Groundswell Winter 2014 Winter 2014 | Page 23

Hang Yin Candy Lo For Hang Yin Candy Lo, sometimes words alone are not enough. A dancer and performer since childhood, Lo sees the world through a physical, visual lens. This explains the hole cut out of an illustration of the sky on her business cards. Lo is the founder of Piece of Sky, a creative arts therapy and counseling agency in her native Hong Kong. “Everyone should have their own piece of sky,” Lo explains. “Everyone’s dream should be different. Wherever you put the hole, that’s your piece of sky. Piece of Sky gives my clients – and me – a place to start, a place of potentials that can be fully developed.” Although Lo had long recognized that dance could be therapeutic, she spent many years working strictly as a performer. In her mid-20s, while working as a vocalist at Hong Kong Disneyland, Lo began to rethink her priorities. “I was seeking, and I was at a low point,” she says. Around that time, in 2008, a massive earthquake in Western China killed roughly 70,000 people. “My very wise friend said, ‘You don’t realize how many people are striving to live,’” Lo “You don’t realize how many people are striving to live. If you’re so much in doubt, give your life to them.” recalls. “‘If you’re so much in doubt, give your life to them.’” This propelled Lo’s decision to attend graduate school at Antioch University New England to study dance/movement therapy and counseling, as well as drama therapy. She earned her MA in 2012. Lo, who has lived in China, Belgium, England, and the United States, has learned that people are more alike than they are different. “Sometimes people will say, ‘I’m not a dancer. I’m not creative.’ As human beings, we’re all creative, actually. Every movement is dance. Life itself is creative. It’s just a matter of whether or not we’re aware or we acknowledge it,” says Lo. Today, Lo says life is a balancing act between her various identities: small-business owner, child-life specialist at the Children’s Cancer Foundation, dance/movement therapist, and performer. As a person who thrives on being somewhere different every day, Lo says she feels “blessed, very blessed.” Photo by Gary Yim GROUNDSWELL.ANTIOCHLA.EDU | J0953_GroundswellR.indd 21 21 12/18/13 11:19 AM