I grew up believing in magic.

 

I grew up with a magical mother. She taught me to see the unseen, hear beyond the silence, and recognize the magic woven through everyday life. She introduced me to tarot, the elements, intuition, the Earth, angels, and the Light, Universe, Source, God, whatever language feels true to you. When I was sick, she gathered plants and herbs. When my emotions became overwhelming, she taught me grounding and meditation. Her support helped me remain connected to my intuitive senses as I grew older.

Until I decided I no longer wanted to see, hear, feel, or know so much.

My childhood was filled with love, but it was also unstable. Life required me to grow up quickly. I experienced sexual abuse between the ages of three and seven, and at twelve, I was raped by someone I trusted. I was an empath with a wide-open heart, but no boundaries, very little self-worth, and no clear sense of who I was. Instead of moving more deeply into my spirituality, I turned toward numbing, self-harm, and self-sabotage.

At fourteen, when I was questioning whether I wanted to remain alive, I saw a quote etched into the side of the auditorium in my Iowa hometown:

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“There is no greater conquest than that of self.”

 

Something in me stopped. How could I leave this life when I had not yet discovered who I was? That question began a journey of self-discovery that I am still walking today.

 

Education became both my escape and my attempt to make meaning from what I had experienced. I wanted to understand trauma, the human psyche, and the resilience of the human spirit. I wanted to understand what had happened to me and help prevent it from happening to others. But achievement also became another place to seek the worth and identity I could not yet find within myself. There was always another degree, accomplishment, or résumé line promising that perhaps this would finally make me feel like enough.
 

I earned a dual master’s degrees in Cognitive Science and Social Psychology, earning two advanced degrees in the time it typically takes to complete one. I worked in both an inpatient psychiatric crisis center and a residential treatment center, before spending nearly five years in the country’s leading PhD program focused on Violence Against Women research.

I completed all of the program’s requirements except my dissertation (what academia calls “ABD)” because...​ ​at twenty-eight, I was raped again, this time by a stranger. I understood trauma professionally, academically, professionally; I had even written the handbook for Lansing’s Sexual Assault Response Team. 

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And still, I froze. Everything I knew intellectually disappeared beneath the weight of everything I had not yet healed.

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Cue the panic attacks that resulted in hospitalization. Depression so dark and overwhelming that I felt as though I had touched some layer of hell. Manic spending. Self-sabotage. And pain that surfaced in nearly every part of my life. I had always felt like an imposter in my doctoral program. My inability to do all the “right” things when presented with what seemed like the “ideal rape scenario” one in which I had the knowledge, resources, and support to respond became further evidence, in my mind, that I was unworthy.

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It was also during this time that I returned to energy work, breathwork, creativity, and a great deal of therapy. 

My breakdown became my breakthrough.

Yet, healing was not a straight line.

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I really damaged my body because I didn’t love myself. I entered an abusive relationship because codependence felt comfortable. I lost my ideal job because I was still looking outside myself for validation. I became involved with a manipulative energy teacher because I hadn’t yet developed discernment or learned to trust my own knowing.

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Then one day, I was fucking done.

Done abandoning myself.
Done handing my authority to other people.
Done repeating patterns that reinforced the belief that I wasn’t worthy.

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That transformation did not come from finding one perfect teacher, one healing method, or one final answer. It came through integrating all of myself: my lived experiences, psychological understanding, spirituality, shadow, intuition, humanity, and multidimensional awareness.

 

I stopped trying to become someone worthy.

I began remembering who I had always been.

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Why I am here.

I know what it is to lose trust in yourself.

I know what it is to search for your identity through achievement, relationships, teachers, and other people’s approval. I know what it is to sense something deeper within yourself while simultaneously questioning whether you can believe it. And I know what can happen when you begin reclaiming the parts of yourself you were taught to fear, dismiss, hide, or abandon. 

I do not believe you are broken.

I believe you may have become disconnected from your own knowing.
 

My work is to help you see more clearly, heal more deeply, reconnect with your multidimensional nature, and integrate what you discover into your actual life.

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I am not here to give you something you do not already possess.

I am here to help you remember who you are and trust what you already know.

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This is why I am here.

To help you remember who you are and trust what you already know.

 

With grace and gratitude,

Your Spiritual BFF,
Shannon​​