideas and different viewpoints that may be different from the same ones their parents held onto. Students are discovering how they want to live their lives, and what they want to fill their lives with.

Its such a great age and a time in peoples lives, Thomas explained, and theyre moving away from their families and getting to see that things are different, and not everybody does things the way their families do it. Its a big eye opener theres so much going on at this age. Its a total kick to be around all of that, and supporting people on that quest of self-discovery.

Since joining the College, Thomas has been working to get students involved in the act of meditation. She has participated in different events held in all three of the residence halls and last semester she even began to have a weekly session where students can get together in one big space to sit down and relax via the power of meditation. These sessions do not focus solely on completely clearing ones mind as she knows this can be hard for beginners but just giving people a moment during the day where they can just stop and relax.

Initially, her meditation sessions were held in Sullivan Lounge, a space she quickly realized was not the ideal spot for meditation. This semester, she holds the weekly session in Bowman Hall room 201 between 12 and 12:30 p.m. Thomas has had a much better student turnout this semester; she said shes had as many as nine people show up.

I put on relaxing music, we do about tenminutes of movement to help people slow down, feel their body and breath, turn their attention inward, she said, and then I guide them through about 15 to 20 minutes of meditation.

Thomas is an Austin, Texas native who joined MCLA in 2016 from Austin Riggs, a psychiatric hospital in Stockbridge, Mass. She holds a masters degree from Lesley University in clinical mental health counseling. Over the course of her time as an undergraduate student, Thomas went to six different colleges. She first started off at Simmons College for a year, before she decided to take a year off and go to Barcelona, Spain. Thomas remarked that going into college right after graduating high school was not the best decision at the time for her.

After a year and a half, I thought well I really should get my life together, she said. I decided to come back [to the United States] and went to a community college in Oregon for two years, and then the closest college, for me, was in Boise, Idaho.

At Boise State University, she studied voice performance. While preparing to go to graduate school for music, she taught at a high school for a year. As she taught voice lessons and took graduate courses, Thomas found herself talking about people and their lives in an hour-long music lesson.

She soon realized singing wasnt what she wanted to do with her life. Thomas found herself much more interested in learning about peoples stories; she knew she wasnt in the right field for her and decided to switch into studying to become a therapist. It took her about fiveyears to decide on a graduate program; she ended up at Lesley University.

Its such a good experience to do something completely new, said Thomas, and as an older student, I appreciated it so much more and I wasnt burnout. After being in the work world it was so much fun to go to classes, and to learn, write papers, read and to do group projectsI was a much better student in my 30s than in my 20s.

Thomas participated in an internship at Lesleys counseling center; her husband moved out to the Berkshires to take on a job at Williams College. Thomas joined him a year later, taking a position at Austin Riggs before joining MCLA. She had been looking for a while to move back into a college setting.

In her free time, Thomas loves to be outside hiking with her dog and even snowshoeing.

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Sonora Thomas: Healing minds through meditation - The Beacon