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ACTIVITIES AND ADVENTURES OF NOTE

Patricia Varga’s Creativity Workshops Help Individuals Meet the Challenges of Career and Life Transitions

A 25-year veteran of publishing and media, Patricia Varga (’79) has worked in sales, marketing, and content development for companies such as Times-Mirror, Tribune Co., Conde Nast, Hachette, Hearst, and The Economist Group. She also has worked for The New Yorker, The Economist/economist.com, House Beautiful, Elle Décor, Outside Magazine, and The Los Angeles Times in sales and marketing. Currently, she is a partner with Professional Social Networks Inc., a social media company that provides professional social networks for chief information officers (www.ciozone.com) and chief financial officers (www.cfozone.com). Patricia helps corporate executives reach out to their peers to solve problems, exchange ideas, and keep up with changing trends.

Patricia is also the founder of A Woman with Wings (www.womanwwings.com), an organization and a social networking website that fosters creativity, compassion, and leadership skills in young girls and women. Wings was originally started to benefit organizations and causes that raise the status of women and children. It has evolved into a community of women for women who use their creativity and compassion to give back. Patricia also works with Haven House, a domestic violence crisis shelter, where she teaches creativity to abused women in transition. Similarly, at the Glendale Adventist Cancer Center, Patricia leads creativity workshops for patients with cancer and their families.

Patricia’s creativity workshop, “The Journey Within,” represents many years of personal research, writing, an witnessing how creativity (writing, drawing, and imaging) helps people heal on many different levels. By exploring a series of exercises, Patricia guides participants to define themselves, their lives, their wishes and dreams, and to move with -- rather than against -- the inevitable challenges that everyone faces at various life stages. The benefits of this workshop to individuals in transition can be great – self-insight, clarity, relief from stress and anxiety. Patricia’s overall goal for the workshop is to help participants feel connected and grounded in a way that allows for the best possible decisions.

Many of the principles that Patricia covers in her workshops at Haven House and Glendale Adventist Cancer Center can assist professional women navigate their career and life choices as well. Patricia says that the simple techniques used with pen and paper are meant to allow the participant to “get beyond the critical mind and ego to that creative and wise place within where they can see themselves and their lives clearly.”

For more information about Patricia’s work, please contact her at This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it or (626) 403-7575.

Article Source: April 2010 Stanford Professional Women of Los Angeles Newsletter Page 3