How going against the grain made me the woman I am today.

I didn't always bet on myself. For a long time, I did the opposite.

I sought validation from everyone around me. I stayed in relationships that diminished me and convinced myself they were fine. I smiled and nodded through situations that made me want to scream. I abandoned my own needs so reliably that I stopped being able to name them. I know what it's like to lose yourself — slowly, quietly, in ways that are hard to explain to anyone who hasn't felt it. I also know what it costs. And I know what becomes possible when you finally decide that you are worth fighting for.

My path here was anything but straight — and I think that's exactly the point.

After graduating in Hawaii, where I studied marine science, I spent a year figuring out who I was outside of a classroom — working in a café, an analytical lab, and underwater as a scuba diver, while slowly realizing I wanted to be an advocate, not an observer. So I left. I spent six months doing work exchange in New Zealand and Australia, traveled through Southeast Asia and Europe, came home to Denver, bartended, managed a café, fundraised for a nonprofit, and applied to law school — all at the same time. I've lived paycheck to paycheck. I've moved to two states sight unseen to chase something that felt right. I've rebuilt myself more than once, from the ground up, without a map.

Today I'm a practicing environmental lawyer, a certified life coach through the Certified Life Coaching Institute, and someone who has made a personal mission out of getting uncomfortable.

I've jumped out of planes — twice. I jumped off an 850-foot building in Las Vegas. I taught myself to love running over fifteen years, going from dreading a half mile to finishing a marathon at 31. I walked into a weight room knowing nothing, felt completely out of place for six months, and kept showing up anyway. I traveled solo to Belize. I helped organize a union. I don't tell you this to impress you — I tell you this because every single one of those things started with fear, and I did them anyway. That is the whole philosophy.

I also want to tell you the harder things, because those are the ones that actually matter.

I survived sexual violence at nineteen, and spent years quietly untangling what that did to me — the fear, the confusion, the way it shaped how I saw myself and what I thought I deserved. I've been in relationships where I accepted treatment I never should have, and worked hard to understand why. I've struggled with body image. I've people-pleased my way through rooms and relationships and seasons of my life, prioritizing everyone else's comfort over my own truth. I'm not sharing this for sympathy. I'm sharing it because if any part of that sounds familiar, I want you to know you are sitting across from someone who genuinely gets it — not theoretically, but in her bones.

I became a life coach because I believe that the most transformative thing a woman can do is learn to bet on herself.

Not recklessly. Not perfectly. But with intention, with courage, and with someone beside her asking the questions no one else is asking. My job is not to tell you what to do — you already have those answers. My job is to help you hear them, trust them, and act on them. If you're ready to get a little uncomfortable, to move toward joy, and to start building a life that actually feels like yours — I think we're going to do extraordinary things together.