People often think they're condemned to a life of misery after they experience trauma. I also believed this at one time. During that time, I only wanted to die because I thought my suffering was only going to end in death. But it wasn't true!

Everything changed the moment I realized I could choose what I was going to focus on each day. I could choose to focus on the pain and devastation my trauma left behind. Or I could choose to focus on the day right in front of me. Once I started to focus on the day in front of me, I began to see that life wasn't just about suffering. I started to see beauty all around me. I saw that every minute of every day I had a choice of what I chose to focus on: pain or beauty.

As I say in this video, “We can change how we experience life by just shifting the stories we tell ourselves and shifting what we choose to place our focus on and that’s empowering! That means that our unchangeable past can stay where it belongs, in the past. And it means...

Because I'm happy and bubbly by nature and always have a smile on my face, people often think I don't have a care in the world. People who don't know about my past traumas think that I've never struggled when it's the farthest thing from the truth. I'm constantly at battle with myself. Every day I need to choose whether I'm going to slip into old patterns or repeat the new habits and beliefs that will get me closer to the life I desire and deserve.

In this video, I talk about why most of us hide our pain with a smile, the consequences of doing so, and how we can start working through our hidden pain. I also do a reading from my book, Transformation After Trauma: Embracing Post-Traumatic Growth. 

If you're in need of tools to deal with the moments and days when you feel like you're dying inside, I encourage you to read or listen to Transformation After Trauma. I detail the tools that have been most important in my healing journey and instructions on how you can use each...

We can learn a lot about resilience when observing nature. I'm particularly fascinated by trees and how they can thrive in the face of adversity. It's why hiking has been so important in my healing journey. It's shown me examples of resilience in all life forms, including myself.

Hopefully this video gives you ideas for how to look for glimmers of hope in your environment so you can hold on while you figure out how to get through the obstacles life has thrown in your path.

If you have a specific obstacle that you'd like to overcome, but need assistance in creating a plan for moving forward, I'd love to help! Learn more about my 2-hour strategy sessions here: serotinouslife.com/strategy-session

Hiking has been important in my healing journey for so many reasons. It pushes me mentally and physically. It proves to me over and over that I am strong, and that I can do hard things. In the early stages of my healing journey it made me realize that if I can keep going in the mountains when I wanted to give up that I could summit the figurative mountains in my life that I thought I wasn't capable of summiting, particularly my traumas.

In this video, I talk about how important hiking was in my healing journey and the importance of chunking down your goals into manageable bite-sized pieces so you don't get overwhelmed.

If you want a full toolkit on how to use goal setting in your healing journey, I encourage you to read my book, Reclaim Your Life After Trauma: The Power of Goal Setting. Sign up here to begin reading the Introduction and Chapter 1 of the book for free: serotinouslife.com/reclaim-your-life-book

If you'd like to read the full book, you can find the eBook and...

Even though love can help us heal, it's so hard to trust again after experiencing trauma. Because many people I encountered when I was younger hurt me, or they died, I started to distance myself from people. Even though I love people and I love talking with them there was always a wall that I put up so people couldn’t get too close. But I was very lonely for most of the years of my life. I’m now 40 years old and it’s only been within the past few years that I’ve allowed myself to really get close to people. But I didn’t do it randomly.

I first started with people who wanted to be close to me, but I pushed them away. I was very open and honest with them and told them about my mission to improve the relationships with people who love me and to build trust in others. I told them I was scared of getting hurt and that being vulnerable is hard for me. Because they already loved me, and this is what they'd been hoping for all along, each of them was patient...

Rivers and waterfalls provide perfect examples of how change can be beautiful. Our trauma forever changes us. Yes, trauma can be devastating. But if you look hard enough, you can also see that it has changed your life in beautiful ways.

You may find it helpful to watch this video I recorded while reflecting on renewal during a recent trip to Letchworth State Park in New York:

We can never change the fact that our trauma occurred. The only thing we have control over is how we look at our trauma. If you'd like to break the cycle your trauma has you trapped in, I encourage you to read my book, Reclaim Your Life After Trauma: The Power of Goal Setting. It will give you the inspiration and tools you need to move yourself further away from the devastation your trauma left behind and into the life you desire and deserve.

Sign up here to begin reading the Introduction and Chapter 1 of the book for free: serotinouslife.com/reclaim-your-life-book

If you'd like to read the full book, you can...

In this video, I talk about how trauma can steal moments of joy from us unexpectedly. Like I recently experienced, you can be enjoying life in one moment and then something can trigger you and send you back into remembering your trauma. Or, it can cause you to be scared over all the ways that your current joy could be stolen from you.

Hopefully it will give you ideas for how to handle moments when you're triggered. If you need additional ideas for self-care practices to handle the moments when you're triggered, I encourage you to read or listen to my book, Transformation After Trauma: Embracing Post-traumatic Growth. Sign up here to begin reading the Introduction and Chapter 1 for free: serotinouslife.com/transformation-after-trauma-book 

If you want to read or listen to the full book, you can find the eBook, audiobook, and paperback on Amazon: amazon.com/dp/1950336204

What are you grateful for today?

"Every once in a while when I’m walking, I like to put out my arms, close my eyes for a brief moment, and focus on the sun and breeze on my skin. It always makes me smile. Being surrounded by all elements of nature makes me feel alive and reminds me how blessed I am. When I’m home, I like to place my hands on my chest so I can feel my heartbeat. I’m so grateful that it’s still beating. I’m so grateful that I hung on and didn’t give up. This simple practice fills me with gratitude and joy."

"When you begin to focus on all the good things in your life, you’ll see all that you have to be grateful for. Practicing gratitude daily has been a game changer for me. I spent many years in my teens and twenties wishing I were dead. Now that I’m on the other side of the devastation, I’m able to find joy all around me."

From my book, Reclaim Your Life After Trauma: The Power of Goal Setting.

With experiencing...

It saddens me to think about all the years I spent wishing that I never existed. I thought that death was the only way that my suffering would end. But that proved to be far from the truth. I'm now grateful for every single day that I have on Earth.

In this video, I discuss the importance of goal setting and self-care, just putting one foot in front of the other, and holding onto one more day until you can get enough separation from your pain.

My book, Reclaim Your Life After Trauma: The Power of Goal Setting, is dedicated to how I used goal setting to separate myself from my unchangeable past and I provide the reader with the tools they can use to do the same. Sign up here to begin reading the Introduction and Chapter 1 for free: serotinouslife.com/reclaim-your-life-book

My book, Transformation After Trauma: Embracing Post-Traumatic Growth, is dedicated to the self-care tools I used in my healing journey. Each section includes actionable steps so the reader can try each tool in...

I fell so far after my traumas. It still pains me to think about how I hurt myself and others when I was just trying to figure out how to survive. I know I was just doing the very best I could, but there was a lot of devastation left behind from my self-destruction. 

The thing about self-destruction is we don’t only hurt ourselves in the process. In this video I discuss why it’s important to get help after experiencing trauma and to find positive ways to cope so we don’t continue to hurt ourselves and others. 

We pass along pain from one generation to the next in our families and within our communities when we refuse to do the work necessary to heal after our trauma. Yes, it sucks that we had to endure the pain we’ve experienced. Yes, it sucks that not a thing can be done to change the fact that we experienced trauma and that those memories will be with us forever. But it doesn’t mean that the rest of our life must suck because we’ve...