We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Brook Belden a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.

Brook, looking forward to hearing all of your stories today. If you had a defining moment that you feel really changed the trajectory of your career, we’d love to hear the story and details.

In my work, the most interesting is always the one that created the greatest resistance and breakthrough! So for me, it was 4 1/2 years ago. My husband and I were running a business together. We had been working hard and hustling for years. We created some great success – built a great community, became leaders in our industry, and grew a ton, but we were doing it all on hustle principles and it was all off. We never thought that we would or could leave our business. We had so much wrapped up in it. So instead, I suggested that we just move to a virtual model, sell off our belongings, and take our 2 and 5 yr old on a travel adventure. I wasn’t as connected to my intuitive voice back then and when I was really in a bind, I would just make negotiations with God – for instance, “I need to know if this is the right move. So, If I am going to sell my house and everything I own, pack up my tiny kids and geriatric dog, and live in 180 sq feet, I need this transition to demonstrate total ease and flow. We can have adversity while we’re out there, but not in the process. Make the house sell and the purchase of the trailer go smoothly.” Needless to say, that didn’t happen. We had issues after issue. The people we were buying a trailer from ghosted us. Our beautiful house sat for three weeks with crickets (in a strong market). Our dog’s health declined. It was a mess. My husband kept trying to rationalize it all, but I couldn’t ignore this pact that I made. So we pulled the plug. Took our house off the market, walked away from our business, and watched the entire thing crumble. My husband took a job and we spent two years healing and rebuilding. It was the hardest and most beautiful time in my life. While our businesses and life is in great shape, the inner landscape of who I am has never been more solid.

As always, we appreciate you sharing your insights and we’ve got a few more questions for you, but before we get to all of that can you take a minute to introduce yourself and give our readers some of your back background and context?

I suppose I have always been a person with emotional depth and curiosity. I had this burning question about what creates dissatisfaction, supposedly always knowing that we have this innate right to inner peace and “happiness”. The most conventional career path led me to becoming a therapist. While I was completing my master’s degree, I wrote my thesis on how improving basic wellness, like through exercise and nutrition could improve our mental health. Now this was 15 years ago and super “woo” back then. I went on to work in the health and wellness field as a coach and nutrition consultant for nearly a decade before getting burned out. I have always been on a path of uncovering what was underneath – pulling back the layers to uncover that initial question, which inevitably led me to my own existential crisis or dark night of the soul and the deeper embodiment of spiritual practices, hearing my intuition (and following it), believing my psychic channeling, and being blown away by the accuracy of Human Design and astrology as tools for alignment. My practice now is multi-disciplinary and client-centered. My goal is to uncover their innate truth and heal any narrative that is robbing them from that.

Learning and unlearning are both critical parts of growth – can you share a story of a time when you had to unlearn a lesson?

The biggest lesson that I have had to unlearn is a masculine model for running a business. There is different energy – masculine and feminine. They don’t necessarily have to do with gender and both are valuable. Yet, the masculine energy is what has bee dominant in the business and entrepreneur world for decades. Only in recent years have feminine energies been valued and highlighted in leadership roles.

I felt my absolute lowest in business (and in life) when I was a brand new mom trying to keep up with the hustle and run my business. I wanted desperately to be a present mom but also didn’t want to sacrifice my business or let my team down. I was prioritizing strategy, consistency, and production over relationships, feeling, and flow. Again, you can see how all of these are valuable traits in business and leadership, but my strengths and just innate character errs on the latter. The grind not only led to burnout, but inevitably led to the end of that business.

When I walked away, I knew I couldn’t run another business by neglecting who I really was, my strengths, and my way of operating. I don’t have to be all things to all people, but I do need to do me.

How about pivoting – can you share the story of a time you’ve had to pivot?

Ha! I think I’m still in a pivot! During covid, we made the decision to homeschool our two children. It’s been a wonderful decision for our family and it’s the role that I have taken on primarily in our home. But I have had to shift from a lot of scheduled appointments for clients and networking to projects that I can fit in while the kids are occupied. This is evolving still, but right now it means more writing projects and beginning to shift from one to one clients to retreats. I think the beautiful part about this pivot is that it is forcing me to prioritize and also to just do the things that really light me up.

Contact Info:

• Website: www.brookbelden.com
• Instagram: www.instagram.com/reclaiming.her

Image Credits
Justyn Lord Photography