Healing is nurtured. Healing is fostered. Healing is kindled.

North Aster is a Halifax-based initiative working to de-stigmatize mental health and provide free, trauma-informed support, education, and navigation services to all.

North Aster is based out of Halifax, Nova Scotia.

This is us.

Mission Statement

North Aster’s mission is to foster safe healing hubs with authentic, lived experienced mental health professionals. We engage in mental health awareness and education to build a stronger, healthier communal healthcare system.

Mandate

To support, educate and navigate all those healing from emotional wounds.

Vision

North Aster strives to build a stream of continuous resiliency through education, support and navigation, providing trauma-informed hubs for those who seek emotional communal safety.

Services & Projects

  • Counselling at North Aster is a space where your story is met with care. We offer trauma-informed sessions (60 or 90 minutes) taught and supervised by people with lived experience, designed around your pace.

    You set the focus, location, and goals—we’re a healing team, supporting you without labels or judgment.

    🌿 Sliding scale. Virtual, in-person, or open‑air options. Transparent, collaborative, and human-first.

  • Navigation is your guided pathway through life’s toughest systems—like mental health care, community programs, or legal processes.

    We partner with you to co-create clarity: filling forms, making calls, and advocating as needed.

    🧭 Choose a single helper or explore our team of perspectives and modalities—your journey, your pace, your support.

    ✳️ Blue Feather graduates—people trained as trauma-informed allies—may be available as part of the Navigation or Counselling ecosystem, carrying the Blue Feather token as a recognized symbol of safe, compassionate support.

  • Blue Feather is North Aster’s educational program for building trauma-informed allies across our communities. Through engaging workshops, lived-experience storytelling, and practical tools, participants learn how to recognize trauma, respond with compassion, and create emotionally safer spaces.

    Those who complete the program receive a Blue Feather token, a visible symbol that tells others: “I am a safe person. I will meet you with care.”

    🕊 Currently in development for educators, caregivers, support workers, and community members ready to walk gently with others.

    ✳️ Blue Feather graduates—people trained as trauma-informed allies—may be available as part of the Navigation or Counselling ecosystem, carrying the Blue Feather token as a recognized symbol of safe, compassionate support.

  • The Existential Owl is our podcasting project born of lived experience, reflection, and curiosity. Together, we probe themes like anxiety, purpose, burnout, joy, identity, and grief.

    Listen in for honest dialogues, creative voices, and shared humanity.

    🦉 Real stories. Real healing. No self-help façade—just connection.

  • The Collective Delusion is an open-source digital publication written by everyday people. Through poetry, essays, and anonymous stories, we explore the intersection of mental health, identity, and survival.

    ✍️ First issue in progress. Submissions now open.

  • The Roost is a future home for community care. This open building will house therapeutic rooms, creative workshops, a mental health café, and a space for safe social connection and growth.

    🛠 Renovations planned. Want to help build it?

“All we have to decide is what to do with the time that is given to us.”

J.R.R. Tolkien

Katie Cyr

Matt Hickey

Liam Cyr

Dawn McKelvie

Kaylee Beaton