Dr. Chrissy Stachl - From Chemist to Consultant & Coach

[PODCAST] Diverse Routes: Career Journeys in Science & Medicine (Episode 46)

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Dr. Chrissy Stachl is a somatic empowerment coach, trauma-informed practitioner, and organizational change consultant based in Oakland, CA. She holds a PhD in Chemistry from UC Berkeley, a background in neuroscience and medicine, and 600+ hours of somatic coaching training—a combination that lets her bridge intellectual rigor with body-based, emotionally attuned support for her clients in a way that's genuinely rare.

Through her coaching practice, Chrissy works 1:1 with high-achieving adults who look successful on paper but feel quietly disconnected, overextended, or unfulfilled inside. Her work is not mindset coaching—it's embodied identity empowerment. Together with her clients, she unwinds patterns of over-functioning and self-abandonment, rebuilds the capacity to feel joy and desire, and supports a return to internal authority rather than external validation.

Through Reflecting Equity, her organizational consulting practice, Chrissy supports STEM organizations in creating cultures that can actually hold the discomfort that real culture change requires—integrating nervous system literacy and relational safety into equity and culture work.

Her career has never been linear, and she wouldn't want it to be. Every pivot—from pre-med to chemistry, from academia to consulting, from consulting to coaching—has been an integrity-driven recalibration toward work that honors both the body and the mind. She brings all of it into the room.

Episode Highlights:

• How a chemistry PhD led to an unexpected career in coaching.

• How she knew it was time to leave her traditional STEM path.

• The surprising connection between figure skating and her career today

Resources

• Connect with Chrissy on LinkedIn:https://www.linkedin.com/in/chrissystachl/

• Learn more about Chrissy’s Services:

  • https://www.reflectingequity.com/

  • https://chrissystachl.com/

  • https://elifesciences.org/articles/71583

  • https://www.reflectingequity.com/resources

  • https://chrissystachl.myflodesk.com/reic

Become a patron @ patreon.com/diverseroutes for access to the extended interview