“You gain strength, courage and confidence by every experience in which you really stop to look fear in the face.” ~Eleanor Roosevelt Courage is a quality I have always felt I was blessed with, even from a child. I’ve faced fear many times in my life and discovered courage. The most memorable time I have found courage was falling on that hospital floor realizing I couldn’t walk. That moment is a moment I will never forget. And luckily that memory has lead me to face moments of fear but realize I would see courage…. Over the past two years I have stepped out into an unfamiliar territory. I have developed my own non profit brain trauma organization. I began working on this business in 2013 after an experience I will never ever forget. I describe this experience as my awakening to life…. I did a photo shoot in Atlanta Georgia for a tennis wear company. I remember accepting this shoot and thinking egotistically how this was MY time… Stephanie you would be on the cover of this mag and that mag, just ego crap… But after that shoot that day my life has not been the same…. Because I met an eight year old boy with a head injury, sitting in a car seat. He had his head hanging down in that seat and he had spit rolling out of his mouth uncontrollably. When I looked at this child all I saw was my life at 14 years old sitting in that wheelchair. That WAS my moment, the moment when I hit the floor of that hospital and faced my REAL fear…. “It takes courage to grow up and become who you really are.” I traveled back home after that photo shoot and began working diligently on this organization. Through this journey I have discovered so much on courage. If you had told me five years ago or even a day before that photo shoot I would be taking an entrepreneurial route for my life I would have laughed in your face. But after that day I did describe as my awakening, it woke me to feelings and emotions I hid for so long on my own brain injury. Upon waking to those feelings and emotions I faced some of my biggest fears. And I have always heard and read facing our own daemons are the worst enemy we will ever have in life. Well I found this statement to be more than accurate. There hasn’t been a day in two years life hasn’t been showing me in one way or another to stay my course. Even though I have had to rediscover that courage I developed on that hospital floor in 1993 over and over. Through building this business, I have faced plenty of fears but always been able to see that courage that was initially developed in 1993. Its been a rough road building this business being a single mom. I cannot say it
has been easy to smile through this process and I am far from done. This has been one of the most difficult struggles I have ever endured in my life. But through this struggle I keep that day I hit the floor in my mind. Just as I always kept it in my mind for my running to get me to the finish line. I know with every ounce of my soul it will get me to this finish line also… To end this entry I will say although I have faced a lot of fear and disappointment in my journey the past two years I have learned so much about courage and life. One of the greatest lessons I know I have cultivated through this and I say this with conviction is I know at the end of this life what really matters will not be what we bought, but what we built, not what we got but what we shared from what our life has brought to us… So this is why I have developed Share Your Strong and my mission is to help bring awareness to brain trauma and encourage and inspire the lives of people who have been affected by this,just as I was… Never Give Up, Never Give In, Never Stop Trying, Never EVER Give Up!!!!