We had the good fortune of connecting with Leila-Scott M. Price, MAOM, L.Ac. and we’ve shared our conversation below.

Hi Leila-Scott M., what’s the most important thing you’ve done for your children?

The most important thing I have done as a parent, is to understand my role as sacred. There is parenting, and then there is sacred parenting. When I came to understand that I am a steward of the lives of my children, a mentor to them, as opposed to thinking of them as belonging to me, I learned to parent from a very different place. A self-responsible, conscious place…and my children feel that.

This all happened when I came to understand that life is a gift, which is to say, I came to understand that my life is my gift. Which may seem trite and unrelated to parenting, but coming to this understanding has had a profound effect on every aspect of my life – including parenting. You see, before I realized that my own life is a gift and that I have an inner light to nurture for myself and share with others, the pressure was on my children to be the gift, the pressure was on them to share their inner light with me since I wasn’t aware of my own.

Living with the knowledge that my life is a gift and the knowledge that my opportunity to parent is a sacred one, is what makes me the mom that I am. And it is what allows my children to know that they too have the gift of life, a light of their own to nurture and shine forth. It helps them understand that if they are parented by one who understands how sacred that role is, that same parent must understand how sacred THEY are.

Alright, so for those in our community who might not be familiar with your business, can you tell us more?

Gladly!! The Center For Healing Arts & Sciences is a well-care collaborative I began with my husband, Dr. John Price, over 10 years ago. We offer acupuncture, Chinese medicine & herbs; spiritual guidance and several different forms of therapy for individuals, couples, families, and groups; we sell supportive wellness products; we offer classes and workshops; and we are currently in the process of building an online community. Our brick and mortar really focuses on mind+body wellness (come and see us!!), but our new online community is allowing us the opportunity to focus on the spirit part of that mind-body-spirit trilogy. Stay tuned for that!!

There have been plenty of rewards and challenges along the way.

Some of the rewards are that it is:

– a complete and total gift that we get to be involved in bringing people the genuine care they seek

– a gift that I get to co-create a place that I would want to go to if I were the client or patient. The Center for Healing Arts & Sciences is where I would want to come to get my acupuncture or my therapy or my spiritual guidance or come to my women’s group or men’s group or where I’d want my teen to be getting their guidance through individual work or group work. This is where I’d want to receive my care and this is where I’d want to build community.

– a gift to work with all the beautiful-hearted people on our team who are aligned with our healing values and, therefore, to get to offer powerful healing opportunities to our community through our synergistic, collaborative alliance.

But let’s be real, it’s challenging to run a business

For example:
– It’s been a challenge to build a dream that’s bigger than we had a bank account to build.

– It’s been a challenge to have made some expensive mistakes.

All in all, I think it’s important for people to know that when they’re trusting a place like The Center For Healing Arts & Sciences that it’s not been created by some hobbyist who has a fascination with interesting forms of healing. Or someone who’s just trying to fill a hole in the market. This was born out of a known need that people need to be met in their suffering, and related to in their struggle.

Often the people we serve are high functioning trauma survivors who don’t even realize they’ve suffered trauma – or they’ve buried it so deeply it’s just not how they think of themselves.

But even with trauma, suffering, and struggle, we can evolve. We can move into the pain of our past in order to heal from it.

Sometimes I have to pinch myself that despite all the hard work and challenging moments of running this business, that it exists! And that it has such beautiful human beings helping to make it possible. And that it has people who trust us to work with them coming and going from our front door every day.

You know, it is holy to be let into someone’s life, whether that is a patient or a team member. I can’t stress that piece enough. When someone walks into our space, vulnerable and choosing to trust us and tell us what’s difficult and joyful or touching about their life, about the ways that they’re in pain physically, mentally, emotionally, spiritually, we do not take that lightly. And I think our patients and community can tell that. When people show up ready to receive care, they are being incredibly brave and we honor that.

Which brings me to another project I’m working on, which is the project of working with women to help them come home to themselves. We are in another wave of feminism that doesn’t look like the last wave where we needed to emulate the masculine in order to get things done. We don’t have to put on our power pant suit and throw elbows to get to the top of the corporate ladder. What the world needs of femininity right now is all of its presentations. Masculinity is one of them, but there are many other ways we as women can, and do, contribute to this world with our feminine strengths.

For each of us as the embodied feminine to remember ourselves is not just to remember what we have forgotten, but to put back together what has been torn apart & separated – and it seems to be exactly what we as people need right now. Which is desiring of the feminine aspect to be brought back online. Yes this means honoring women, but this healing is for men and all genders too. This healing is for all of us. And, I desire to stand in this row of human beings who desire to heal what’s been broken and forgotten for a long time now.

Any places to eat or things to do that you can share with our readers? If they have a friend visiting town, what are some spots they could take them to?
-We’d have to hit LOTS of restaurants and museums! I always feel so proud of Houston’s diverse population and how the range of cultures shows up in our amazing city.

-Menil Café followed by a walk through The Menil Collection – and then over to the Cy Twombly exhibit…then maybe a nap under one of the giant trees in Menil park…dreamy!

-We’d have to hit up a reading at Brazos Bookstore followed by dinner at Vinoteca Poscol

-Definitely would take them to catch a show at the Rec Room Theater and the original Ninfa’s on Navigation

-Brunch at Pondicherry followed by a stroll around the updated Memorial Park or Houston Arboretum would be called for.

The Shoutout series is all about recognizing that our success and where we are in life is at least somewhat thanks to the efforts, support, mentorship, love and encouragement of others. So is there someone that you want to dedicate your shoutout to?

I owe a debt of gratitude to:

-Dr. Becky Bailey who wrote Easy To Love, Difficult To Discipline, and helped me tremendously with learning how to become an authoritative parent.

-Dr. Clarissa Pinkola Estes who wrote Women Who Run With The Wolves, and reconnected me with the healing power of women who tell stories and women in myth.

-And many other beautiful women authors who have inspired me over the years like Terry Tempest Williams, Marry Karr, Anne Lammot, Mirabai Starr, Robin Wall Kimmerer, Mary Oliver, and on and on.

-My husband who is my partner in life and business.

-All the amazing individuals who work with us at The Center for Healing Arts & Sciences and help make our healing center possible.

-Our parents & siblings who each support us in the best way that they can.

-My sacred sisters, they know who they are.

Website: www.TheCenterforHAS.com

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