“The meaning of life is to find your gift; the purpose of life is to give it away.” – Pablo Picasso
This quote from Pablo Picasso is a favorite of Nicole Broadus and has clearly guided her life-long learning and interest in the exploration of integrative medicine. Searching for a way to focus her gifts and be of service, her discovery of Acutonics really spoke to her. She describes it as the missing link she was looking for, not only to personally heal, but it also provided a modality that she could study and use to help assist other people in their healing journey.
Nicole’s journey began in Phoenix, Arizona, where she has fond memories of growing up. She was an active child able to spend much of her young life outdoors. Some of her earliest memories are about being outside with friends until sundown. “We enjoyed chasing down the ice cream truck that would cruise the neighborhood for our daily fix of cold popsicles and treats. I also enjoyed roller-skating, riding my bike, swimming, dance, gymnastics and tumbling.”
She lived in Arizona through college attending the University of Arizona in Tucson, where she graduated in 1996, with a BS in Merchandising and Consumer Studies.
I loved fashion and wanted to work in the fashion industry as a buyer. I was lucky enough to get a job prior to graduation as an Assistant Buyer for a retailer based near the San Francisco Bay Area in Hayward, California. I moved there a month after graduation. A few years later I transitioned to the role of retail business analyst working for several retail headquarters in the San Francisco Bay Area. I also worked in product development.
After marrying my husband, we moved to North Carolina where I was scouted by a retail company to work as an IT Business Analyst, which was my first segue into Information Technology (IT). I was lucky enough to be recruited and mentored by a wonderful industry leader who saw potential in me and helped me discover a new profession I absolutely loved and exceled at. In 2006, my husband was offered a great opportunity to work for a defense contractor in Virginia, so we left North Carolina and have lived in Virginia ever since.
After the move to Virginia, Nicole continues her work as an IT business analyst, and over the years has worked in all three branches of government for various agencies. About five years ago she transitioned to a new role as a Business Architect, a role that she enjoys and likens to TCM, Nicole explains:
Just as Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM) focuses on looking at the whole person, business architecture looks at a business ecosystem as a whole, breaking down silos, to look at the business holistically rather than by piece meal in order to make more informed business decisions upfront before strategy execution. It was an approach that really resonated with me and a challenge that I enjoy.
Since her mid-twenties Nicole has been interested in acupuncture and TCM and held a strong belief in its efficacy. After experiencing unexplained sudden back pain, at the suggestion of a friend she went to a Chinese Medical doctor in San Francisco who explained to her the correlation between stress and pain.
The doctor asked if I had experienced any abnormal stress or life changes recently. I told him that my husband who was in the military was getting ready to be deployed to Iraq and that I had been worrying a lot about him being gone and his safety. The doctor did a full acupuncture treatment on me and told me that over the next few days I would regain movement in my back. Amazingly, each day thereafter, the pain in my back lessened and I began to regain full movement of my back, the pain full subsided within five days. At that moment I was a believer in TCM and acupuncture. When I first learned about Acutonics, I instantly wanted to learn more about how sound combined with the principles of TCM and acupuncture could be used to heal not only physical ailments, but also psycho-spiritual and emotional blocks.
Nicole discovered Acutonics in 2018 when she attended an energy healing immersion weekend in Asheville, NC and the wife of the instructor was a Licensed Acupuncturist and Level VII Acutonics practitioner, who introduced the class to the Acutonics tuning forks.
She placed two tuning forks on a few points on each participant prior to her husband doing energy work. I felt the most intense energy release that I have ever had. I was instantly enthralled with what these tuning forks were about. After getting home, I went on the Acutonics website to see if training was available, but I did not find a class near me until almost a year later. Valentina Morani was offering a Level I class in Maryland, and I signed up immediately. After taking it, I knew that I wanted to pursue certification in Acutonics.
Just five months later, the COVID-19 lockdown began. At the onset of the pandemic, the Acutonics Institute worked with its senior faculty to pivot quickly to move from live in person classes to live on Zoom classes. Identifying the best strategies to teach an applied methodology in a cohesive way that truly honored the students and the medicine being taught. Nicole looking for something positive to turn her energy toward enthusiastically jumped into Acutonics Level II, offered lived on Zoom, by senior faculty Katie Mink and Laurie Herron.
Nicole describes feeling an instant connection with them both. She loved their teaching style, the sense of community, meeting people from all around the United States and from other countries and continents.
Nicole was a bright light from the moment we met her on Zoom in 2020. We were just getting our feet under us for teaching on Zoom. Being accustomed to live teaching with its give and take of response and non-verbal cues, it was rough going at first.
Nicole was the person we found ourselves looking for, because she was ALWAYS attentive, she laughed at our jokes and made us feel like we still “had it”, even while muted! (This is a precious gift to a teacher, trust us!) As the year progressed, we were honored to have her join us for every class we taught, all through the pandemic. She is enthusiastic, thorough, and generous with her care for others, she has been a new gem in our community. Working now on her thesis, she is dedicated and a champion researcher. We are excited to see what she will create, as well as appreciative of the work she has already done on Long COVID. — Katie Mink and Laurie Herron
Nicole has always been a believer and enthusiast of Chinese Medicine, acupuncture, and various other integrative medicine practices for healing. She grew up knowing that she had multiple intuitive gifts but didn’t know how to develop and direct them towards a specific modality or practice. She has taken various classes over the last 15 years in intuitive development, mediumship, reiki, intuitive healing, angel oracle readings, etc. But from her first Acutonics class she experienced a deep sense of finding her true calling.
Acutonics provides me with the perfect modality to learn and combine my intuitive gifts and channel them in a way to help and be of service to others. I love that Acutonics combines Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM), Taoist principles, cosmology, astrology, archetypes, etc. Most of all it works and is highly effective at healing so many things in a gentle and non-invasive way. In addition, I am fascinated by the eight extraordinary vessels and how tapping into those points can really bring forth a powerful shift energetically and physically. I am not aware of any other healing modality that works in this way and is so effective.
Nicole goes on to describe the way in which Acutonics has shifted her life.
It has deepend my learning about the connection between mind and body and how important it is to recognize signs from our body when it is experiencing blocks, energy stagnation, physical pain, and emotional pain. It has made me more conscious and proactive about keeping my physical, emotional, and energetic body in divine resonance to avoid dis-ease, dis-comfort and dis-connect with the macrocosm of the universe. It also taught me the importance of a daily practice of meditation, grounding and checking-in with my body. I am also able to make connections through my learning of Chinese Medicine of how to treat things on myself, which is really empowering.
Due to Covid, Nicole currently focuses her clinical practice on Zoom appointments, but she has plans to work in a clinic on weekends sharing a space with a friend who is a massage therapist. She has received very positive feedback for the sessions that she’s offered on Zoom and has referrals from many clients. In addition to working with the tuning forks she incorporates the Acutonics Hand Chimes, Tibetan Bowls, Essential Oils, Planetary gongs, and Gem Tips into her treatments.
My clients become deeply relaxed and some are in a dream-like state throughout the treatment. At the end of a treatment, after grounding with Ohm unison, I always sound the chimes. I find this will slowly wake them up if they have fallen asleep or are in a deep meditative state.
Nicole is close to finishing all requirements to become a Certified Acutonics® Practitioner. Her thesis explores the efficacy of Acutonics for the treatment of Long Covid. Working with her mentor Katie Mink she recently finalized a treatment protocol to use with multiple study participants. She will use a multi-symptom survey over the course of three treatments to measure changes in their symptoms after each treatment. Nicole explains:
According to my research, long COVID is characterized by any lingering symptoms four weeks or more following the initial onset of COVID-19 symptoms. The protocol targets the top seven long COVID symptoms to include fatigue, brain fog, shortness of breath, chest pain, insomnia, gastrointestinal upset (e.g., nausea, vomiting, diarrhea), and muscle/headaches. We are still looking for additional participants. If there are any Acutonics practitioners or students interested in participating themselves or if you have patients, friends or family interested, please contact me at nicole@divinegoddessacutonics.com by the March 31st deadline for consideration.
Although family, work and Acutonics have filled much of Nicole’s time she works hard to maintain a balanced life. She enjoys yoga, spin cycling, dancing, wine tasting, traveling, and shopping. She also remains committed to deepening her gifts and being of service to others.
If you’d like to connect with Nicole she can be reached at nicole@divinegoddessacutonics.com