Meet Chenda Lor

We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Chenda Lor a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.

Chenda, thanks so much for taking the time to share your insights and lessons with us today. We’re particularly interested in hearing about how you became such a resilient person. Where do you get your resilience from?

I get my resilience from my mom. My family immigrated from Cambodia on January 10th, 1980, when I was 5 years old. She was 37 years old, mother to 6 girls and one boy, she had just become a grandmother, lost her husband to an injury induced stroke and had to leave him in a shallow grave in Thailand near the refugee camp we walked many miles to after escaping the Khmer Rouge and those horrible 5 years in concentration camps. When I think about my mom and the life she had lived and the life she gave me growing up in a white suburb of Chicago, I am empowered and motivated to keep moving on and making the world around me and my community a better place, because my parent’s efforts to keep me alive and the hard work and sacrifices they endured all those years so I can be here right now was not in vain.

Great, so let’s take a few minutes and cover your story. What should folks know about you and what you do?

My days are very full. I fill them with art, planning or building my next shed or house, my commitment to Rotary and volunteering in my community.

A day is not complete unless I’ve created something, let it be a painting or design for the next structure. I have to do some art. It’s a relaxation tool, an escape, and energizer. Putting pen to paper, paint to canvas, or just writing in my journal helps me focus, find peace of mind, and helps me reassess and process the day and its events. Especially when there are issues or challenges to overcome. Painting, drawing and writing things down helps me problem solve and ease my anxieties. It’s a huge release and is my tool to process emotions in stressful times. I’m excited to be the new art instructor at the local senior center. I will be teaching watercolors, art history, drawing, and a new senior seminar to incorporate my art coaching practice through the community education program funded by grants through Cuesta College. It’s a great opportunity to serve and I’m psyched to start! Did you know that anyone in the community is eligible to participate in these classes offered for free at the senior center? You don’t have to be a senior! I just learned this and think it’s important to share.

I love the process of planning and designing structures to create spaces for people to live and work. I’ve been part of the building industry since I was 15 working as a cashier at a home and building center where I grew up. Since we were married, my ex-husband and I have built over 50 homes together as partners of a general contracting company. Since the divorce, I’ve been a business manager for a structural engineering firm and the executive director at a botanical garden where I helped improve public spaces and design lasting programs. After leaving the garden, I’ve been working with architects and engineers the last couple years designing my next residential infill project, remodeled a little beach shack, and created the Lor Coaching Studio & Gallery. The permit process is complete for the new home with ADU and I’m excited to start. I’m just waiting for the funding now and with any luck, we can break ground in June. I’m also excited to start building a little shed in the back lot of my studio to create a calm shelter for the upcoming young artist summer camp the studio is hosting and to have an alternative more intimate space for me and my coaching clients to meet. I am a big believer in form equals function and prioritize comfort, craftiness, and creativity in my projects. I want people to feel safe and calm in my spaces so they can be confident to create and express themselves in my art and coaching sessions. So, things aren’t always perfect nor fancy and there’s plenty of nature around. The spaces are also flexible to host new gallery shows and artist receptions, summer camps and workshops, and other private events and parties. We offer customizable craft and painting party packages, so the overall mood of the place is lively, creative, and comfortable.

And lastly, I spend my “free” time surfing, hiking, gardening, and serving my Rotary club and volunteering for local nonprofits. I’m out for a little while longer from surfing and hiking until my knee heals after the total replacement, but I’m still able to tend to my plants! I have orchids and other house plants and a small yard with a small vegetable and herb garden. I’m able to harvest greens, radishes, and many herbs right now. It’s great to live in a climate where I can grow food all year round. I also attend weekly meetings for my Rotary club as the secretary and president elect nominee and enjoy the volunteer opportunities we have through the club. I also serve on a couple Chamber committees for Morro Bay and San Luis Obispo. I’m a volunteer for Diversity Coalition and TMHA and a few other nonprofits when time permits. I enjoy the community events and giving back where and when I can. Mostly I love seeing and working alongside old and new friends doing purposeful work and staying connected. I look forward to getting back to the surfing community in a few weeks since it was a daily ritual for me that I really miss.

Looking back, what do you think were the three qualities, skills, or areas of knowledge that were most impactful in your journey? What advice do you have for folks who are early in their journey in terms of how they can best develop or improve on these?

I think the most important qualities that were most impactful in my journey thus far were persistence t, resilience or stubborness to , and courage.

If you knew you only had a decade of life left, how would you spend that decade?

If I only had one decade left to live, I would spend it playing in the surf, making art and sharing my love of the arts with others through my coaching and education outlets, traveling with my favorite people, and spending every moment with the people I love.

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Chenda Lor

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