Sumin Dai
Sumin is a psychotherapist, a communitarian, and a musician. She came to the Triform Camphill community for a gap year in 2013 and fell in love with Camphill. She came to Camphill Village Kimberton Hills in 2016 and returned in 2019, where she is now a long-term coworker.
Sumin is from Xiamen, China and did her undergraduate studies in Beijing, where she volunteered at a Waldorf Art Therapy institute for children with autism. It was there that she first heard of Camphill. She decided to travel across the world to take a gap year so she could learn more about handcrafting, spend more time in nature, and experience a different way of life. But it gave her so much more. She discovered in herself a passion for lifesharing and intentional community. She rediscovered her love for creating music.
“I play piano and flute, I sing alto; I’m happy to provide harmony. I started playing when I was very young, around 3 or 5. But I had stopped playing a long time ago. When I came to Camphill, I picked them all up again. I learned many other types of music at Triform,and I learned how they can have different effects and purposes. Even though I’ve left, I still practice and am now learning the harmonica.”
And she found a deep appreciation for the moment-to-moment mindfulness that is a part of Camphill life and the ongoing inner growth it cultivates. It helped her build the most essential, the foundational skills that every great therapist must possess.
“The mindfulness comes from knowing that my reaction has a visible effect on people. It comes from being aware of how I think and what I do. I feel like it’s the best way to learn about myself - to think before I act rather than act without considering the consequences. With my background of being an only child, growing up in a city in China, where the emphasis is on studying and academic performance, I hadn’t really learned how to care for other people. I think the most important thing I learned is the self-awareness that I’m able to carry with me.”
Sumin earned a Masters in Social Work from the University of Pennsylvania and worked afterwards in community mental health, where she met with individuals and groups for psychotherapy. Camphill had inspired her to start listening more to people’s stories, giving her time and attention to help people tell their stories and heal. Before her volunteer experience, Sumin couldn’t imagine herself working with people. She and her whole family thought she’d go into Academia. So it’s not surprising that she finds it pretty funny that in those years she paid her rent by talking to people.
“One of the best gifts from the experience is my interest in other human beings. Folks with special needs showed me how being true and open and vulnerable can be a powerful thing. It’s empowering.”