A Serving Soul
Words: Kat Noel • Apr 15th, 2008 • Category: FOLKS.
La Shell and one of the families that she works with at Room to Grow
How a Jill of all Trades is Committed to Service
Shirley Chisolm once said that, ’service is the rent we pay for the privilege of living on this earth’. Then as a children’s book author, mother of two, Senior Director of Room to Grow and feng shui consultant, La Shell Wooten is paying more than her fair share and she doesn’t mind one bit.
With a Master’s of Social Work under her belt, Wooten’s journey has taken her from working with HIV positive youth, foster families and pregnant teenagers to providing development services to first time expecting parents at the nonprofit program, Room to Grow. As the Senior Director of Client Programs, she works directly with families, offering support and education for their unborn child and during the critical first three years of the infant’s life. “I see about three of four families a day and we meet for about two hours,” shares Wooten. “I give them a lot of education and parenting support advice on how to stimulate mental and physical growth, and how to develop a family bond while their children are young, so that impacts how they relate to their child throughout their lives.”
It’s apparent from how she affectionately shares about her work with Room to Grow and her two sons, who are six and eight, that Wooten has a tender spot for young people. ” I feel very connected to children,” confesses Wooten. “They are the trusted forms of human beings.” Due to that connection, in 2005 she self-published her first children’s book The Sharing Secret, which was on exhibit for nine weeks at the Children Museum of Manhattan. “I decided that one of the things that is important to me is helping my children and the children I come in contact with through my work, to recognize that even at a young age what they do is important because it impacts people around them, which in turn impacts them right back.”
La Shell at the Harlem Book Fair in 2007
Wooten’s venture as a children’s book author has taken her from classrooms all and Tri-state area and provided her with a limitless sense of fulfillment. “Writing in general, allows the writer and reader to escape their own circumstances and take a little vacation in someone else’s circumstances. Children’s writing is far more fulfilling to me than writing adult stories because I don’t believe you get the opportunity to get the same kind of feedback. In addition to that, I realize that a lot of interactions with adults are really so prescripted. As a children’s author, I’m far more in touch with the human experience.”
She confesses that though she “enjoys asorbing a lot of the human experience”, that it can take a toll on one’s spirit. “It can be taxing sometimes because not all human experiences are fantastic,” Wooten acknowledges. ” I have done work, especially in the social work profession, where I had to make the decision to move on and do something else because of the types of issues I had to deal with on a regular basis began to weigh too heavily on me. I knew I did as much as I could in that area and I need to move on to something different.”
La Shell using a feng shui compass
She attributes energy to the reasons why many of us often overuse one area of our homes or offices, leaving another part of it completely ignored. Wooten also believes that energy is something we all emanate and that it’s reciprical. “A lot of who I am as a person is related to univeral energy,” she reflects. “I really do feel and believe that we’re all connected in some way. I’m also a strong believer that energy cycles around - a little like karma.” If that’s true, Wooten will definitely get back what she puts out into the universe, ten times over.
Kat Noel is a true rolling stone, who believes everyone has a story to tell and never leaves home without paper and pen. She’s hoping that Square Rootz is her meal ticket out of the country.
Email this author | See all Square Rootz writing by Kat Noel
She’s right, it’ s very important to take notice of what your body and spirit is telling you…or else it will shut down at the most inconvenient time. That kind of work is definitely a labor of love…thanks for featuring a public servant (like myself )
Now these are the type of soldiers we really need. Big ups to you Le Shell!
And to you too Jenny B! LOL
Its great to read about exceptional people using their talents to make a difference in the world. Its enlightening to humanity and an example of using positive force, to create change that effects us all. Keep up the great work LaShell!
LaShell - You’re a wonderful example of how dynamic each of us is and a great motivation for those of us who do not begun to fully explore and utilize our many gifts, talents and abilities. You’re my sheroe!
It is absolutely amazing to read stories about women such as LaShell Wooten. People like this who have so much to offer and so many talents and skills are truly successful in every aspect of their life. Furthermore, the ability to touch masses of people is somewhat a rarity and not as popular as it should be. We all need to be thankful for the LaShell’s and many people across the globe who have harnessed this skill and make daily use of it. If not for people like LaShell shining light on others, many people would not be able to tap into their own greatness and find the light that shines within themselves.
I’m never ceased by amazement when it comes to hearing, reading, or seeing things about my great friend LaShell. She truly is a wonderment of humanity. LaShell is always ready to be there for anyone in need, and offers the listening ear or words of advice that truly come from the heart. They are not only heartfelt words of advice, but educational and motivational. Thank you LaShell for being a “Wonder Woman”.
Girl, you are a true representative of the people, who, oftentimes, are viewed as the wretched of the earth, and the so-called wretched were created by the so-called civilized. Yet, the civilized create population-control programs in order to cease the creation of the wretched, but the wretched of the earth do not decide to become extinct; they resolve, on the contrary, to multiply: life is their only weapon against life, life is all that they have. The civilized created a world that is responsible for the slaughter and enslavement of innocent people, for raining down bombs on defenseless children whenever and wherever they decide that their “vital interests” are menaced, and the civilized think nothing of torturing a man to death: these people are not to be taken seriously when they speak of the “sanctity” of human life, of the “conscience” of the civilized world. There is “sanctity” involved with bringing a child into this world: it is better than bombing one out of it. Dreadful indeed it is to see a starving child, but the answer to that is not to prevent the child’s arrival but to restructure the world so that the child can live in it; so that the “vital interest” of the world becomes nothing less than the life of the child. Your riveting work with the children and their families is a mirror reflection of the vital interest of the people: the child and the child’s development and the child’s future. I am certain that whenever you hold a mother’s hand, and whenever a mother holds your hand, it is as though you are supporting both the weight that scales measure and the weight that no scale can measure. Keep up the absolutely and incontestably fabulous work, young lady.