A Softer Confidence

​Imagine for a moment, a younger version of yourself.  Perhaps the version of you from a decade ago.
What’s different?  How are you different?  What has changed?  How have you changed from this earlier version of yourself?
 
A decade ago Shauna Gullbrand was a very different version of the person you see today.  She was selfish, mean, unsympathetic, uncaring, painfully honest and lacking any filters or boundaries in her approach to others.  She was, in all honesty, a difficult person to interact with.  It was her way or the highway as she had little capacity to compromise.
 
The parts of her that could be selfless, nurturing and compassionate were tucked neatly away in dark corners of her shadow self.   Those traits, to her, were signs of weakness.  They were unknown.  Or more so, they were values that were never introduced, taught, encouraged or supported.  Ahhhhhh, the joys of childhood conditioning and patterns of thought and behavior that cycle through generations. 
 
The Care Giver, Divine Feminine and Great Mother archetypes lie dormant within her until the birth of her sons and the coming of her spiritual awakening and heart-centered soul work.  
 
The birth of her children awoke the archetypes and she settled into her role of mother but not much had changed at that point.  She took care of her babies and raised them to the best of her ability with the tools she had in her toolbox at the time.  That said, neither child could stay home from school unless they were bleeding or dying.  The emotional dramas or traumas from her children were noticed yet handled with a matter-of-fact kind of attitude and OH, you’ll be fine.  She was rigid in her desire to have everything her way.  And it would piss her off every time her husband would be fun and loving, nurturing and compassionate with the kids when Shauna wanted to stick to the schedule or routine on how the house was run and the children raised. 
 
Shauna began to understand, through her developed daily practices, how her words and actions had an effect on others.  Her spiritual awakening brought with it the practice of self-forgiveness.  She began to understand, or release the belief, that the world does NOT in fact, revolve around her.  That other people had feelings too and that maybe she could start being more mindful of that fact.  So she began forgiving herself for all the years of rigidity, anger, and control and began setting daily intentions to see people in her life through eyes of love and compassion.
 
She was certified as a Life Coach, Yoga Instructor and Integrated Energy Therapy Master/Instructor.  Shauna began working one-on-one with clients and with groups of people, like the students who filled her yoga classes and her programs.  In October of 2018 she received a Heart Initiation.  Although she had been playing around with the energy of nurturing compassion, it still felt unreal and uncomfortable.  It felt fake to her.  She would preach self-love and compassion, but wasn’t truly practicing it herself.    During the time of her heart initiation, Shauna experienced an intuitive insight around the need to give herself permission to nurture herself and to be compassionate toward herself.    This epiphany granted her the opportunity and opened her up to the possibility that if she could be nurturing and compassionate toward herself, she could be nurturing and compassionate toward anyone.  A whole new world opened up for her.
 
A decade has passed and Shauna stands before all of you now, a woman who is very aware of the times she slips back into the selfish child when something is thrown off in her day or on her schedule.   She’s aware of the triggers and the rising irritation and desire to lash out irrationally.  Shauna does her best to breathe and then maybe sit in her sacred space in order to feel through the child-like pattern of behavior so she can heal.
 
Shauna has been given golden opportunities to sit with either son when they need her, to listen with an open heart and with the intention to understand, ready, willing and able to nurture and offer compassion toward whatever it is they have going on in their life.   From this, her relationships with her sons has grown and deepened.   With it, a new level of respect.
 
In her classes, with clients, family or friends, she brings a message of the importance of self-love.  She invites those she knows to release any and all self-criticism and self-judgement, and in their place, a sense of compassion and nurturing.  She reminds herself and others, that we’re each doing the best that we can and to always be gentle toward our Self.
 
Shauna is currently collaborating and brainstorming with like-minded people in the creation of classes, programs and events that are focused on daily practices of love and compassion.  She has begun attending networking events with the intention of reaching a larger audience to share her wisdom, guidance and experience.  She sees people for the Divine beings they are, each on their own journey here in the jungles of time and space.   It can still be a little challenging for her to release control and the need to be selfish.  She’s working on it. 
 
Through this transition and healing, she now has the confidence in her ability to put someone else’s needs before hers and the confidence to be soft and welcoming, like an oversized couch that envelops, swaddles, and holds you close. 
 
Shauna holds a strong desire to make a difference in the world.  She sees herself on stage in front of hundreds of thousands, she sees herself with smaller classroom size groups, she sees herself authoring and publishing a book.  Her desires are to raise the vibration of individuals and collectively, raise the vibration of the planet!