Dr. Tamara Yakaboski, Coaching and Consulting

03/05/2026

Many academics are feeling massive stress and strain right now - and it feels different than other times of programs closing or budget cuts. Institutions are making decisions that feel destabilizing and like betrayal. The hardest part of the career grief and identity that comes from this moment is it feels like a harbinger of the collapsing of academia.

When your work has been intertwined with who you are for years (or decades), the unraveling of academia that’s happening right now can feel deeply personal. The grief that follows often shows up as exhaustion, anger, numbness, or the constant question:

What now?

Next Wednesday, March 11 at 6pm Eastern (4pm MT), I’m hosting a webinar with The Professor Is In (and Out) called: Career Grief in a Collapsing Academy.

Curious? Want to join? Register here (you'll get a recording and resources if you miss the live convo) => https://theprofessorisin.com/webinars/

New Webinar for the times.

Join Resilience Coach and former academic, Dr. Tamara Yakaboski, for this meaningful new webinar, Career Grief In a Collapsing Academy, next Wednesday March 11 at 6 PM Eastern.

In the wake of academia’s collapsing landscape, institutional betrayals destabilize more than your employment. They shake your identity, purpose, and future dreams. In this moment, academic career grief experiences are existential and deeply personal, on top of any professional logistical concerns.

When grief shows up as exhaustion, disorientation, anger, or numbness, it also brings a lingering sense of what now or next. In this workshop, you’ll:

* Understand the impact of the harbingers of academic and institutional collapse on your sense of identity, future, and wellbeing
* Learn a 4 step process to working with your career grief so you can shift out of stuckness, overwhelm, or paralysis
* Identify next steps for shifting your relationship with your career or institution to navigate what comes next with greater clarity

Based on years of working with career grief, Tamara Yakaboski, PhD, shares steps to process grief so that you can reorient to a collapsing academic landscape. Tamara integrates her expertise as a scholar of higher education organizations within her business as a resilience coach and leadership consultant to help academics and leaders bridge the gap between what was and what’s next.

Presenter Bio: Tamara Yakaboski, PhD, spent over 20 years as a professor and administrator before confronting the reality that academia, for many, is no longer sustainable. Whether due to burnout, institutional dysfunction, or forced career pivots, she knows that leaving can feel like a loss of identity and purpose. She integrates her expertise as a scholar of higher education as a resilience coach and leadership consultant, to help academics and professionals bridge the gap between what was and what’s next. Whether you’re reimagining your career, rebuilding after burnout, or struggling with identity loss, Tamara provides practical tools and compassionate guidance to help you navigate the transition with confidence and clarity.

01/16/2026

"Academia is particularly predatory for folx who have experienced gaslighting abuse as the norm in their upbringing – we see the system, we recognize how the system works, we’re familiar and so it’s ok, right?"

🎯

That was shared by my colleague, Dr. Marie Gasper-Hulvat, who is an assistant professor, founder of Soul Star Attunement LLC, and the Ivory Tower Inner Fire Summit happening THIS WEEKEND.

Especially as another year ramps up, I know that familiarity feels safe. AND I know the power when one day, the veil drops. The illusion of “this is just how the world works” crashes. We suddenly see the gaslighting clearly: in meetings, committees, policies, and culture.

That, my friend, is the power that waits for you in this weekend’s Ivory Tower Inner Fire Summit. A collective gathering of 20+ presenters, myself included, ready to walk with you as we name and interrupt these institutional spells we’ve been living inside, or trained in to carry on inside us even after we’ve left.

Long before I wrote my final Dear John letter to academia and long before started working with others on career grief, the research I wanted to pursue was in that intersection of folks who identify as healers working in academia. I was deeply curious about folks, who, as my teacher, Clarissa Pinkola Estés Réyes, calls them, are ‘wounded healers’ - those who hold deep complexity, emotion, and care in their work and often hold healing space for others.

Given the rampant toxic work culture and chronic burnout lifestyle, did other folks experience the stressful disconnect from soul and body that contributed to burnout breakdowns? Were they attracted to the promises and deep purpose of academia and/or did higher ed (subconsciously or not) prey (and profit off) those very wounds? So many questions I held.

While I never got to officially run that research, I have definitely been working in that tension of how institutions rely on your capacity to endure (to keep pushing), how that survival mode is internalized in the individual, and how endurance is rewarded until it breaks open as burnout. And how we can deinstitutionalize our minds, bodies, and souls from all of that, even from within.

If you’ve experienced this “veil drop,” know this: your perceptions are real, and your response matters. You are not alone, and this Summit space has been passionately created to honor, validate, and show you ways forward.

The Ivory Tower Inner Fire Summit (January 17–19, 2026) is a free, 3-day virtual event to help academics, those leaving academia (and those out of it but socialized by it), turn burnout into sacred, soul-aligned work.

Are you signed up?
Here's your free link: https://ivorytowerinnerfire.com/summit-registration?am_id=tamara2059

01/16/2026

The power that waits for you in this weekend’s Ivory Tower Inner Fire Summit. A collective gathering of 20+ presenters, myself included, ready to walk with you as we name and interrupt these institutional spells we’ve been living inside, or trained in to carry on inside us even after we’ve left.

Free, online, and accessable for 48 hours with lots of free downloads and good support

Sign up: https://ivorytowerinnerfire.com/summit-registration?am_id=tamara2059r withr art

01/12/2026

This January, I’m stepping into the Ivory Tower Inner Fire Summit with a deep sense of recognition. I've walked through the fire of chronic burnout and alchemized career grief as an invitation to more authentic and regenerative work, for myself and so many clients.

From the first moment Dr. Marie Gasper-Hulvat of Soul Star Attunement LLC reached out, I was a HELL YES to this! And I hope you will give yourself this generative space she's convening!

This gathering is for those who can feel the ache of an ending (maybe one you didn’t necessarily choose or one you've longed for) and the quiet pressure of something else wanting to emerge. For academics and higher ed folks living with career grief, identity unraveling, or a growing misfit with institutional rhythms, this is a space that understands that so many other ways of knowing often arrives before language and the brain catches up.

In my session, The Sacred Everyday: Rituals as Boundaries for Soul-Aligned Living, I’ll explore how small, repeatable practices can become acts of protection and reclamation in lives shaped by overwork and institutional demand. These rituals aren’t about adding more to your plate, but they’re about tending your energy, clarifying what actually matters, and building a bold life that includes meaningful work but is shaped from the inside out.

Rituals can be small and mighty. I’ll guide you through an accessible way to design your own; one that’s been tested and refined through years of client work supporting people through career grief, embodiment reclamation, and the slow, intentional work of deinstitutionalizing how we relate to productivity, worth, and self-trust, especially when you choose or have to stay in your institution.

Across three days, you’ll hear from scholars, practitioners, and guides working at the edges of burnout, identity, and career; not to fix or optimize them, but to listen more carefully to what they’re asking of us.

The summit is free to attend, with a short window to revisit the conversations afterward. Many presenters are offering follow-up support. After my session, you’ll be invited to download a free companion workbook, Design Your Own Rituals for Winterizing Your Boundaries, where I walk you step-by-step through creating personalized, embodied support.

If you’re feeling the pull toward a quieter, truer next chapter - one that honors all of you - the link is in the comments.

09/03/2025

Registration is OPEN for the 3rd Annual Creative Colorado Writers Retreat!⁠
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I’m thrilled to be leading a climate and nature-informed workshop at this year’s retreat so come hang out with me in the Denver area for:⁠
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💚 Writing with the More-Than-Human World: Kinship Narratives⁠
📅 Sunday, Sept 21 | ⏰ 9:45–11:15 AM⁠
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In this session, we’ll step outside human-centered storytelling to collaborate with land, animals, and ecosystems. (Yes, we will even be writing outside for this workshop!) By crafting kinship narratives, you’ll explore reciprocal ways of writing with nature and discovering what emerges when we listen for voices beyond our own.⁠
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The full retreat by Twenty Bellows runs Sept 20–21 at Mint & Serif in Lakewood and includes lunch or you can do a single day. Here what's happening:⁠
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📝Poetry, Fiction, and Hybrid Workshop Tracks – Focused sessions led by experienced writers to help develop your craft.⁠
📝Open Writing Time – Quiet, structured space to make meaningful progress on your work.⁠
📝Keynote Address by Poet Brice Maiurro – A powerful reflection on writing, process, and creative life from one of Colorado’s leading poetic voices.⁠
📝Adult Book Fair and Open Mic – Discover work from indie presses around the region and share your own in an open, welcoming space.⁠
📝Community and Networking Opportunities – Connect with fellow writers, editors, and creatives from across the state.⁠
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Early bird pricing already ended but here's your code for 20% off registration: Yakaboski20⁠
Spots are limited and advance registration required!⁠
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Register now at twentybellowslit.com.

07/31/2025

Have you signed up yet for next Wednesday's free workshop on career boundaries? Do that now ➡️ https://subscribepage.io/TY-Career-Boundaries-Webinar

Here are 3 of the most common struggles I see folks have when (re)drawing their boundary lines with their career. I'll lead you through 3 exercises to help shift how you relate to each so that you can redraw those lines as we shift out of summer mode and into September/back to school routines.

What questions or patterns do you have with career boundaries?

07/14/2025

What's your boundary line and do you know how to redraw that line as you and your career change? ⬅️ That's the conversation I'm having with a lot of folks right now.

One of the most radical career pivots isn’t changing your job (I argue this is important to do before you change anyway). It’s changing your expectations—of yourself and others. Letting go of self-inflicted perfectionism that drives high expectations and those frustrating, unspoken hopes for others creates space for a healthier relationship with your career.

Maybe this resonates...do any of these sounds familiar:
😬“I can’t change my job, but I want to stop feeling like it owns me.”
😬“I don’t want to lose the little calm I built this summer.”
😬“I’m tired of the emotional rollercoaster.”
😬“I keep trying to be everything to everyone—and it’s not working.”
😬“I’m not ready (or able) to leave, but I need to feel different while I stay.”

If any of these sounds familiar, I encourage you to sign up for this free webinar.

The first pivot is internal, and how you relate to your job, body, and energy can change.

signup: https://subscribepage.io/TY-Career-Boundaries-Webinar

06/09/2025

Taking a Summer Pause (but not disappearing entirely)

After sharing my latest piece - “Summer doesn’t ask us to work harder, it invites us to grow differently” - I’m honoring that message by stepping back from regular social media posting this summer.

No content calendar. No keeping up. No marketing systems. Just breathing room and a return to the slower, seasonal rhythm that summer naturally invites.

But I’m not vanishing. I’ll still be writing, reflecting, and connecting — just in quieter, more intentional spaces with deeper conversations and longer musings

📬 You can find me by:
1 - signing up for my free newsletter - Awakening Resilience (https://subscribepage.io/TYEmailList)
2 - subscribing for free on Substack at Dirt & Disobedience (https://tamarayakaboski.substack.com/)

In both of those spaces I’ll be sharing creative prompts, seasonal rituals, behind-the-scenes musings, and stories from the Summer of Resilient Joy community with the different angles and audiences that those spaces invite.

These are the spaces where I’ll continue practicing my craft and tending to the questions that matter to our lives and building a bolder world together.

So if you’re craving slower, richer creative nourishment this season… come join me there.

✨ Let this be the summer we grow differently. Together. ✨

😘

06/06/2025

Ahhh, the first week of June.

Summer doesn’t ask us to work harder. It invites us to grow differently.
It’s a season that expands us—sensory, alive, brimming with possibility. But too often, we drag spring’s hustle into summer’s warmth, hoping the same grind will yield different fruit.

Here’s the truth I keep returning to: Creativity is a seasonal practice of resilience.

And in summer, that looks like:

🌿 Listening to your body.
Let rest be part of your creative rhythm—the nap, the walk, the journal scribble, the half-formed thought. They all count.

🌿 Emergence, not performance.
You don’t need a plan or a polished piece. Just show up. Even a murmur is a seed.

🌿 A gentle rebellion against overwork.
In a world obsessed with output, creativity says: “I am enough. I am whole.”

If you're feeling blocked, scattered, or simply tired, you’re not alone. But your creativity isn’t gone. It’s simply waiting for a softer rhythm. Summer is the time to reawaken it.

Let it be messy. Let it be slow. Let it be sacred.

☀️ I’ll be sharing creative prompts, seasonal rituals, and stories in the coming weeks to support your summer emergence. Be sure you’re signed up for my free weekly Awaken Resilience newsletter, though! Link in the bio to sign up.

In the meantime, ask yourself: What part of me is asking to grow creatively this season?

Let that be your guide.

06/02/2025

When I left academia, it wasn’t really about leaving.

It was about unlearning.

About remembering.

About finally asking: “What kind of life restores me instead of depletes me?”

It took years. Breakdowns and break opens.
Healing, play, creativity.
And most of all—community.

Reimagining your life alone is the hardest way to do it.

You need mirrors. Witnesses.

Safe spaces to say the quiet things like:
“I want more.”
“I’m tired of over-functioning.”
“I’m allowed to not know yet.”

There’s something about admitting those quiet things out loud to another person that stokes the fire within.

In the beginning, I didn’t have a name for what I was doing.
I wasn’t “leaving academia” until I was.
I wasn’t “building a business” until I was.

I was just trying to reclaim the parts of me I’d buried to survive the systems that drained me.

Journaling at sunrise. Wandering gardens. Following curiosity instead of credentials.

And I kept thinking: Where do people like me go?

Folks who aren’t in crisis, but can’t go back to business as usual either?
So I built that place.

It’s called Cultivate Connection—a space for the ones on the edge of something.

If that’s you: Come as you are. No need to perform clarity. Just space to reconnect to what’s real. We meet live a few times a month - sometimes focused workshops and other times open conversations during Office Hours.

DM me if you want to know more.

05/26/2025

You don’t need another certificate.
Stop confusing overing with being worthy. You need to remember yourself.

And creativity—not more trainings—is the bridge between where you’ve been and what’s next.

One of the most common things I hear when folks are navigating a transition is:
“I don’t think I’m ready.”
“I need more training first.”
“There are other people who are more qualified…”

But what’s really going on?

We’ve been taught to overlearn, overperform, overgive—because somewhere along the line, we internalized the myth that doing more = being worthy.

I know because I did it, too.

After my 2016 burnout, I took so many trainings—some transformative, others just another checkbox. None of them made me feel “ready.”

Eventually I realized: I wasn’t broken. I was burnt out from trying to prove I was enough.

Imposterism often shows up in times of change. It’s not a personal flaw. It’s a systemic pattern that thrives when we tie our worth to output and perfection.

You don’t need to earn your enoughness. You’re already whole.

Need some support returning to yourself? Reach out.

05/22/2025

I didn’t leap or rage quit. (Although I did have a resignation letter written and saved).

I built a bridge.
One board at a time.

That bridge became what I now call diversifying your career. And it’s one of the most powerful ways I know to build career resilience.

When I experienced my first big career shock, I didn’t have language for it. My body was shutting down. My purpose was leeching out of that J-O-B. The career I had built with care and credentials no longer fit the person I was becoming.

What came next wasn’t a clean pivot. It was at times beautiful and others messy. It was slow. There was grief, trial, unlearning, and deep regeneration.

It looked like:
– Exploring new ideas outside my discipline
– Reclaiming rest, creativity and somatic practices
– Redefining purpose, leadership, success
– Grieving the loss of identity and old dreams
– Following joy and healing, not just credentials, but some

That’s how my regenerative business came to life. Not from a formula, but lived experience. And it’s what I now walk clients through with their flavor, but all our journeys take a different shape, but there are threads of commonalities.

Because diversifying your career isn’t about starting over (unless you want to). It’s about weaving your values, strengths, and lived experiences into something more adaptive and aligned.

Career shocks are not failures.
They’re invitations to rebuild, intentionally.

✨ Reflection: If I weren’t afraid of starting over, what would I allow myself to imagine next?

Ready to explore regenerative career pivots? Download the Free Toolkit: https://subscribepage.io/career-pivot-toolkit

Want to work 1:1 with me? Explore Coaching Options: https://www.tamarayakaboski.com/coachingpackages