Alright – so today we’ve got the honor of introducing you to Lauren Gilhula. We think you’ll enjoy our conversation, we’ve shared it below.

Lauren, looking forward to hearing all of your stories today. What did your parents do right and how has that impacted you in your life and career?

I grew up in a household that welcomed holistic and alternative ways of thinking. This gave me a strong foundation and permission to be curious about western societal norms and views and to seek alternate answers to the questions I have about health, wellness and belief systems that western views couldn’t answer for me.

This resulted in a belief system that is a collection of eastern and western philosophies; many of which are supported by each other.

I became very interested in psychology during high school and it evolved to a passionate interest in medicine, biology and neuroscience that continues today.

My exposure and curiosity around eastern approaches to life and wellness didn’t fully blossom until 2016 when I started going to yoga classes.

This felt like home in a way I can’t fully describe. Doing a physical asana practice helped to strengthen my body but the real magic was in the spiritual teachings and other branches of yoga.

It’s here that I began studying and exploring topics I was familiar with from childhood and other topics that I felt magnetized to.

As I dove into topics such as breathwork, mindfulness and meditation, I was curious about the science behind these eastern practices.

This continues today and is the approach that I take doing my soul-led work of introducing others to topics that inspire me to live a more loving and expanded life.

Many of the tools and beliefs that my parents introduced me to and helped me explore are beneficial in my corporate job as a communicator for search and rescue operations.

Grounding and breathwork practices allow me to stay focused and do my job well to serve others.

My spiritual beliefs have taught me how to detach from and surrender to outcomes and give myself grace along the way.

These practices allow me to teach others from a place of embodiment as opposed to regurgitating information that I have learned on topics that interest me.

The last few years of deep introspection have strengthened my belief that we are a soul having a human experience.

When I look at the role my interest in both eastern and western philosophies play in my understanding of this life, I see two main themes:

My interest in western topics such as psychology, medicine, biology and neuroscience help to support physical body; our human.

My interest in eastern topics such as mindfulness, meditation, spirituality etc. supports our life force; the experience of our soul.

Combining both into everyday life and understanding allows us to see how our human survival patterning shows up, how to support it so it doesn’t control our life and seeing the role of our soul, what it looks like and how we can better lead from soul.

I thank my parents for giving me the foundation of knowledge and curiosity to the soul part of the journey.

This allowed me to advance my understandings at an early age in order to live a beautiful life with more grace and ease and to lead others towards their own version of this.

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?

Hi there, I’m Lauren!

My passion and purpose come from the depths so let’s dive in.
 
So much of how I live and lead my life stems from early loss and grief.

The summer we were 12, my close childhood friend Nicole died in a car accident. She was born the day after me and we were truly two peas in a pod.

Every birthday is both a celebration of another year of experiences for me and a sadness of another year without Nicole.

From an early age, I had to learn how to navigate grief.

I became the friend that others would come to for advice and support when they experienced loss. I saw it as shining a flashlight on the path slightly behind me so that others didn’t have to navigate the darkness alone.

20+ years later, I have a pretty beautiful toolbelt of wisdom and practices that carry me through all of life’s seasons.

After I lost my dad to cancer in May 2022, I started feeling a strong pull to broaden my impact so I can help more people navigate life with grace and ease.

This is when my podcast was born. The Living on Lemonade with Lauren podcast is where I share my thoughts and experiences of everyday life along with the nuggets of wisdom I extract from these experiences.

With the podcast, I started feeling an intuitive nudge to start teaching. This became my Living on Lemonade with Lauren Facebook community where I hold monthly community calls, along with monthly classes inside the group and I share my paid courses and offers too.

The mission around this soul led business is to encourage more curiosity in others and to guide them into discovering themselves more and build their own soul care toolbelt as I call it.

My soul care toolbelt is full of all the practices and wisdom that I use to navigate every season of life.

My experience with grief and loss, along with years of personal discovery and love of learning allows me to lead others through deep personal work and hold space for the transformations they have.

Topics of study that I draw from in my teaching and guiding include neuroscience, psychology, stress, trauma and also eastern philosophies and modalities such as breathwork, mindfulness, meditation.

Combining both eastern and western approaches and integrating them into daily life has helped me to live more fully.

The western side allows me to take care of my humanness and the eastern side helps me maintain connection with my soul and lead from the inner wisdom and whispers of my soul.

This is what I’m passionate about in my own life and leading others to do for themselves.

The people who will find my work the most interesting and helpful are those who love learning and have a knowing that there’s more to life than the hamster wheel of society and they want to discover it for themselves with support and guidance.

My people are the kind that believe there’s magic to be made in life while not bypassing our humanness.

They’re a “follow your heart, take your brain with you” kind and I love every minute of guiding and supporting them.

If that’s you, welcome to my mission :)

Are there any resources you wish you knew about earlier in your creative journey?

Identity and mindset work are topics that have changed my life in the most beautiful ways.

On one hand, I would’ve loved to have known about these topics and began doing this work at a younger age and on the other hand, my struggles and life experiences brought me through what I needed to learn and I know I would’ve missed some lessons and wisdom had it gone any other way.

I’m just glad that I have the awareness and tools now to work through limiting beliefs and other things as they come up so I can release what no longer serves me and continue to be more of who I’m meant to be.

Authenticity is the benefit of doing personal healing work.

What’s the most rewarding aspect of being a creative in your experience?

Working with others and guiding them through their own personal transformation is sooooo rewarding. I’ve watched women have profound “aha” moments through my live courses and as a result make what might look like subtle shifts but over a short period of time create huge changes in their lives.

The visual I get is leading them into the cocoon as a caterpillar and then watching them emerge as a butterfly in excitement of their new chapter of life and all the adventures that go along with it.

Seeing people become more of who they’re meant to be from a soul perspective is the most magical thing and drives my passion to do this work.

Contact Info:

• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/mzzlaurengilhula/
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/groups/livingonlemonadewithlauren
• Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@livingonlemonadewithlauren
• Other: Living on Lemonade with Lauren podcast available on all major podcast platforms