How To Find True Inner Freedom with ALANI

A quote from Virginia Satir goes, “Life is not the way it’s supposed to be. It’s the way it is, but how you cope with it is what makes the difference.” ALANI struggled with abuse at home at a young age and with divorce from her best friend after 22 years of courtship and marriage. Her healing from both of these very tragic events in her life and her life work came through a strong spiritual connection.

ALANI is called the Freedom Igniter as her passion and her work are designed to help people find and live in true inner freedom. ALANI says when we get to a place where we really and truly understand what love is all about, and we truly begin to operate in love, something releases on the inside of us. When we can operate in love, then compassion is easy. Find an opening for true inner freedom from within yourself as ALANI takes us through her story of tragedy to triumphancy.

Listen to the podcast here:

How To Find True Inner Freedom with ALANI

The following episode is from the While We Were Silent series and it is with ALANI. ALANI is a beautiful soul who struggled with abuse at home at a young age. Her healing and her life work came through a strong spiritual connection.

My favorite quote from this interview with ALANI says, “When we get to a place where we really and truly understand what love is all about and we truly begin to operate in love, I think something releases on the inside of us and when we can operate in love, then compassion is easy.” That is from ALANI. ALANI is called the Freedom Igniter. As her passion and her work are designed to help people find and live in true inner freedom. I hope with his interview with ALANI, you find some true inner freedom from inside yourself.

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Our guest on this episode is ALANI. Welcome, to the show.

How are you? Thanks for having me.

Thank you for being here. I’m excited to have ALANI for this interview. ALANI,the Freedom Igniter is on a divine assignment and mission. She has survived family sexual abuse and is also recently divorced from her best friend of more than 22 years, but she has found a way to overcome these difficulties. She wants to share her emotional healing process to help people live a fruitful and productive life. ALANI holds a BS in Psychology and MA in Human Resources Management and a franchise owner certificate.

SCS 11 | Inner Freedom — A Family Secret Revealed: More Than A Story

ALANI speaks, writes and advocates, liberation and non-oppression. Her first published work, her book, A Family Secret Revealed:More Than A Story, empowers individuals to stop emotional pain and take responsibility for their healing. ALANI helps people seek freedom from bondage and move from tragedy to triumphancy. Welcome, ALANI. Can you begin by telling us about your story and how it led you to doing what you’re doing now?

I will start by saying that as a young girl, I was sexually violated by a family member for a very long time and it took me probably twenty years or so to come to a place where I could even say the word incest and not feel a certain disdain about me personally. I got through that and life continued on and progressed and I fell in love and married my understanding best friend. After 22 years between courtship and marriage, he decided that he wanted to do different things.

What came after that was an unexpected separation and divorce. I was not supposed to have been violated by a family member. I was not supposed to have been dumped. That was not supposed to happen but it did.Those two stories remind me of a quote by Virginia Satir who says,“Life is not the way it’s supposed to be, it’s the way it is.How you cope with it is what makes the difference.” I can truly say that how I coped with both of these very tragic events in my life is really squared up in my strong belief and relationship in God and everything it is that I do is God-inspired.

Can you tell us what it is that you do to help others?

It’s interesting that ALANI started off going in one direction, as you heard in the beginning with the incest.After this last event, it grew into something else. I started on this journey helping individuals who had either been victimized or those that were perpetrators or those that were the spouses of either the victims or the perpetrators. During this time, I had self-published this first book.

I did speaking engagements mostly at churches. I did one-on-one coaching counseling with individuals. I volunteered on a crisis hotline. I did what I called ACup of Healing, where I had gone to a number of little coffee shops or little delis and while givinglittle samples of coffee or whatever it was that they wanted to provide, I would offer a cup of healing by way of talking about incest. I also wrote, produced and facilitated the ALANIShow on Blog Talk Radio.

All of those things I had done and then life happened. I was stopped in my tracks as I was dealing with a tragedy that I didn’t see coming and that was the eventual separation and divorce.While working through my hurt and my rejection, I realized that the work for ALANI was beginning to expand. It occurred to me that there were others who could benefit from the message of love, compassion, forgiveness and healing that I was sharing with my original audience.

While my message has not changed drastically, the audience has a little. I’m still doing speaking engagements after that tragic event had happened and I had also begun to do some training of counselors. I know a young lady that has a program where she helps women to rebuild their lives after divorce and she had a couple of women who had experienced having been violated from someone in their family. She thought immediately of ALANI. I do that now whenever they bring on additional counselors, I go and I instruct the counselors on things to look for and how to make a connection with those that may have experienced incest.

The ultimate goal of where I am now is really to help people to take ownership and responsibility for their healing. We find ourselves in a position of having been emotionally hurt sometimes by the choices that we make.Sometimes having been victimized by circumstance.Sometimes because there are just really mean and malicious people out there who want to cause us harm but at the end of the day, we are responsible for our own healing.

I also, in terms of my goal, want people to not only discover but also begin to operate in their God-given inspired purpose. I do believe that we all have something on this Earth that we’re supposed to do. Sometimes because of what happens in our emotional pain, we are not able to focus on that. I do help individuals to come to recognize what that is.At the end of the day, I believe that we all can live a fruitful and productive life in spite of having experienced emotional hurt and pain.

One of the latest programs that I have put together is called the BRIDGE Program and it is helping people go from tragedy to triumphancy. It is an eight-week program starting out with the BRIDGE. B stands for Breaking ground and then there’s Root-defining,there’s Inner assessing,there’s Discovering, there’s Growing and there’s Executing. I take people through a number of exercises, activities. I give them homework assignments.It’s very important for me to help people not just be in a place where they’re telling their story again for the hundredth time. We have to get to a place where we can move beyond. That balance is very important.We understand that there are certain things that you go through to get through the hurt, to get through the pain but then there’s action that has to happen.

That is what this BRIDGE Program is all about. One of the ladies who came up to me at the end and was in tears and she said, “You will never know what you have done with me with this program. I just, “Thank you so much for taking the time and writing and pulling this program together.”It’s been a ten-year journey really with ALANI having started in one direction and then life happening and then I had to backpedal, put it on the back burner and then bring it full circle again. It’s been a labor of love for a decade.

[Tweet “We all have something on this Earth that we’re supposed to do.”]

When you said at the end of that, “Execute,” that E that it’s time to take action,can you give an example of what you mean by that?

What happens is I want people to be able to take a good look in the mirror. One of the questions that you had asked before too is what advice would you say to someone who is suffering in silence? Part of that has to do with creating goals for yourself. That is very important and I also had just mentioned balance. I will tell you thatthere was an individual that said, “I thought I was healed,” but when she hadgone through some of these exercises that we went through, she realized that there is still work that she has to do. I do believe thathealing is ongoing. I don’t know that we ever reach a full plateau of healing.

A specific example of that, everybody is going to be different.Even people that experienced the same thing is going to have a different outcome and what works for one person may not work for another person. It really does depend.Putting into action really has to do with doing more than telling the story, looking at yourself in the mirror and being honest about what you see and recognizing that you need help and owning thatand stop making excuses and those are the types of things. I don’t have a specific concrete because as I said, everybody’s going to be different.

The next question is about remaining silent. You’re mentioning in your program about telling your story. A lot of people have a really hard time. I don’t know if this is what you do in your step of breaking ground but people are having a really hard time of what I’ve been calling breaking through the walls of silence.

To actually speak up and to tell the story and to begin even to themselves, to look in the mirror and be honest with themselves and breakthrough that silence to start the healing.In your experience as well as your work with others,what do you see as the main reason that people stay silent?

I think that there is, at the base, a fear of something. A fear of exposing, a fear of destroying the family,a fear of not being believed,a fear of people saying that you’re the reason that it happened or that you allowed it to happen. Some kind of fear I think is the basis. People want to avoid being victimized all over again so you just don’t say anything.

I know for me personally, I remained silent for so long because I just had a hard time saying the word incest. I had a hard time saying family sexual abuse. If there was any inclination that a conversation was going in that direction, I was headed in the other direction. I had vowed that I was taking everything with me to my grave.

I never imagined writing a book that talks about it. There’s a lot of graphic information that I revealed in this book. I didn’t tell everything that happened but I told enough to give a sense thatthere’s really graphic things and I never imagined that I would.In addition to just holding on to that,I just felt a certain disdain or an uncomfortability that I had with myself. Just not wanting to talk about it, not wanting to address itagain, just not wanting to be victimized all over again, so I left it alone.

What were you experiencing that led you to change that to decide to speak, to decide to write?

I think that came from a higher power. I have a very strong belief in God. I have a very strong relationship with God. I’ll tell you this story. Some people believe, some people don’t but this was my experience. I remember one morning in 2007, it was in the falland I was awakened by the ceiling fan over my bed and it sounded like a time clock. It was the blade hitting the chain as it was going around. I heard God’s voice very distinctly say two words to me,“It’s time.” I had absolutely no idea what that was.

You briefly said that and it felt like it totally landed in me when you said that.

I’m still on a quest trying to fully put my head around exactly what that means. I knew that I needed to do something. My husband at the time was there, he didn’t experience what I experienced but he heard what I went through and I shared with him that I felt like I needed to do something. I don’t know exactly what but it was just an impression in me to do something. That following spring, that’s when I had that conversation with my then husband and it would be a few months later that I would begin to put pencil to paper and I just wrote all kinds of things.

Whatever came down, came out on paper. What resulted was this book and a couple of programs. I had created a nonprofit organization that didn’t go into fruition because while all of these things were being downloaded to me, there was an interruption with my then husband who made a different decision and everything I was doing the brakes were put on, but it didn’t die.

ALANI was buried for a little bit. It’s very interesting because even whileI was in that period where I was not actively doing anything with ALANI, I was still doing things with ALANI. There was still information that I felt was being downloaded and I’m saying, “God, when am I going to do this?” I am working a full-time job. I manage a commercial cleaning company with eighteen contracts and 25 employees and I’m a single mom and all of these things going on. I’m just like, “I don’t know how I’m going to get this done.” I just kept writing everything down that that would be sent. That was the onset of when things began to change and shift for me.

During that period of silence, looking back from where you are now, what do you recognize as the consequences of living with that unhealed trauma? That can be for your experience with yourself as well as the other people that you work with.

I think that we don’t really get to know or understand our real authentic selves when we are holding on and not breaking through and taking a step toward healing.We’re living a mask on. We’re living with a Band-Aid on and we’re not really fully exposed to our full potential. I really think the greatest opportunity for healing lies in what I described earlier as love, compassion and forgiveness.

In my estimation, all three of those lead to healing. The way I like to think of it is when we get to a place where we really and truly understand what love is all about and we truly begin to operate in love, I think something releases on the inside of us. When we do that, when we can operate in love, then compassion is easy once you know how to love.

Compassion for yourself, compassion toward other people and when you can get to a place where you love and you show compassion, forgiveness is easier. It happens in steps. You hear people all the time say, “You have to forgive.”That is true but it doesn’t happen instantaneously. I believe that there are steps that you have to take to get there that start with love and then next is compassion and you move on to forgiveness and ultimately, you’re on a road that’s going to lead you to heal.

I don’t know that we ever are 100% healed in our natural beings. It’s almost like if you can imagine, and I’ve done this particular exercise, if you take a piece of paper and you either crumple it or you fold it, in however many times you fold it or you rip it in shreds and then you try to put it back together.

In some cases, you can re-engineer what you’ve done with that paper but it will never ever be 100% what it was before. It may break in the same places that it broke before or ripped before, but it’s never going to look like it was never touched. Being 100% healed, I don’t know if we are ever there in the natural.It’s a constant ongoing work for us to do, I believe.

I also believe that everything happens for a reason and I also believe that there is a time and a place for everything, including our healing. I think that it might be possible if we force our healing, that we might miss something vital. I believe that experience and just living life.The older you get, the more you understand, the more revelations come to view, all of those things I think play a role in our healing as well.

ALANI, I really appreciate what you’re sharing. You mentioned that you help people, other therapists to understandor you teach them about how to make a connection with someone who’s been violated. Can you say some words about that? Can you give us some tips about that?

What I do want to make a correction about is these are not therapists. They are not licensed in any way.They are women who have also been through divorce.This ministry that they work through,they are there as resource for womenbut they are not clinical.

This is when you are working with more of the divorced people then the violation or is it both?

It’s both. It’s people who had been divorced who have gone through this particular program of rebuilding your life after divorce. The founder of this organization,this ministry has a series of trainings that she does for her counselors. It just so happened that she and a couple of the other counselors were working with a couple women who brought that up.That’s something that they were dealing with and she says, “It might be a good idea to have the counselors have some understanding about what it is.”

I’m so glad that they recognize that because with the statistics of one in four women under the age of eighteen and one in six men under the age of eighteen, it sounds like this kind of training can be beneficial for anyone who does any kind of counseling work.

I believe that too and also my giving the information. I’m not a clinician, even though I hold a degree in psychology, I don’t practice that.What I do share with them is what is incest from my perspective and we review some facts. We talk about some common characteristics of family sexual abuse. I also spend some time talking to them about detecting incest,addressing it.

What are some possible effects of incest and then building relationships with the women that they are counseling or helping through this divorce.As you well know or possibly know, there are people who have been violated as children who never say anything even to their spouse. Sometimes that’s the reason for the divorce. Sometimes people just don’t deal with it.

[Tweet “There is a time and a place for everything, including healing.”]

Sometimes the person they need to say it to or that they’re not saying it to is themselves.

Which for me, that was my twenty-year thing. I couldn’t say it. I couldn’t bear. I couldn’t deal with it.It was too painful and so I get that. That’s the perspective. It’s short and sweet. It gives them a little insight and I always tell them in terms of a resource is to reach out to someone who is in the clinical field who specializes in abuse situations, violation situations and refer that individual there if they want to seek out additional clinical help.

Once that silence has been broken and someone steps on that healing journey, what do you feel is the greatest opportunity for them to realize in their lives?

That there’s a lot of work that they still have to do, that there’s work for them. This ties back to what I was saying earlier in terms of finding their purpose. Once they can get on this path of healing and being able to recognize their true, authentic self, they will hopefully go to a place where they can recognize, there’s a contribution that I can make to society. That’s what I believe is the greatest opportunity that people can hope for.

That’s in recognizing, “I do have something to give. I am of value. I do have a place and a purpose.”

I wrote an affirmation and this was more so for my divorce situation than it was my family sexual abuse situation, but the same concept applies. I was dealing with very deep hurt and rejection and I know that I am a person of value, but when you experienced that kind of thing, it has a way of tearing you down on the inside. What I did was I wrote a poem in affirmation that I have plastered in my bathroom, plastered in my bedroom as a reminder.

It says, “This is me from A to Z. I am amazing and bodacious. I am confident and desirable. I’m eloquent and fun. I am God’s beloved. I am happy and intelligent. I am joy-filled and knowledgeable. I am love. I am a masterpiece. I am nurturing. I am an overcomer and a phenomenal woman. I am Queen B, as in beautiful, inside and out. I am resilient and I am spiritual. I am a treasure and unique. I am valuable and extraordinary. I am youthful and I am zealous. This is me from A to Z.”

That is beautiful. Thank you for sharing it.

It’s really important no matter what challenge you face in life and even if everything on that list, this was an exercise that I had given in the BRIDGE Program as part of the homework. Everybody that we met, I said, “Find five adjectives that describe your ideal self.”Even if it’s not everything that you are, if it’s everything that you’re striving to be and you continue to tell yourself that and recite that, it becomes part of you.You will eventually live that and the more positive that you give yourself, the better off that you’re going to be and help to move those negative things out of the way.

Could you share with us any insights that you have about what’s shifting in our collective right now?In our masses, what are some shifting grounds now? A lot of the things changing with so many people coming forward after having been silent for so long and it’s really changing things in the mass consciousness as well as there’s this upheaval in the culture. What insights do you have to share about that?

Just experience and living life does open our hearts and open our minds to believing that there is more to life than just what I’m presently living. Sometimes I think people have an a-ha moment,a revelation of sorts. Sometimes we can hear the same message over and over again, but it’s not until the tenth time that it actually registers. Sometimes when we hear the stories of other people, I think that’s helpful. Sometimes we feel compelled as was my case and inspired by something greater than ourselves and everybody is different,so there’s no cookie cutter expectation. I do believe that there is much to be gained.

As you’re saying that and getting a feel for your belief in God, the word that comes to me is reliance on God’s divine orchestration. Having this visual of there is a grand orchestration that is moving through our culture, through our world and each one of us is going to have a different perspective on it depending on where we are and what lenses were looking through and what relationship we have to it. We’re going to have a different experience of it, a different perspective of it. We’re going to be in different places with it, but ultimately there is a grand orchestration that’s moving through, just visualizing or feeling as you were saying that.

I definitely believe that to be the case. There is a higher power. I know people have a different way of believing and thinking, but there is something greater than any of us here. I think it benefits us to be in tune with that.

I would agree with that with gratitude because we on our own, we would certainly mess things up even worse than we have.

It’s interesting you say that because so many people, when they finished hearing all of the things that I find myself involved in, first of all they’re like, “I’m exhausted just listening.” Secondly, “Where do you get the energy? How do you do it?” It is not me. As you said, if I relied on myself to get things done, I wouldn’t get things done. There is definitely something bigger than me.

It’s apparent that it is moving through you in some beautiful ways. Thank you for being that conduit for it in that channel.

To God be the glory because I tell you, ten years ago, I called what I was doing, I was on a divine assignment and I’m still on that assignment.It changes. It’s really interesting because I was one of those people who was very rigid and structured and organized. That’s my personality and I am still like that to an extent but I also recognize that I can’t be used and have God orchestrate things if I’m not flexible. I have learned to adjust and go. I started out one way, but that’s not where I am now and if that’s where I’ll be two years from now, I don’t know. I’m here for the ride wherever I feel inspired to go and it lines up with what I believe, my purposes, I’m all aboard.

I’m so happy to hear you say that because I’m the same way. People say, “Where are you going? What are you doing?” It’s all still the same God, but there is this directing wherever it’s needed based on guidance. Sometimes, it might look a little different but it’s the same. It’s just that the purpose that it’s serving in the moment shifts.

With regards to our future and I ask this question because sometimes we get stuck with that,what difference will it make if I keep my stuff inside or if I step on a healing path and begin to change myself. In the sense all of these stuffs that’s coming up is making it safer for more people to speak up, even if it is only to themselves, only to their mirror and begin to open up and to step on a healing path to heal what they’ve been carrying inside. What do you see as what’s possible for our future as more and more people start to heal?

That was a hard question for me to answer because on one hand, I do believe that there are certain ills in our society that will always be and will spend a lifetime trying to understand the why, yet on the other hand, when we work together in spite of not understanding the why, this is when we can perhaps witness the epitome of triumph. I would hope that the future offers us a quest to never stop trying to get it right. To continue to seek acceptance and mutual respect and harmony.

ALANI, what would you tell someone, that one person that’s here right now,that is perhaps still struggling in silence or just stepping a foot on that healing path, what would you say to them?

There’s a couple of things that comes to mind. The first thing is about patience, being patient not only with yourself but with others. Those that have to interact with you while you’re going through, be patient with them as they’re being patient with you. It’s very important not to be closed minded, to be open. I think it’s important. I talked about this earlier, setting goals for yourself and sticking to those goals. I talked about this before too, and that’s recognizing balance. It is important to work through your hurt and working through that is going to be different for everybody.

Working through and overcoming, they are two different things and you don’t want to spend all of your time working through without overcoming.There’s work involved in overcoming, as I just spoke of.There’s more to healing than retelling your story, as I mentioned earlier. You have work that you have to do, just being mindful of that. I think it’s very important to lose the victim mentality, be conscious and recognize if you’re manipulating people and or situations and stopped doing that.

One of the things that I had written in the book, I had come to realize about a year afterwards that I should have done something different and it was used a specific term and that was victim. I realized, don’t use the term victim because people will associate that mentality and so instead of saying victim, I say person who has been victimized. It’s really important to not associate yourself with that term. I think the other thing which I have spoken up a couple of times already is seeking out and beginning to operate in your God-given purpose. Those were things that I think are very important for individuals that are struggling right now.

Speaking of that purpose, believing that you have a purpose, beginning to feel that spark inside of you and know that it’s real, that it’s credible and you can feel it and you can listen to it and you canlet it grow inside of you and let that be a guiding light that carries you through.

One of the things that I shared in this last BRIDGE group, for those that thought they had their purpose but not exactly sure.It’s amazing that when we go through challenges in life, sometimes our purpose lies there and finding a cure for something or being transparent for someone who’s dealing with what you dealt with.

This has ended up being my passion. I’ve never, when I was a little girl, said I want to grow up and do the work that ALANI is doing. It happened as a result of life happening and recognizing that I am not the only person. I’m not special in that regard. There are lots of people who had experienced what I have and worse but I just recognize that living in this world, it’s not about me.It’s about helping other people.

If people stop and take a look there, it may give them some indication of what their purpose is. The other thing I say as we were talking about this orchestrating and moving, I don’t believe in many cases that your purpose just falls in your lap.

Sometimes you have to get up, you have to go out, you have to try things, you have to ask questions and then you find yourself on a road and then the a-ha moment comes. “This is the direction I’m supposed to go in. This is where my purpose is.” I recognize that it’s not easy and I recognize that people struggle sometimes with trying to figure out what their purpose is, but don’t ever stop searching. Don’t ever stop asking the questions.Don’t sit down and just wait for it to fall in your lap because that’s not going to happen either.

ALANI, if people are wanting to connect with you and take their next step or just learn more about you, how can they find you or learn more about you?

The website is Alani.org or on Facebook they can find me @ALANITheFreedomIgniter.I did have one of the thing that I wanted to share really quick. I wanted to read a very short chapter in the book A Family Secret Revealed:More Than a Story. It’s chapter twelve, titled Silent Pain. “My emotions have been trampled into the ground. I didn’t have any more to give. I had officially reached rock bottom. As the hallucinations increased and magnified, I had no one to talk to about my emotional state and my gruesome overwhelming silent pain. While my best friend knew of my many struggles, even he could not fill this void.

There were simply some things that were too painful to address and to share with him. My dad’s voice ringing in my ear from one of our notorious phone fights was ever present like my shadow following me on a city sidewalk at sunset. It wouldn’t go away like a constant drip from a leaky faucet in the middle of the night, keeping me awake. It was there. Everywhere I went,every place I turned landed me face-to-face with the drips, shadows and voices. I try to shut my dad’s voice off in my mind but his yelling and constant nagging weighed heavy on every fiber of my being.

[Tweet “People struggle sometimes with trying to figure out what their purpose is, but don’t ever stop searching.”]

The strange thing was that this was somewhat familiar scenery. I had been here before, at least in the same neighborhood. This was not the first time I hallucinated. The difference this time was the intensity. The yelling was louder and more piercing. The nagging, stronger and more pronounced. It drips, the shadows, my dad’s voice more intense.

In addition to the hallucinations, I began to question my own actions. Why was I allowing this to continue to happen to me? What was it about me that let this go on? What was I really afraid of? These were all questions to which I had no answers. As the thoughts and questions permeated my consciousness, I reasoned a warm bath would ease my mind, so to the bathroom I went. To prepare for this cleansing, pouring smell goods under the running hot water, at just the right moment, I stepped in and took my place in temporary comfort and relaxation.

Not long after I closed my eyes to settle in, bad thoughts resurfaced and as if a weight was tied around my neck,slowly I sank sliding further under the water until finally my face was submerged. I have no idea how long I stayed under the water in that position and I have no recollection of what got me to rise up out of it. All I remember is that in a quick flash, I shot up out of that tub, face first gasping for air as my heart was beating out of my chest cavity.

Because I could not handle my intense thoughts, I unintentionally exposed myself to an extremely unhealthy situation that could have been fatal. I could have died that night in my suffering silent pain but God said, “Not so. You shall live.” To God be the glory. I thank Him for His grace and mercy and for saving my life. I didn’t run that bath water with the intention of trying to kill myself.

I am just so grateful to God for the strength to rise. Even though life after this point certainly had its ups and downs, the downs have never led me down that road again. My emotions since that time and ability to cope, were more in control. There were no more intensified hallucinations. God is so good. I am better, stronger and wiser. I am not forever broken for I have become unshattered.”

Thank you so much for sharing that.If that has touched you, by all means jump into our Facebook group and connect with ALANI,@WhileWeWereSilentis the name of the group on Facebook. Join us there. Tag ALANI and give her your questions, anything a-has,anything you’ve received from this, please share.

Let me say that this is not a compulsion. Everybody’s journey is different and there is no compulsion to break.You must break silence or you must share. I don’t want to make it sound like that’s the case but the invitation is there. The door is open for you to just share even a wow or thank you or whatever it is, just anything that’s come to your heart. You’re welcome to join us and thank you again for being a part of this program. ALANI,thank you so much for sharing that.

Thank you very much for having me. I’ve enjoyed my time.

About ALANI

ALANI, The Freedom Igniter, is on a divine assignment and mission. She has survived family sexual abuse and is also recently divorced from her best friend of more than 22 years, but she has found a way to overcome these difficulties. She wants to share her emotional healing process to help people live a fruitful and productive life!

Along with being a loving mom of two wonderful daughters, she is also a daughter, sister, niece, aunt, cousin, employer, friend, and an acquaintance to countless others. Besides spending time with her loved ones, she enjoys various genres of music, healthy cooking, and exercising to maintain good health.

ALANI holds a BS in Psychology, an MA in Human Resources Management, and a Franchise Owner Certificate.

ALANI speaks, writes, and advocates liberation and non-oppression. Her first published work, A Family Secret Revealed: More Than A Story, empowers individuals to stop emotional pain and take responsibility for their healing. ALANI helps people seek freedom from bondage and move from tragedy to triumphancy!

Find Alani at http://alani.org.