I was so lost.

I was so deeply identified as a victim that I couldn’t see a path forward. The only thing I knew how to do for a while was just wake up every morning. I had two small children, crippling anxiety and depression, and a broken heart full of dreams that I had no idea how to move towards.

It wasn’t always like this.

I was born in Palm Springs, California, where I lived until I was 33. I was raised in church with my family and you know how the story goes, everything looked fine from the outside. What I know now is that my childhood was really common. While yes, there was an incident of abuse from a non-family member that planted a seed of deep fear and shamein me, but the most painful thing about growing up was simply being a highly sensitive kid in a culture that valued obedience, with very little emotional connection.

I got married at 20 to my husband James. I had been a worship leader since I was 15 and a performer, singing for thousands of people on big stages, and I had dreams of so much more. I have always wanted to sing, to pursue music and express myself through art for as long as I could remember. There were signs of stress, anxiety, and overwhelm, especially after the traumatic birth of my firstborn child, but I didn’t know how to face any of that, so I ignored it. (If you’ve seen Inside Out 2, it was me putting it all in the back of my mind…and you know what happened!) It wasn’t until a series of panic attacks after the birth of my second son at the age of 30 upended my entire life that I realized that avoiding my pain wasn’t going to work.

9 years ago, I began the journey of healing. I was in therapy, coaching, and reading books every day trying to figure out how to clear the fog and calm the fear, but for awhile, I was just treading water. I was circling around and around my pain, but not resolving anything. I had heard that you needed to “feel it to heal it”, so I thought my ticket out was in feeling as much of my pain as possible. My Christian faith community mostly explained my struggle as spiritual attack, as an “Enemy trying to steal my destiny” and so I seriously doubled and tripled down on worship leading and “rebuking the darkness”. To my credit, I have always been a very determined healer but the foundation of my healing journey was based on the idea that there was something wrong with me and/or an external force. This only left me in deep disregulation, completely frozen and struggling with terrifying dissociation.

I know darkness really, really well.

Finally, after finding the right support in a trauma-informed coach, I began to very slowly understand how I found myself in that black hole, but I was still struggling with identity, and missing the vibrancy I had experienced years earlier and still hoped for.

It wasn’t until I read a question in a book that would truly change everything for me:

“What would you want to say is true for you10 years from now, if anything is possible?”

It bugged me. It intrigued me. It lit me up to even think about it. “What would I say is true for me? I don’t have time for dreaming, I’m trying to heal my pain!” But still…I felt a deep spark of empowerment at the idea that I could design my own life. But it honestly, it didn’t seem like a productive way to heal all this anxiety and depression. It felt frivolous, like wishful thinking, or escapism…wasn’t it?

I asked my trauma therapist about it, and she said something that surprised me. “YES. Courtney, dreaming is imperative for healing.” People ask me about pivot points all the time, and while there have been many, I will always point to this one. That moment, that reframe, her confirmation of what I had already felt a spark of truth around changed the course of my entire life, and gave instant purpose to my healing journey. It clicked: OH. You can’t heal if you can’t dream.

From that point, I was no longer trying figure out what was wrong with me, I was trying to figure out what was IN BETWEEN me and the things I dreamed about pursuing. I began to dream again, and finally,I could feel my own personal journey of true transformation begin.

During this time, something I didn’t expect but could not avoid was a deep wrestling with my own faith. I have come to find find that deconstruction and emotional healing journeys quite often go hand in hand.

I had been born and raised in evangelical Christianity since birth, and went from Sunday School, to Youth Group, to Worship Ministry at a mega church and ten Ministry School in Northern California in my early 30’s without skipping a beat. My emotional crisis led me to some really tough questions about the context I had been given around emotional health from my church upbringing and my trauma therapy began to clash with the messages I was hearing every week. When evangelicalism is your entire worldview, questioning that can feel so deeply destabilizing...terrifying even. But it was essential and I’m so grateful I did. A very life-altering journey of taking apart the ideas I had been given from people I had been raised with or looked up to and gently reconstructing my spiritual belief systems was imperative. My new relationship with faith began to develop based on deep self-trust and connection with the Holy Spirit and it has become the most wonderfully grounding thing about my life.

While some that I deeply respect and admire have found their paths led them away from Church, my journey led me back to the essence of the Gospel of Jesus that I had fallen in love with as a kid, and returning to church felt risky, but compelling. While still so messy, I have been so deeply healed and nourished by returning to a church community. I carry within me my own deep sense of connection to God and a wide capacity for mystery and the imperfection of it all. It’s been really beautiful. Most of the people that find me now are Creatives who have their own complicated histories with Christianity, and its an honor to hold space for each of them as they develop integrated spiritual health and vibrancy. It can be scary, but its so worth it.

I have come to feel very certain that God is working to heal the world by the dreams he is putting on the hearts of those he creates. He knows full well, as trauma science shows, the your dreams will always require your healing. And once those dreams show you what needs to be healed, its time to actually live them out, which in turn, inspires and heals other people as well. I’m pretty obsessed with this beautiful design.

I barely recognize the near-constant panic and depression I used to live in, but I have deep compassion for that girl. Although life is still full of variables and challenges, there is a capability and hopefulness within me that only grows every single day. A deep study and healing of my nervous system was imperative to my health, and it is the context I live from, and teach others to live from as well. From a place of safety and regulation, there is color and joy and momentum towards all that I’ve always dreamed of building. Relationships are so much deeper, stillness and relaxation are safe, creativity is sustainable, and the gift of knowing that there isn’t anything I can’t handle as I move forward is not one I take for granted.

What’s more, the things I began to write down a few years ago, the things I wished were true about my life? I am currently living out so many of those things. I have seen them come true, and I am being invited to dream even bigger

It’s a miracle that I’m here today, but it is not a mystery. Healing is so possible, and my hope is that everything that I offer reminds you of who you truly are, helps you heal what’s in the way, and returns you to your creative power, once and for all.

I now help people from all walks of life do this exact thing, moving from surviving and problem-chasing into true life creativity. This is what I want to help you do as well.

I want to help you find your way home. 

It’s because of this journey I’ve been on that I can confidently say: with support and intention, you’re going to have the most beautiful life.