My Story
Hi! I’m Sasha Cagen, life and leadership coach with a focus on helping women.
I’ve been working full-time as a life and executive coach for women leaders since 2012. I’m also a writer, an author of two books at work on my third.
My life has been one gigantic non-linear path, so of course, I didn’t come to life, leadership and executive coaching through the traditional path. (Though I’m not sure what that would be!)
I grew up in Cranston, Rhode Island, and worked hard to come out on top as high school valedictorian, then went on to achieve all kinds of things early. I published two books with major New York publishing houses by the time I was 33, and started a nationally-award winning magazine called To-Do List. I also cofounded StyleMob, a Silicon Valley social media startup that we sold to another company with a successful exit within 9 months. I was on all the Women in Silicon Valley panels.
My resume was all kinds of impressive. But inside I felt lost and unsure who I was any more.
I didn’t like the male-dominated environment in Silicon Valley, the lack of ethics, or the version of myself I was becoming in it.
So I followed an instinct that said, get out of your head and into your body, and into the unknown. I packed up and spent a year traveling alone through Brazil, Colombia, and Argentina.
That year of travel and cultural immersion in dance led to one of the central insights I draw on as a coach: to know ourselves and live our most inspired lives, we need to connect with our full selves by connecting with our bodies. This insight led me to embrace a somatic approach and body-based strategies for confidence and decision-making in my coaching work with clients.
When I came back to San Francisco in 2011, I retrained as a life and leadership coach and built a practice around helping accomplished women in all kinds of interesting fields gain more confidence in their lives, work, and choices. My clients tend to be smart women who are longing to reconnect with their bodies too.
15+ years later, I’ve coached hundreds of women founders, business owners, political leaders, and ambitious professionals. I also tend to work with academics and doctors. I have helped women in industries ranging from AI to restaurant groups and wellness studios to national politics. I help my clients unravel and work through imposter syndrome, perfectionism, burnout, people-pleasing and to make inspired choices that reflect their true desires rather than societal expectations.
I bring to this work my conviction that transformation is possible, that we can make finding the new path an adventure, and it happens one baby step at a time. Working with me tends to be a growth experience that people say they wish they had done even earlier because it makes new things possible.
Are you curious to exploring working with me in life or leadership coaching? Reach out for a free consult. Tell me about you. Let’s talk.
Get to know me by watching this video
- 15+ years coaching women founders, executives, and political leaders. I believe in holding space for the women who are making change in this world, and helping them to do it from their most centered, empowered selves.
- Founder of the Quirkyalone movement — and creator of the word “quirkyalone” which eventually made it into the dictionary!
- My book Quirkyalone: A Manifesto for Uncompromising Romantics (HarperSF) was praised by Barbara Ehrenreich as potentially as important as The Feminine Mystique for women
- Author of To-Do List (Simon & Schuster) — and invited speaker in the prestigious Authors@Google series, where I presented to-do list research at Google headquarters
- Co-founder of a Silicon Valley social media startup StyleMob (successful exit: we sold within 9 months to an internet ad network. I’ve been the only woman in the room pitching to investors and working through an acquisition. I bring both business knowledge and personal transformation to my work with clients.
- Tango addict (dancing now for 16 years) who has danced all over the world, in search of the next tangasm (the cocktail of good hormones we get through the hug in the dance of tango). I’ve danced tango in Bali and Paris, Montreal and Montenegro. Tango is a big passion for both the dance and what it teaches us about relationships, life, and connection to our own axis (our own center). I bring tango as a metaphor into coaching for clients who are into dance!
- Extensive media coverage for my work as an author, coach and thought leaded. My books and coaching have been featured on CNN, and in Wired, Vice, Women’s Health, and more. I know how to get messages out there, and I help clients who want to become more clear in their messages.
- Worldwide reach! I became famous for a moment for being the first woman to marry myself in Argentina. Self-marriage, of course, is non-exclusive: it’s a commitment to yourself and your own life as a foundation for everything else. I was on the top news show in Buenos Aires talking about the trend of self-marriage and then a guest expert on Dr. Phil talking about the same topic, where I wound up being surprised with a political debate about the implications of women loving themselves.
- Lover of languages. I speak French, Spanish, and Portuguese fluently, and would spend my whole life learning languages if I could because I find it so fascinating how words reveal how cultures think.
- Personal essayist and memoirist, and writing teacher and coach. Alongside coaching and dancing, writing is my great passion. I have taught personal essay extensively and memoir structure. I have been working on my latest project Wet for 14 years and am eagerly anticipating bringing out this follow-up to my first book Quirkyalone. Wet is a memoir, the story of healing from a buried secret of childhood sexual trauma through listening to my body in all these wild, outside-the-comfort zones adventures in sensuality in South America. I can’t wait to share this book with my readers!
Here’s what my coaching clients say
“Working with Sasha has been instrumental in huge changes in my life. It helped me leave a job and find a new one, it helped me have a wonderful long-distance relationship and feel resilient when that relationship ended. I am so grateful for the freedom and confidence working with Sasha has given me over the past year.”–Megan Cramer, Atlanta, Georgia
“With Sasha’s easy-going, enthusiastic and supportive nature, I gained so much awareness of myself. As a result of working with Sasha, my confidence in myself increased: I changed careers, restarted dating in an open/honest way and I joined a local tango community. I owe much of my new outlook on life and ways of interacting with others to Sasha. I have peace, satisfaction and a true view of my worth. If you are stuck or just can’t get rid of a nagging feeling that your life is moving by without you, Sasha can help like no other.”–Carissa Giblin, Tampa, Florida
“I was fortunate to work with Sasha in the latter half of 2024 while struggling with some pretty heavy personal issues. Sasha helped me tremendously in getting “unstuck.” I was able to get through the outcome of the 2024 presidential election with not only my sanity intact, but a newfound fire and engagement that is sustaining me today. I recommend her unreservedly to anyone looking to take the next step in achieving control of their life and future.”–Jamie Lloyd, New York City
“Working with Sasha as a coach has been really important and transformative for me, and I have worked with other coaches before.
Something about Sasha’s style and experience as a tango dancer, as someone who wants women to be empowered, happy and comfortable with who they are is really unique and important.
I would encourage anyone who is thinking about working with Sasha to give it a try, you will learn all kinds of things about yourself that will change your world.”–Kelly Macias, Los Angeles
Let’s work together
Through my coaching practice, I provide a unique, deep, creative, and action-oriented alternative to therapy to help you make lasting change.
What can we focus on?