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Hello, my name is Chakriya, though most people know me simply as Chatti. I am a holistic wellness practitioner based in Wheat Ridge, Colorado, and I also hold credentials as a registered art therapist and licensed psychotherapist. My work is devoted to guiding courageous souls who are seeking stillness, balance, and healing in the midst of life’s demands.

For much of my own journey, I struggled to find my voice. It wasn’t until I discovered the creative arts that I began to feel truly at home within myself. Art-making became more than expression—it became a way to transform pain into beauty, and to release what no longer served me. Through creativity, I learned to quiet the inner critic that whispered, “You’re not enough,” and embrace the deeper truth: “You are already whole, already beautiful.”

Over time, my path expanded to include sound healing and vibrational work. This practice resonates with both my love of science and what I call Earth Magick—the mysterious and grounding forces that connect us to the natural world. While I began formal training in sound healing in 2018, my fascination goes back much further. In eighth grade, my science project led me to study how music affected the growth of plants (pinto beans, to be exact). That early curiosity grew into a lifelong awareness: like plants, our bodies and minds respond intimately to sound, rhythm, and vibration.

Today, I feel deeply honored to share this integrative work with others. Whether through art, sound, or therapeutic practice, my intention is always the same—to create a safe space for healing, transformation, and the rediscovery of your own inner voice.

MY PATH

My family came to the United States as refugees after surviving four years of genocide in Cambodia. I grew up in California carrying both the weight of that history and the gifts of resilience it gave me. At UCLA, I studied Sociology, Women’s Studies, and Anthropology, where I first began to nurture a lifelong curiosity about people, culture, and the ways we create meaning in the world.

That curiosity eventually blossomed into a deeper calling. I earned my Master’s in Transpersonal Counseling Psychology with an emphasis in Art Therapy at Naropa University, and in 2010, I felt pulled to Cambodia, my ancestral homeland, for the very first time. There, I worked with a healing arts organization and also began a private practice. I sat with adolescents facing trauma, HIV/AIDS, violence, poverty, and displacement, and supported expatriates moving through anxiety, depression, and life transitions. What I discovered in that time has stayed with me ever since: art knows no boundaries. It heals, connects, and restores hope wherever it is welcomed.

Today, I bring those lessons into my private practice. I see healing as a journey of returning home to yourself—of discovering the stillness and strength that has always lived within you. My role is to walk beside you as you step into that place of wholeness and renewal.

What I’ve learned, both in my own life and in the sacred work of sitting with others, is that light and dark are not enemies, but companions. The shadows remind us how to notice the glow, and the glow reminds us that shadows never last forever. Healing doesn’t come from chasing perfection; it comes in the soft moments of surrender—when we allow ourselves to breathe, to open, and to trust that life knows how to unfold.

And always, there is light. Sometimes it appears as a flicker, sometimes as a blaze, but it is never absent. It lives in laughter that bubbles up unexpectedly, in tears that cleanse, in the quiet beauty of a garden blooming, in the sound of a drum that grounds us back into the body. The light lives in us, and it is patient—it waits to be seen, even in our darkest hours.

In my own journey, I continue tending to ancestral healing and generational trauma. The work can be challenging, but I meet it with creativity, curiosity, and joy. I paint, I knit, I dance, I grow flowers, and I rest in nature. Each of these acts is a way of inviting light into my life—moments of play, wonder, and connection that remind me of the beauty and resilience within and around us.

I refuse to let life dim my childlike curiosity, and I hope the same is true for you. The light lives in each of us, waiting to be noticed, nurtured, and shared. Even when the world feels heavy or uncertain, there is always brightness—sometimes a gentle glow, sometimes a radiant blaze. And as the saying goes, the darker the night sky, the brighter the stars.

ART THERAPIST

ATR.#14-110