5 Ways I’ll Help you Bloom Your Life

Welcome to Bloom Narratives. The place where you can come to be equipped and nurtured so your story can unveil itself to be full of its greatest beauty, strength, and wholeness. This blog exists for 5 purposes:

• To help women rewrite the stories of their lives so they are the heroes in them.

• To give women self-help tools that actually work.

• To help mothers and/or professionals navigate the challenges of parenting while feeling stressed, anxious, or overwhelmed.

• To empower women to challenge dominant narratives that are oppressive

• To equip women with simple strategies that produce maximum benefit in their lives.

#1. My blog exists to help women rewrite the stories of their lives so they are authors they can count on in times of peace and conflict.

Have you ever felt that your life is written for you by the characters you interact with every day? That you have little control over the actions those characters have on your life? My passion in life is supporting women to recognize themselves as the author, rather than a supporting character in another person’s story.

Stories are written for us women are oppressive, constraining, anxiety-provoking, and overwhelming (to name a few!). Stories women begin to write for themselves empower them to take control over their thoughts, feel less afraid of their emotions, and increase confidence in decision making, walking along her journey with confident, purposeful, and peaceful steps.

#2. My blog exists to give women the right interventions that actually work. Long-term.

The self-help industry is a global multibillion-dollar enterprise, so why do we keep searching for resources and tools? Many self-help books and materials are fantastic, but there is a significant amount that endeavors to manage or reduce symptoms rather than solve the problem that created the symptoms. My training in mental health during grad school was tailored at critically analyzing the structures we have in our systems today and how those structures inherently perpetuate the social-emotional challenges we see today. My learning and training focused on asking the questions:

• With all the knowledge we have today, why are peoples’ struggles still existing?

• What are the other stories western ideology is missing in the market of ‘self-help’?

• Why are our recovery models focused on the absence of behaviour as a measurement tool, rather than the feelings and circumstances that created and sustained the undesired behaviour or symptom?

I created this blog to share with you the tools I have been conceptualizing through extensive research and using with my clients successfully for over 10 years. I encourage you to experiment, get curious, and see for yourself how small changes make big results, without the hefty price tag.

#3. My blog exists to help women navigate the challenges of working and/or parenting while feeling stressed, anxious, or overwhelmed.

Personally, I wear many hats in my life. My therapist once said “Good God, no wonder you're anxious. Look what’s on your plate!” That… was very validating. My hats include being a professional, daughter, partner, mother, sister, friend, leader, entrepreneur, tech support, community partner, history buff, gamer, gardener, dog trainer, acquaintance, peer, and I’m sure I can throw on many more, as I’m sure you can as well.

Life, in whatever way yours looks, is challenging. Our brains have 3 different internet browsers open with 20 separate tabs open in each. It’s exhausting. So…of course, Anxiety is going to step in, because that, my friend, is a threat to our health. No longer are double shifts occurring, but triple, quadruple, etc are. Often, we have a thought that says “I can push through” or “If I just get ___ done, I can rest”, which let’s face it, there are never ‘end’ points to the things you have on the go. So my job with these materials is to help you navigate through the story of the challenges you face in your life, coming out of them feeling pride, accomplishment, and above all, love for yourself.

#4. My blog exists to empower women to challenge dominant narratives that are oppressive

Our westernized culture is built upon oppressive narratives that perpetuate and sustain oppression. We live in a society with paradoxical standards of professionalism, beauty, productivity, health, wealth, and social norms. In other words, the culture in which we live hurts us every day we buy into the unattainable standards it professes.

I was working with a young woman recently who was struggling with the weight of expectations she put on herself. I asked her to write out all the expectations she feels she should be responsible for daily and come to the next session to talk about. She did, and she came with….4 pages! 4 pages of expectations she felt a weight of doing to feel like she’s ‘enough’. When we explored it further, there were only a handful of those expectations that fit with her core values and passions. That’s what this blog is about… empowering you to critically challenge the hurtful expectations this society puts on you. What you’ll find here is grace, acceptance, and safety.

#5. My blog exists to equip women with simple strategies that produce maximum benefit in their lives.

By now, you have heard my heart, my passion, and my mission. To share with you the expertise I have as a therapist that can equip you to live your life in its fullest bloom. For me, equipping means helping you prepare yourself mentally and with the right tools to give maximum benefit to you wherever you are in your journey.

One of my niche clientele is treatment-resistant anxious individuals, with little hope of ever feeling ‘normal’. I have had them marvel at the changes they see in their lives through these strategies. Are they simple? Yes. Are they difficult? Also yes, and with the right support, the right conditions, it ends up being much, much easier than “pushing through” life the way we keep trying to do.

Conclusion

Just imagine with me for a moment… what if you lived a life you loved? What if, in that life, you loved and accepted yourself? What thoughts would you think about yourself? What hopes or dreams would flourish?

For a flower or plant to bloom, it needs to be nurtured, tended, cared for. One of my first plants was a peace lily, and the thing never bloomed… until I realized why. It couldn’t grow and flourish in the conditions I had it placed in. Contrastingly, a pepper plant I broke in half when I was transplanting it (okay, clearly I was not born with a green thumb…), flourished because my partner didn’t give up on it. He tended it, weeded it, and in time, it grew peppers. You can bloom too where you're planted. Sometimes we need some help, and this is one of those places to find it.

I am so excited to embark on this journey with you. Let’s Bloom, shall we?

Hi, I’m Sharla.

I’m a Registered Social Worker who specializes in working with women to heal anxiety and all the fun it brings to the party, ADHD struggles, disordered eating, shame, and trauma.

I founded Bloom Narratives, a private practice that provides holistic wellness services.

Why? So you can be a game changer in your life. Because healing people heal people.