Brenda Bradshaw, Priestess, Queen, Facilitator
My journey of “hearing” my intuition and sensing things started at a very early age, which led to fear, doubt, and ignoring what I knew was my path. My path was a path filled with a quest for knowing and searching for teachers and mentors to find the answers. An experiment in Transformation!
Divine source would send me messages. I can’t tell you how many times I heard someone talking to me and although I knew I was the only one in the room I still looked around. One time my grandmother called me and asked me to come visit because Papa was very ill. I had excuses on why I couldn’t, until I went to bed that night. I was awoken to my grandmother sitting in her rocking chair, I sat up and said “Mimi”? and she said “yes, you must come now”. I was on that plane the next morning! I’m so glad I did because I was able to say good-bye to my Papa. Yet, I still wasn’t ready to accept my true path. I had a gift, like we all do, yet I was afraid…of what? Really when I write this at this time in my life, I have to say I don’t know what. So, I self-sabotaged to prove my unworthiness and just kept trying to get lost in the noise around me. I didn’t let go of things that no longer served me and I tried locking these gifts up in a trunk and burying them deep in my shadow self. Then I gave birth to this most amazing little human. There was this huge awakening deep with-in, I allowed myself to hear the Goddess again. I started going to counseling with Father O’Neil, an Episcopalian minster. He helped me find the way to my path again. Of course, as relationships didn’t work out, and I was learning to be the best mom I could, and working to pay the bills, I got stalled a few times! Yet I did start a search for knowledge, mentors, and teachers, where were the answers!?! Father O’Neil had suggested a more ancient path for me, unconventional, the path of the Goddess/Nature. He told me our gifts come in different ways, to embrace this divine gift in a way that felt right to me. Yes, he was an amazing teacher.
I had many mystical experiences, ones that felt like I was being taken to other worlds, where the very fiber of my being was being stretched. Around 14 I had started experimenting with transcendental meditation but these experiences were different, very powerful (no drugs or medicinals involved) no meditation needed. I had been learning from many sources on how to listen to source, how to see outside this dimension, while going about my day. Mind blowing! Yes, you guessed it, I still wasn’t ready to own it! I started careers in many areas, child development, pre-school teacher in a huge Baptist church, worked with sexually abused and emotionally disturbed children, (during this time I also decided to do body building), Licensed Massage therapist, Energy Worker, Intuitive, certified doula, childbirth educator, whole health coach, owner of a wellness clinic, and several network marketing adventures as well!
I forgot to mention I am a roamer, gypsy, wonderer, as there is so much to see and experience! I take my roots with me, I’m not a tree! I quit counting after 60 moves! From sea to shining sea, North, West, Pacific NW, London. Lived in cabins with no indoor plumbing to large houses with a pool, houses near the ocean, to houses up a mountain.
Then messages started being louder, like upside your head loud! Things that I was working on, didn’t happen, my body was having some issues….I was entering my crone stage and wasn’t sure what to do with my hot self. I was stuck, couldn’t move. I had been carrying around a business plan that I had even taken to professionals, lawyers and such, several times over the years to help develop the “plan”, but I was stuck. I wasn’t seeing the “plan” in the way source wanted me to.
Finally the Goddess I guess couldn’t take it anymore. Picture lighting, thunder and a very loud voice shouting “ENOUGH! Shed the ego that is holding you in fear, you are loved and you are love. The warrior that is you is needed now!” So she shook up my world. I let go of the career, belongings and relationships. I trusted in the Sisterhood and magic happened! Divinity in motion! The plan took a slightly different turn, but one that resonated in every fiber of my being. Guiding and Facilitating women on a journey of deep conscious awakening is what I was meant to do. As a result of choosing, taking the chance and making the choice, to be divinity in motion, I have met many women who help me be the best version of myself. Together, because that is how it is meant to be working with each other in a conscious way, an on-purpose way we bring into life the creation of AEF, we are meant to bring this information into the world at this time. Together we facilitate the re-connecting to the feminine collective, the force that gives life and holds life. Re-newing, re-orienting, and re-membering how to connect, how to explore what impedes us on our quest for the desired lifestyle we each want, and to be a community of women embracing each other’s gifts.
Together we walk in truth and light, and as we do we shall change the world.
Martina Barragan-Losey, Queen, Facilitator
My deepest desires come from deep within my soul. The very essence of who I am has led me to this very moment where I find myself adjusting a beautiful crown upon my head and sitting upon a throne draped in truth…my own truth where I celebrate the divine being I am.
It’s taken me years to find this truth even though it was inside me the whole time. That’s the funny thing about life isn’t it? We search continuously for the almighty answers out in the world, when in fact they are deep within our very souls. Now, how I got to this point, is my story and it’s filled with disappointments and triumphs, heartaches and celebrations, failures and great achievements, fear and fearlessness, and all that falls in between.
My story begins as a young child and remembering how I could feel and understand how others were feeling, whether it is emotionally or mentally. It was a heaviness I couldn’t explain and lived in constant worry. Not knowing it then, but understanding now, that I had a keen ability of what is known as an empath. So, not knowing how to handle all those feelings of others, I became a person who didn’t want to disappoint for fear of how it would make others feel. I did this despite the fact that it sometimes meant I was disappointing and letting myself down. As I have continued my journey of self-awareness, I am now in a place where I honor myself by simply listening to the feelings of others and can consciously stand in my own truth and simply offer the gift of listening. For many years I listened with the intent to respond instead of listening with the intent to just simply listen and hear what is being said in that moment. I believe that it had become my “job” to help others feel better, but what a difference it has made to not take on the feelings of those around me. Living my truth as an empath means I’m simply creating a space for others to come in and sit for a while, and in doing so, they begin to unravel their own stories where eventually their own truths come to the surface.
While I am just beginning this new leadership role, I intuitively know that I was meant for it. Being a facilitator in some realm is something I wrote down years ago. Many thought I should go back to school and work on leadership courses to become an administrator in the public schools, and as flattered as I was, I knew that wasn’t part of my story. I did eventually leave the world of teaching in the education system and even though I knew I wanted to be a teacher, I recognized that it could happen in a different setting. After 20 years, I put in for early retirement and started my own business as Childcare Extraordinaire and offer childcare in my home, which had been a dream of mine for years. The stars were in alignment, God knew my heart’s desires, and so here I am…..living my truth once again.
Our journey together will be heart opening and life changing. You will uncover your soul’s deepest desires, reflect on what success means to you, love and appreciate what makes you original, empower and be empowered by other women, learn to be a leader in your craft and speak up for what you need in your own life, and support this movement as you honor yourselves and each other. It’s all about S.O.U.L. (Successful Original Unified Leaders).
Peace and Blessings, Martina