Sanctuary Builder Session — HOME SOVEREIGNTY STUDIO

SANCTUARY BUILDER SESSIONS

We will use our sessions to reflect on your motivations, intentions, vision, process, resources for creating sanctuary spaces. You can be in any stage of the process and this can be any form of sanctuary: inner or outer // immaterial or material.

I have experience working with artists, academics, architects, maintainers, health/care workers, politically engaged spiritual practitioners, & writers, but the sessions are suitable to any one seeking to create and hold sanctuary spaces for historically resilient communities.

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MAIN OUTCOME NUMBER ONE

this would be a short blurb about one of the main outcomes of this session so a visitor gets an idea of what the to expect so they understand if this is right for them.

MAIN OUTCOME NUMBER TWO

this would be a short blurb about one of the main outcomes of this session so a visitor gets an idea of what the to expect so they understand if this is right for them.

MAIN OUTCOME NUMBER THREE

this would be a short blurb about one of the main outcomes of this session so a visitor gets an idea of what the to expect so they understand if this is right for them.

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This is for you if..

Speak to the symptom of the problem that they’re experiencing… and where they’d like to be.

Speak to the symptom of the problem that they’re experiencing… and where they’d like to be.
Speak to the symptom of the problem that they’re experiencing… and where they’d like to be.
Speak to the symptom of the problem that they’re experiencing… and where they’d like to be.
Speak to the symptom of the problem that they’re experiencing… and where they’d like to be.
Speak to the symptom of the problem that they’re experiencing… and where they’d like to be.

WHAT WE CAN DISCUSS

Creating programming online and irl for QTBIPOC fellowships, retreats & residencies.

Resourcefully creating personal retreat time/space with what you have.
Cultivating refuge practices, such as daily ritual, land & water connection, ancestral reverence, meditation and energy work.
Support with visioning & initiating earthen // adobe // clay building projects.
Designing an intentional travel experience.
Beginning the process of sharing access to land you steward.
Beginning the process of translocal coalition building and collaboration.
Understanding and contributing to sanctuary and asylum seeking movements.

BOOK A SESSION

YOUR GUIDE

⁘ 𖡼 𓇢𓆸 𖡼 ⁘

Meet HSS’s steward —

sarah sao mai habib [any pronoun] is multidimensional artist, storyteller, builder, culture bearer, educator, and quantum healing navigator. habib supports historically resilient communities and their accomplices to cultivate inner and outer infrastructures of care [islands of refuge].

habib works at the crossroads of ancestral remembrance, social ecological justice, land based, and contemplative practice.

Hello, thank you for taking the time to get to know more about me here. I was born in Kuwait shortly before the Gulf war to a Kuwaiti/Iraqi father and Vietnamese mother. I was raised in Kuwait and frequently traveled to Turtle Island to visit my maternal family who sought refuge there after the end of the Vietnam/American war. My lived experience of traversing borders and embodying many cultures and faiths, and my natural inclination to create, heal & build in the midst of systemic fragmentation led me to study art, psychology and architecture.
I eventually earned my bachelors and masters degrees in these fields. In this process I gained over a decade of experience studying and working on community based design and creative healing arts initiatives, including contributing to building low income multi-family housing, disaster rebuilds, media around climate responsive architectures, etc. with national & international firms, schools and nonprofits.
After much trial and error, I learned that the status quo of addressing pressing collective issues was perpetuating more of the same problems, which led me to digger deeper: reconnecting to my cultural and spiritual roots, the earth, community, revolutionary histories, gifts and the fertile compost that my ancestors left me to transform. I went on to engage in decolonial storytelling & teaching, work at border medical mutual aid camps, contribute to healing gatherings, facilitate & codesign majority BIPOC fellowships online and in person, live and work at Dharma centers, and craft DIY creative/rest residencies.
It has been about 7 years of focused energy invested in these wider realms and I am committed to unlearning, learning, and integrating more of our truths. I continue to travel, with the intention to stretch my understanding & strengthen intercultural, interspecies and interfaith solidarities. I view this as a lifelong process held together with a curious beginner’s mind. I’m strongly motivated to support others with this inner and outer work to fortify & multiply infrastructures of care in defiance of all that continue to challenge them.
[bio written in May 2025]

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TESTIMONIALS

“Sarah brings a light and presence to her teaching that is inclusive and sensitive to differences in thought, while challenging the audience to step outside—even for a moment—one’s own history. She is very adept at interacting with diverse backgrounds in professional environments, with an intuitive and calm nature, understanding how to bring out her audience’s innate curiosity. Sarah understands embodied healing through the depth of her own work, sharing this knowledge with others who have growth aspirations. She is someone from whom you immediately and consistently want to learn and hear more!”

— Kavita Rajasekhar, MD MPH, preventive medicine and public health physician

“Sarah is an interdisciplinarian with an architectural background who embraces holistic approaches that bridge between disciplines, space, and imaginations. Their perspective sits outside of disciplinary silos to address social justice issues related to decolonization while leaning into the discourses that emerge. Sarah is deeply immersed in engagement that centers indigeneity related to land sovereignty in practice and pedagogy and how it translates to experiential and relational practices towards spatial justice. They are dedicated to creating a safe and equitable dialogue for a diversity of perspectives to cultivate influence beyond boundaries while framing discomfort as a portal for learning. Sarah cultivates belonging and connection with self, others and the land that bridge to different scales of repair with the intention to move towards land back and all that it entails.”

— Shalini Agrawal, Associate Professor of Critical Ethnic Studies at CCA, and Co-Director of Pathways to Equity

“Sarah, with your words, I see these karmic cycles like Venn diagrams, whirling and colliding, combusting like exploding stars, creating our new life, as you say, new cycles of collective care.”

— Sangha Member