In the summer of 1992, Category 5 Hurricane Andrew rocked the East Coast of the United States, becoming the most devastating storm in U.S. history before Hurricane Katrina took its place. On a deceptively sunny day at Jones Beach in NY, my brother Sean got sucked into the ocean by the vicious undertow created by Andrew. Panic gripped me from the sand as he called out my name, terror in his eyes as he was dragged out to sea. I dove into the ocean, trying to pull him to shore as the overwhelmed lifeguards were busy saving other people. My rescue attempt had failed, as I was not strong enough to drag my 10 year old brother back to the sand. Fatigue set in. We were coughing on salt water. Death was coming.
A lifeguard appeared with a rescue buoy tied to a lifeline. Sean and I were pulled to the safety of the sand by the lifeguards on the shore. We kissed the seashells beneath our feet, feeling the relief that we were still alive. We survived. But we weren’t the first members of our family to nearly drown. The reason that my father was not at the beach to save Sean that day was that he too nearly drown as a child and had a fear of water ever since. The repeating family story woke me up to the reality that my family was living in survival mode. We didn’t know any other state of being. For us, it was normal to be emotionally surviving. But I longed to thrive!
Paddling out to sea on my surfboard after moving to Oahu reminded me that I would never be the same after nearly drowning in the summer of ’92. I was afraid of the ocean, yet still drawn to its pristine beauty. I needed to face my fears. As I ducked under the mammoth, 12 foot high waves on the North Shore, my heart pounded and my spine surged with electric terror. When I caught my first wave at Sunset Beach, I felt a sense of triumph over my fears, followed by the exhilaration of being carried by Mother Nature to the shore. I was finally thriving.
My personal transformation became the bases for my Bloodline Healing work featured in my new book Healing Our Bloodlines; The 8 Realizations of Generational Healing. The 8 Realizations illuminate the path that starts with being in Survival Mode and ends with the liberation of courageously living your most authentic life. It guides you through the process of breaking free from those repetitive family stories, like people nearly drowning in my lineage, so that you can expand to meet your greatest dreams. When you release the scripts of what others think you should be, you finally arrive at your new reality of being an expanded, thriving, being.
September 3rd, 2019 at 6pm PT/9pm ET, I’ll be doing my online Book Launch for Healing Our Bloodlines: The 8 Realizations of Generational Liberation on IG Live and FB Live
