The Unbecoming Sessions
What i Offer
Identity Alignment Work with Alix Vasquez, PhD
This work is for you if you've always felt like a misfit.
Not because something is wrong with you — but because you've never been willing to fully abandon yourself to fit in. You've negotiated, performed, adapted. And it's worked, up to a point.
But the cost has been high. And you know it.
You might be a founder, a creative, an academic, a leader. What you share is this: you think deeply, you feel what others don't name, and somewhere along the way you learned to perform a version of yourself that the world found more acceptable than the real one.
This work is about finding your way back. Not through reinvention — through recognition. Seeing clearly where the performance ends and where you actually begin.
It's grounded in sociology, shaped by years of research on identity and embodiment, and it's deeply practical. You'll leave with clarity, not just insight.
Why I do this work
I have spent my career studying the gap between who people are and who their world asks them to be. My doctoral research at Brandeis examined identity negotiation — how people contort themselves to fit organizations, cultures, and expectations that were never built for them. My research on sartorial labor named the invisible cost of dressing for a self you haven't chosen.
But this isn't just academic for me. I founded Herderin because I believe clothing can be a daily act of self-recognition rather than self-erasure. I have sat with hundreds of people in fitting rooms and watched how they speak to themselves. I have spent years doing my own deep work — embodiment, somatic practice, contemplative inquiry.
I am not a therapist. I am a sociologist who works at the level of the self. That distinction matters. I will help you see the structures shaping you — and help you decide which ones you're done carrying.
What working together looks like
We begin with an exploration session — a 30 minute conversation to see if this work is the right fit for you. There is no pressure and no commitment. Just an honest conversation.
If we decide to move forward, we enter The Unbecoming Sessions — a three session arc over one month designed to help you locate the gap between who you've been performing and who you actually are, and begin building from that place instead.
Exploration session (free)
Who you are and where you feel the gap
Whether this work is the right fit
What The Unbecoming Sessions would look like for you specifically
Any questions you have
No pitch, no pressure — just honest conversation
Session One: Mapping
We slow down and listen.
To your story, your patterns, the places where something has never quite fit.
You will likely name things you have never named out loud before.
Session two: seeing the structure
We bring a sociological lens to what emerged.
Where did this gap come from?
What systems, expectations, and performances shaped it?
Understanding the structure beneath your experience changes everything.
Session three: coming home
We move from insight to embodiment.
What does it actually look like to live and work from a more authentic place?
You leave with clarity and a concrete sense of forward motion.
For those who want to continue, ongoing work is available after completing The Unbecoming Sessions.
what becomes possible
People who do this work stop contorting. They stop spending energy on performances that cost more than they return. They make decisions from a clearer place. They build work, relationships, and lives that actually fit.
This doesn't mean everything becomes easy. It means you stop being at war with yourself. And from that place, almost everything else gets easier.
Ready to begin?
If any of this resonates, the first step is simple. Book a 30 minute exploration session and let's talk.
This is for you. You've always known something didn't fit. Let's find out what does.
Book your exploration session →
"Every morning, before we walk out the door, we stand in front of a mirror and make a decision about who we are. I have spent my career studying that moment — in fitting rooms where people judge themselves in real time, in organizations where workers contort themselves to fit cultures that were never built for them, in research on the invisible labor of dressing for a self you haven't chosen. I have sat with the long-term unemployed rebuilding identity after loss, with new mothers navigating who they are on the other side of becoming, with entrepreneurs and artists who built something real but lost themselves in the process. It all comes back to the same question: what does it cost to perform a self that isn't yours? The Unbecoming Sessions are where that question finally gets answered."
— Alexandria Vasquez, PhD
Get In Touch
Whether you have questions about The Unbecoming Sessions or simply want to say hello, I'd love to hear from you. Reach out directly at alexandria.vasquez@gmail.com or book your exploration session here.