BIO

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Diana’s work as a life and business coach, strategist, psychotherapist and speaker all evolved out of her early Social Work roots and her desire to help others. After receiving her Masters in Social Work from Fordham Graduate School of Social Service in 1995, she worked at Woodhull Hospital inpatient psychiatry. 

 

She advanced her psychoanalytic training at The Institute for the Psychoanalytic Study of Subjectivity, the National Institute for the Psychotherapies, and completed specialized training at the Institute for the Center of Contemporary Psychotherapy. Her coaching training was with The Institute for Life Coach Training. 

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In response to the COVID19 pandemic, she has helped audiences through virtual presentations for the community and business owners on coping strategies for anxiety through the uncertainty. Recent webinars were with Brooklyn Chamber of Commerce, NY State Assemblyman Joe Lentol’s office and Evergreen Exchange, sponsored by JP Morgan Chase.

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In 2020 she founded THRIVE NOW, a program for companies to help business owners and their employees overall wellbeing, morale and happiness. In THRIVE NOW she teaches strategies to manage stress and anxiety, become more energized, increase motivation, improve performance, strengthen resilience, calm the mind and body, inspire optimism and boost overall health and happiness. 

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Diana loves helping people live their best life! As a coach over the past decade, she has been helping executives, entrepreneurs and solopreneurs with intensive personal and professional development. This goal focused work has facilitated transition and transformation to occur. She customizes strategies for navigating change, helps clarify where they want to go, plans their next steps, draws upon their interests, experience and strengths to take their existing work to a new level or launch a new career or venture. 

 

A practicing psychotherapist since 1995, Diana deeply enjoys helping people gain more insight and self-awareness, mange and overcome their unique challenges to move forward and be all they can be.

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As a Strategist and Consultant, Diana Zelvin has led large community projects, galvanized people around causes, created and implemented strategies for sustainability and growth, produced memorable events, secured funding from donors, corporations and government for capital campaigns, expanded client’s networks and partnerships, and supported the local business community. Recent clients include Campaign Against Hunger, Brownsville Community Culinary Center, New York Sun Works, Streb Inc and Alive Structures. 

   

Since 2018 Diana has been doing business development with Alive Structures, a landscape design and build company that specializes in constructing ecological green roofs. Diana helps to advance their mission of building green roof corridors to create natural landscapes in the urban environment, improve air and water quality, reduce energy dependence, and stimulate economic and educational opportunities. She educated building owners, developers, elected officials and the public to the multiple benefits of green technology as the urban solution to climate change.

 

Prior to that, she was Director of Development for The Firehouse North Brooklyn Community Center where she spearheaded their Capital Campaign to convert a shuttered firehouse in Williamsburg Brooklyn into a community and cultural center. In this role she raised $500K in private funding, energized the community around the mission, expanded and built large donor and sponsor networks, recruited and added 4 more people to their board of directors and produced many memorable large fundraising events.

 

Diana spearheaded Williamsburg Brooklyn’s PS84 Hydroponic Greenhouse Rooftop Classroom, a 1,500 SF urban lab, the first of its kind in Brooklyn. At the helm of this project, she raised $2M public and private funding. She worked with elected officials to secure government funding, led the Principal, New York Sun Works advisors, the architects, the School Construction Authority, the PTA and parents through the completion of the project. Since then, hundreds of students have used the hydroponic technology for project based hands-on learning about urban farming and sustainable solutions for climate change. 

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Diana sits on the board of directors of North Brooklyn Chamber of Commerce. She is proud to be an active community resident of Greenpoint, Brooklyn, where she lives with her husband, a commercial photographer, and teenage son who shares her passion for a good dance party, and their mischievous cats Pablo and Carlos. 

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A few other things people don’t know about Diana:

 

• Her own health challenges had led her to seek help in alternative medicine. Eventually she was educated by some of the most progressive people and programs in holistic medicine, including Oz Garcia, “nutritionist to the stars” and head of nutrition programs at Equinox Health Clubs. He trained her to be nutritional counselor at Equinox, and continued on in private practice.

 

• Her interest in health and nutrition led to an entrepreneurial venture in 2003 – to open a forward thinking health club in her community. She spent  a few years immersing herself in the health club industry, writing a comprehensive business plan, building a team of experts, getting investors on board, completing architectural plans and hiring engineers and attorneys. Although she was unable to fully bring her health club vision to fruition, she is grateful for her real world MBA.

 

• Diana was an illustrator the first decade of her professional life. Her keen interest in people was reflected in her paintings of portraits for commissioned book covers by publishers such as Random House, Penguin USA and Little Brown & Co. 

 

• Diana volunteered in the Israeli army after completing her Bachelor of Fine Arts from Syracuse University in 1985.