Today we’d like to introduce you to Flyy High.
Hi Flyy, so excited to have you on the platform. So before we get into questions about your work-life, maybe you can bring our readers up to speed on your story and how you got to where you are today?
I was raised in a traditional West Indian household, where children were expected to be respectful, obedient, and quiet. Emotions weren’t something we necessarily felt comfortable exploring. We were taught to keep going, keep producing, and keep it together. I was “mature” early on. I knew how to look strong and unaffected, but in truth, I’ve always been deeply sensitive. Even when I couldn’t say what I was feeling out loud, I felt it all.
I started reading at 4 years old, and by 6, I had my first journal. That journal became my safe space. Writing helped me make sense of the parts of life I didn’t yet understand. Poetry came naturally. It gave rhythm and shape to the things I didn’t feel comfortable or allowed to say. I wasn’t trying to be a poet. I was just trying to hold onto myself in a world that didn’t always make room for tenderness.
As I got older, I never stopped writing, but I kept performing too. I became an English teacher, moved to California, then shifted into real estate and admin work. From the outside, it looked like I had it all together: stability, some success, a life that made sense on paper. But inside, something still didn’t sit right. I was showing up for everyone else but quietly disappearing from myself. I wasn’t just burned out, my own light was dimming. And in that quiet unraveling, I started to hear myself again.
I’d spent years performing strength while suffering in silence, subconsciously shrinking myself in relationships, and abandoning my own needs to keep the peace. I was often praised for being dependable, supportive, and easy to get along with, but no one was aware enough to ask me what it was costing me. I didn’t have the language then, but I now know that what I was experiencing was deep self-abandonment. The version of me that kept it all together was slowly fading and nobody knew, because, the truth is, I had trained them not to see it.
I was also navigating codependency, especially in my romantic and family relationships. I often found myself playing the fixer, the emotional translator, the one who overcompensated to avoid rejection or loss. That role felt familiar. It made me feel needed. But it was also draining and honestly unsustainable.
All of this was layered with the cultural and religious conditioning I carried with me. Those messages told me to be strong, be silent, stay loyal, and never question the system. There wasn’t room to grieve, to question, or to even feel sometimes. I struggled with emotional neglect, chronic comparison, and the kind of quiet invalidation that never looked like harm but still left wounds.
Even a work, I felt disconnected. I was good at my jobs, but they didn’t nourish me. I had to ask myself: Who am I outside of what I do for others? Outside of being useful, helpful, dependable?
That question sent me into the deepest reckoning of my life. But it also started my healing.
With the help of a therapist, I was eventually diagnosed with Complex PTSD. That shifted everything. Suddenly, the dissociation, hyper-vigilance, fatigue, lack of boundaries, and waves of shame all had a name. I wasn’t too sensitive or broken. I was carrying the weight of “little t” trauma that had never been acknowledged or tended to.
And then grief showed up, not like a tidal wave, but like a quiet old friend. I grieved the girl who smiled through her own unraveling. I grieved the versions of me I had to shed to step into something more real. But that grief didn’t break me, it brought clarity. It reminded me of what mattered, to me.
Looking back, I can see that the truth is, I couldn’t have gotten to this point without community. Healing didn’t happen in one big moment; it happened in a collection of small ones. From friends who saw me when I was barely holding on, to healing circles where I didn’t have to be “on,” to peer support spaces that reminded me I wasn’t alone in these invisible battles. Community helped me feel human again. It reminded me I could be held, too.
Eventually, a friend who saw all of this in me recommended a peer support program through Loyola Marymount University. That moment changed everything. I continued my studies on emotional regulation, facilitating groups, and holding space for others in a new and deeper way. And for the first time in a long time, I wasn’t pretending. I was finally living in my truth.
I returned to the tools that had always been with me: writing, breathwork, stillness, and truth-telling. Supporting others through burnout, transition, identity loss, and emotional overwhelm became not just a skill, but a calling. To be clear, I’m not here to sell you perfection, like everything in my life is perfect now. However, I am hoping that in sharing my story here, I am offering an opportunity to a new perspective. An opportunity to go a different way, to take a path that makes room for all of you, even the parts that are still in process.
And just to be clear, healing is not a destination. I’m still exploring, still peeling back layers, still learning how to honor my needs in real time. We all are. I don’t have it all figured out, but I know now that wholeness isn’t about being perfect. It’s about being honest. And that’s the kind of space I offer for others, too.
We all face challenges, but looking back would you describe it as a relatively smooth road?
Not even close, and maybe that’s been my greatest teacher. I’ve walked through trauma, burnout, codependency, self-betrayal, and grief. I’ve stayed in relationships that asked me to shrink. I took on roles that drained me just to feel needed. I was praised for being the strong one, but eventually I had to unlearn that strength wasn’t a badge. It was a burden I didn’t ask to carry.
Burnout became my baseline. I struggled with feeling like I had to earn love by being agreeable, useful, or low-maintenance. And when I couldn’t name what was wrong, my body started to carry the weight: fatigue, brain fog, hormonal imbalances. I felt numb, like I was disappearing in a life that looked “right” but didn’t feel like mine.
Financial stress made things even harder, especially while choosing a path rooted in healing work. But through it all, I began making small but powerful lifestyle changes. I transitioned to a plant-based lifestyle, got more intentional about nourishing my body, spent more time in nature, and started honoring the cues of my nervous system instead of pushing through. I started showing up for myself the way I always had for everyone else.
I also wrestled with deeply ingrained beliefs, like thinking my needs were too much or that my dreams were too unrealistic. But the more I listened to myself, the more I realized I didn’t need to fit into anyone else’s version of a meaningful life….what I needed was to create mine, as many times as I needed to to get it right.
Grief came along too, but not to destroy me. It showed up like an unexpected friend, helping me release the version of myself I’d been performing just to survive. And that grief? It didn’t drown me, it revealed me.
Healing isn’t a destination. It’s a journey I’m still walking, like we all are. I’m still becoming, still learning, still softening into the truth of who I am. And if anything I’ve shared sounds familiar, I want you to know: you’re not too far gone. There’s another way to live, and you don’t have to find it alone.
Thanks – so what else should our readers know about your work and what you’re currently focused on?
I create spaces for healing, truth-telling, and coming home to yourself. I’m a peer support specialist, author, accountability coach, and future therapist. But more than titles, I’m someone who helps people feel seen, especially the ones who are used to hiding in plain sight.
My work centers folks who’ve spent their lives carrying others: the high-functioning, the emotionally burnt-out, the cycle-breakers, the ones who look like they have it all together but are secretly asking, what about me? I support them through emotional healing, inner child work, identity reclamation, and life transitions that don’t always come with a map.
I use storytelling, psychology, somatic practices, and poetry to help people reconnect with their own voice and values. My sessions are gentle but deep, places where vulnerability isn’t just welcomed, it’s honored.
I’m most proud of how I’ve turned my personal healing into collective medicine. My book, old soul new vessel, is part poetry, part truth-telling, part journal, and all heart. It’s the book I wish someone handed me when I was losing myself. I’ve also led healing workshops, peer support circles, and events that help people remember who they are beneath the survival roles.
What sets me apart is that I live this work. I don’t show up as an expert above. I show up as someone who’s still in it, still exploring, still softening. I bring cultural understanding, real-world experience, and a lot of heart. I’m not here to fix anyone. I’m here to remind them that they were never broken.
And honestly, none of this would be possible without community. The women who held me when I couldn’t hold myself. The friends who saw my potential when I forgot how to dream. The people I’ve worked with who let me walk beside them on their healing journey. That’s what makes this work sacred, how deeply it connects us back to each other.
I’m especially looking forward to expanding my practice by offering more one-on-one sessions, where we can really slow down, tune in, and co-create spaces meant for meaningful transmutation and transformation.
So maybe we end on discussing what matters most to you and why?
What matters most to me is wholeness. Not perfection, not performance, wholeness.
That means living in alignment with my truth, creating space for others to do the same, and choosing integrity over image. It means being able to show up fully as myself, roots, softness, edges, brilliance, and inviting others to feel safe doing the same.
Emotional freedom matters to me. I know what it feels like to be in rooms where I couldn’t say what I needed. To shrink parts of myself just to feel accepted. So now, I do the opposite. I create spaces where people don’t have to earn belonging. I create spaces where they don’t have to abandon themselves to feel seen.
Intergenerational healing matters too (and maybe the most). I carry my ancestors with me, their sacrifices, their strength, their silence, their dreams, and aspirations too. And I know that every time I choose to break a pattern, tell the truth, or honor my own needs, I’m not just doing it for me. I’m doing it for the ones who came before me and the ones coming after.
I also believe healing doesn’t happen in isolation. It happens in community. I’ve been held, seen, and reminded of my worth in rooms where I didn’t have to explain my existence. That’s why I show up the way I do. Because I want to be the kind of space I needed, real, tender, affirming, and honest. That’s what drives everything I do.
Pricing:
- Paperback book $20
- Hard cover book $35
- Coaching sessions $40/hr
- Low income coaching sessions – sliding scale
Contact Info:
- Website: https://www.flyyhigh2wise.com
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/flyyhigh2wise
- Other: https://url.td/poetrybyflyyhigh
Image Credits
Charles Keyes, Samuill Kalambay, AJ Washington, Simone St. Dill, and Vision Taylor.
