Valorie Diane Thomas PhD consultant/coach
DEI, Inclusion, Decolonial learning
Two Mustangs: Horse Healing & Social-Emotional-Intellectual Growth
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My practice is informed by decolonialism, intuitive inquiry, somatics, mindfulness, traditional and indigenous esoteric knowledge, years of teaching, and current organizational research and best practices. As a consultant and personal coach I empower professionals, artists, students, seekers, learners and makers from all backgrounds, at all career and life stages, who are looking to transform and regain or discover balance. Maybe your organization needs inspiration and agility in relation to realizing commitments to inclusion and equity and living up to its potential. Maybe you need a reset on vision, healing, and framing more inspiring goals. Maybe you're transitioning from student to creator/professional. Maybe it's time to dive into your intuition, knowing, and courage alongside formal education. My approach includes mindfulness, yogic energy work, art/writing, and equine somatics-- we interact with horses on the ground who are willing to collaborate to enhance our learning (*not to "use" horses as tools). As a late-identified neurodivergent, first gen, decolonial Professor (emeritus) of English and Africana Studies for 20+ years, writer, artist, mindfulness practitioner, survivor, and social justice advocate, I've developed a culturally inclusive modality grounded in polyvagal theory, neuroscience, and intuitive exploration.
My guidance is about transformative change not about maintaining an obsolete and often toxic status quo; you have the option to effect change and create possibility, and the additional option to experience the transformative presence of horses offering awareness, reflection, and their deeply social and relational way of being.
About Valorie Thomas, PhD
Our Mission
At Valorie Thomas, PhD, our mission is to provide exceptional consulting services that empower clients to achieve their business and personal goals. We deliver transformative solutions tailored to the particular needs of each client.
Background
I bring a specialized skillset anchored by a diverse cultural, experiential, and scholarly background and interdisciplinary academic and teaching experience. I hold a PhD and MA in English from UC Berkeley, an MFA in Screenwriting from UCLA, and am the first African American and first BIPOC tenure track faculty hired and tenured in the Pomona College English Dept (while also joint appointed in Intercollegiate Africana Studies, and affiliated with Gender & Women's Studies, American Studies, and Media Studies), offering Pomona’s first and for decades only courses in Screenwriting and in Contemporary Native American Literature and Native American Women Writers, winning two Wig Teaching Awards, a Draper Center Community Outreach Award, a Queer Ally Award from the Claremont Colleges Queer Resource Center, curating Pomona’s first African Diaspora art exhibition and symposium “Vertigo@Midnight: New Visual AfroFuturisms & Speculative Migrations,” organizing the biannual collaborative symposium “Healing Ways: Decolonizing Our Minds, Our Bodies, Ourselves — A Week of Healing,” introducing mindfulness and somatic pedagogy and practices into English and Africana Studies courses and programming, and organizing DEI related curriculum, programming, and outreach in English for 25 years. I have served as Program Coordinator for American Studies and Gender & Women's Studies, chaired multiple job searches, and been an advisor to the Pomona College Art Museum (now Benton Art Museum). My courses include Literature of Incarceration, AfroFuturisms, Introduction to African American Literature, Film and Literature of the African Diaspora, Toni Morrison, and Healing Narratives. I hold certifications from the HERD Institute, Mindful Leaders Project, and Innerlight Method.
My consulting focuses on delivering innovative individual and organizational solutions to clients across industries and backgrounds.
Approach
I listen, and together we build a conversation about your vision and how to make it happen. Then we work closely together to develop innovative, intuitively attuned, sustainable, informed, future-facing solutions.
