The Mindset Shift That Changed My Life

Here’s the part most people don’t know about my journey.

Mindset gets talked about like it’s a cute add-on to your wellness routine — something you think about when life gets stressful or when you’re trying to stay positive.

But for me, mindset became something deeper.
It became a way of making sense of everything I had lived through — a way to find steadiness inside myself when life felt confusing, heavy, or uncertain.

I know it might sound dramatic, but it’s the truth: the way you think, the way you speak to yourself, the meaning you assign to your pain… it can change your entire life.
I’ve learned it firsthand, and it’s changed the way I show up for myself.

I Grew Up Learning About Loss Before I Ever Understood Life

I didn’t get handed a gentle introduction to adulthood.

My dad’s illness became one of the defining themes of my childhood — watching the strongest man I knew slowly get swallowed by chronic disease. Not because he didn’t fight. Not because he didn’t care. But because the system failed him.
And he suffered for years. & we lost him too soon.

I watched my family get hit again and again.

My Uncle Mark.
My Aunt Peggy.
Grandparents I never even got the chance to know on my mom’s side.
My dad’s parents, both gone far too early.
Another uncle lost to kidney disease.
Another took his own life when I was young.

The list goes on.

Loss & disease wasn’t an occasional visitor.
It was woven into the fabric of my story.

And then there was my own health — the severe menstrual cramps, the headaches, the mood swings, the anxiety… I didn’t have the words for what was happening in my body. I just knew something wasn’t right and I didn’t want to keep ignoring it or be told to take medications anymore.

But nothing — nothing — prepared me for Angelina Grace.

The Loss That Broke Me Open

This chapter of my life isn’t easy to talk about, but it shaped me in ways I can’t ignore.

I dreamed of her.
Hoped for her.
Loved her instantly.

And then we were hit with devastating news — the kind no parent expects or knows how to process. A diagnosis that shattered the world we were building in our minds and forced us into a heartbreaking outcome we never wanted.

We didn’t get the ending we prayed for.
We lost her before she was ever born.
And that loss carved a mark in my heart that will always be there.

It’s the kind of pain you don’t “get over.”
It becomes part of you.
It shifts how you see the world.

And it forced me into the deepest mindset work of my life — not in a motivational way… but in a how do I keep going way?

And Then There Were the Ways I Tried to Cope

Grief doesn’t always look like tears.
Sometimes it looks like pretending everything is fine.

For years (way before Angelina), I coped by staying busy, staying social, staying distracted. I looked “healthy” on the outside — working out, eating well, reading all the self help & wellness books — but I was also partying hard and calling it balance.

I didn’t know how to sit with the pain I was carrying, so I found ways to outrun it. Ways to make life feel lighter. Ways to avoid being alone with the emotions I didn’t have the tools to process.

Mindset wasn’t my first tool.
It was the one I grew into — slowly, painfully, honestly.

It helped me finally sit with what I was feeling instead of running from it.
It’s what helped me stop distracting myself and start understanding myself.

Where Mindset Became Medicine

People often treat mindset like it’s just about staying positive.
But for me, it became a deeper way of understanding myself.

Mindset, for me, was about two things:

1. The way I chose to interpret my pain.

Pain was not proof that life hated me.
It wasn’t punishment.
It wasn’t a sign that I was unlucky or broken.

It was a teacher.
A mirror.
A re-direction.

And sometimes it was simply the reality of being human.

I used to ask myself, “Why me? Why is this happening to me?”
Now I ask, “What is this trying to teach me?”

2. The way I spoke to myself when no one could hear.

I could choose to be my own critic.
Or I could choose to be my own sanctuary.

I realized that the voice in my head would either heal me…
or hurt me more than life already had.

When Mel Robbins talks about mindset, she often says:
“You have to stop waiting to feel ready. You have to choose yourself.”
And that clicked for me.

No one was coming to save me.
No one could rewrite my past.
But I could choose what I believed about myself.
I could choose what these losses meant.
I could choose how to move forward.

Mindset Didn’t Fix Everything — But It Changed Everything

I want to be clear:
Mindset didn’t make the pain disappear.
It didn’t bring my loved ones back.
It didn’t erase the trauma or the grief.

But it did something equally powerful:

It transformed who I became because of it.

It made me more compassionate.
More self-aware.
More present.
More determined to live in a way that honors those I’ve lost.
More protective of my energy.
More intentional with my health.
More grounded in what actually matters.

Mindset didn’t make life easier.
It made me stronger.

And that strength became the foundation for choosing a holistic lifestyle — not because it sounded trendy, but because I needed a life that felt aligned with healing, truth, and purpose.

You Don’t Need a Perfect Mindset — Just a Real One

If there’s one thing I’ve learned, it’s this:

A perfect mindset isn’t what changes you.
An honest one does.

Healing isn’t about being positive all the time.
It’s about being present with yourself.
It’s about choosing thoughts that support you — not suffocate you.
It’s about meeting yourself with compassion, even when life feels impossible.

Mindset didn’t fix everything.
But it helped me meet my life with more compassion and clarity than I had before.
It helped me move through things I never thought I’d have to face, without losing myself in the process.

And that feels like enough.