We recently connected with Lauren Naomi and have shared our conversation below.
Lauren, thanks for joining us, excited to have you contributing your stories and insights. Was there a moment in your career that meaningfully altered your trajectory? If so, we’d love to hear the backstory.
A defining moment in my wellness career was in my initial phases of formally learning yoga. I began to shift in terms of how I wanted to lean into my practice and day to day life. The decision to truly see people and situations completely, the big picture and the impact I make with my choices and value added. This moment in my wellness and tech career happened during my first job in corporate. I had a client that no longer resonated with my values at the time in the food industry. I was faced with a challenge to choose to stay on the project or move forward. I decided to move forward in alignment with my practice and from that point on, I immediately deepened my connection with my other clients, my practice and most of all myself. Within the professional world, you will always be faced with multiple options the key to pushing forward is the one that resonates with you. In my wellness practice I’ve had multiple points of congestion as is the journey with entrepreneurship. Countless times I’ve had to ground back and lean into walking my path even if it took longer or didn’t quite make sense to everyone else. It was a defining moment for me of how I not only wanted to be as a professional but also live my life in practice.
Lauren, love having you share your insights with us. Before we ask you more questions, maybe you can take a moment to introduce yourself to our readers who might have missed our earlier conversations?
I am a wellness and business technology strategist. I focus in cyber security, change management and organizational development. I’ve been able to bridge my career and practice as needed and create safe spaces for my clients and yogis to work towards solutions with ethics and safety in mind.
As my love for wellness grew my practice began to solidify with GloFlow. GloFlow is a wellness practice with a mission to cultivate inner and outer connection, facilitate mental and physical wellness, and curate communities in alignment with resources and the intention of a peace centered life. At GloFlow I wanted to share that no matter how different your walk may be, you are never alone and we can all share in the healing obtained through practice, that is my intention with GloFlow. I am a Military veteran, and the first group of people I taught my first flow to were all Military service members during an Iyengar Yoga course. This nudged me to continue learning and that yoga didn’t have to fit within a specific demographic and was truly for all.
GloFlow began out of practicing for a yoga teacher certification from The Tree Yoga Yoga CoOp. This grew into a community of likeminded yogis, and curated wellness experiences. As a professional and yogi, integrity, safety, and flow are paramount and informed through intention, service, and the space I wanted my practice to hold –that being, a safe space. The safe space represents the opening to be completely and authentically yourself. Your practice, is your practice and not a performance. You are empowered to ‘take your cool off’ and meet each yogi including yourself where they are in their practice and truly see them.
Growing up during very early stages, I saw family just pop up when they were on a side of town near each other. It was normal for me to hear a phone call of “I’m on your side of town are you home?”. In that same way, I’ve modeled the way I do friendships with that in mind. This helped inform the GloFlow pop-up style community. This community is a check in, for yogis, friends and for all of us on our wellness journey to be in and feel into what it means to be well in community.
A branch of GloFlow’s mission is to give back and build the community through, donation of proceeds from select events, community service and knowledge. GloFlow serves to broaden awareness of resources and make wellness accessible to the youth and has partnered with the LA Promise Fund and GirlsBuild who’s vision and mission align with the cause to elevate, empower, uplift and create.
Do you think you’d choose a different profession or specialty if you were starting now?
If I could go back I would see that I have always chosen the same profession I’ve just brought it forth in different ways. All of them have aligned to my purpose in a way. I believe that as long as you are focused on your purpose the profession and specialty will align if you just keep moving forward.
Have you ever had to pivot?
The journey of an entrepreneur and business professional is all about pivoting and continuing to keep going no matter what happens or who shows up. As a multi-faceted creator balance in my personal, professional, and wellness practice are important. There are seasons in professional life that I call ramp up and some I call the slow down. Sometimes with event curating things pop up last minute and I’ll also be onboarding multiple clients and working through schedules. In navigating tech things are subject to change with innovation but keeping the human centered component and innovative insight is what has kept me grounded. With wellness it’s largely about mental health and with clients and organizations that journey is not linear. I had to be able to navigate the unknown.
Overall, understanding not to base my business out of a ramp up season was a huge pivot. Yoga has taught me that nothing is permanent but everything is a lesson. I say often ‘it’ll buff out’ because in the end, no matter how tired you are or what circumstance may have popped up, it always does. Every day you are faced with decisions and get to choose and create your path. At the beginning each pivot was scary from choosing my branding, working with new people, funding, marketing and evolving next steps. I likened it to being on a staircase and elevator. While on a staircase you always know the next step will be there, you just have to keep going. A pivot for a creative person can sometimes feel like being on an elevator where you know you are moving but sometimes the doors don’t open until they’re ready. That is surrender, pivoting for me is truly about surrendering and knowing there is no other way for it to be other than exactly how it is in this moment.
Contact Info:
- Website: gloflowyogi.com
- Instagram: @gloflowyogi @_laurennaomi
Image Credits
Elizabeth Ho Lorenze Davis The Gathering Spot