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Overcomers Approach
“The Overcomers Approach” podcast showcases stories of resilience, where individuals transcend challenges to achieve personal and professional success. With a focus on spiritual, mental, emotional, physical, and financial growth, the podcast inspires listeners to embrace their potential and thrive in all areas of life. Join us to learn how overcoming adversity can lead to evolution, healing, and lasting success.
Overcomers Approach
Finding Light in Darkness: How Author Laura Bratton Transformed Loss Into Purpose
What happens when your entire world changes at age nine? Laura Bratton faced this reality when diagnosed with an eye disease that would gradually claim her vision over the next decade. In this deeply moving conversation, Laura reveals how she transformed from a place of complete denial and despair to becoming a beacon of hope for others facing seemingly insurmountable challenges.
Laura's journey begins with raw honesty about her initial response—the desperate belief her sight might magically return and the constant refrain of "I can't" that dominated her thoughts. But what unfolds is a masterclass in resilience as she shares how her family's refusal to pity her became her greatest gift. Rather than lowering expectations, they maintained standards while making necessary accommodations, sending the powerful message: "You're still you—you just need to do things differently."
The heart of Laura's wisdom lies in her reimagining of what courage and strength truly mean. She redefines grit not as simply pushing through hardship, but as breaking life down into manageable moments—tackling one small decision each day when everything feels overwhelming. Equally transformative was her discovery that gratitude wasn't about appreciating blindness itself, but recognizing the supportive elements helping her navigate through it.
Perhaps most profound is Laura's insight about grief: "Grieving will be part of every single day for the rest of your life. And that is not a weakness." This permission to continue grieving while simultaneously moving forward liberates us from the false choice between "getting over" loss versus being consumed by it. Her ultimate message resonates universally: "Even in the change, you are enough."
Whether you're facing physical challenges, career setbacks, relationship losses, or any profound life change, Laura's practical strategies and hard-won wisdom offer both comfort and actionable steps toward creating meaning amid difficulty. Listen now and discover how to harness courage in your own life through both grit and gratitude.
More on Laura Bratton at https://www.linkedin.com/in/laura-bratton-speaking/
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Thank you for listening!
Hello, this is Nicole Ellis McGregor, the founder of the Overcomers Approach podcast, where I meet with people from different walks of life, different experiences and different journeys, but the overarching theme is that we all have the ability to overcome no matter what we face in life, and we can persevere, strive for excellence and flourish with our natural gifts and talents, and I'm so happy that I have Laura Bratton here today. At the age of nine, Laura was diagnosed with an eye disease and faced the difficult reality that she would become blind Over the next 10 years. She experienced a traumatic transition of adjusting to life without sight. She is the author of the book Harnessing Courage.
Speaker 1:Laura founded the Ubi Global, which is an organization that provides speaking and coaching to empower all people to overcome challenges and obstacles with grit and gratitude. I love that, with grit and gratitude, Laura is passionate about sharing her unique experience of becoming blind as a teenager. Through her life story, she's been equipped with practical resources to navigate through her own challenge and to empower others as well. Laura, I am so happy to have you here today. Welcome to the Overcomers Approach. I am just humbly grateful that you're here today to share your experience and your story with us as well.
Speaker 2:Thank you, Nicole, for the opportunity. I'm very grateful and excited to be here.
Speaker 1:Thank you, excited to have you. Laura, what was your mindset when you first began losing your eyesight at such a young age?
Speaker 2:So my first mindset was denial. Okay, was that denial? Oh, this is not that bad, oh, this is not going to be permanent. Just like I lost an event site, I'm just going to wake up and magically my site's going to repeat, or, you know, just reappear, if I pray hard enough. It complete total mindset was I can't, I can't, I can't, I can't. I cried it, I prayed it, I screamed it, I cried myself to sleep at night. That was my whole mantra, mindset, everything.
Speaker 1:Wow, wow. And at such a young age I could totally identify with experience, a loss of something, and experience that denial at first, like this is not real and how could I change this? And you're trying to pray something away, you're trying to, you know, manifest it away and it doesn't really change the outcome. So I'm sure through that process, as you went through that, I'm sure you begin to grieve. You know losing your sight as you were going through that process. Tell me a little bit more about that. What did that feel like and how did you transition into that?
Speaker 2:So a lot of that denial was the beginning of the grief process, so as, as you were saying, I was trying to manifest it back, I was trying to pray it back, I was trying to do anything to get it back and then the realization that no, that wasn't, it wasn't going to instantly come back. That's sort of the intense grief process, because I was losing or grieving what I had just lost.
Speaker 2:So I was grieving the vision that I'm now, the limited vision that I now have. So a lot of that I can't, I can't, I can't was the anxiety and the depression of grieving Grieving how life used to be, grieving how easy it used to be, because I was constantly depressed by the thought of oh my gosh, I now need help to do this task where a year ago I didn't need help do that task.
Speaker 2:And the anxiety was that intense grief of grieving my present as well as grieving and being overwhelmed my future. So, it was a constant grieving process that every part of my life reminded me of the grief. It wasn't like it was an acute. This particular part of my life was grieving. It was every aspect of my life combined together. So, that's what made the grief so intense.
Speaker 1:Yes, you know, I could totally understand that, like you said, it's just not one part of your life that you're grieving, but it's multiple things that you're grieving. You know, because your sight impacts a number of things. It's one of our senses and then, being the eighth that you were because that is you're already you're changing in so many other different ways as well. Like you're going into early womanhood, being a teenager, your peers are doing things, and then you're grieving future things as well. Yes, so that's like multiple losses, vicarious losses, all at once. And then you said you experienced depression, and I think that's something that many people experience. When they experience is a loss is depression, you know, just depression of, you know, not feeling powerful or not. You know wanting to feel empowered, but kind of feeling disempowered. For you know, for multiple reasons.
Speaker 1:And that's why I'm so glad you're here today, because I think people, whether it's their sight, whether it's the loss of a family member or a friend, or loss of a job, or maybe they have a special needs child, or maybe they're caring for a parent, it impacts every part of your life and it also there's some loss in terms of thinking, future thinking, you know, because you're trying to plan ahead. Yes, how did you as you're experiencing the grief because you're here today and you've created an organization or wrote a book, which is amazing but when you're in that space of like moving forward and I'm sure you reached a state of acceptance as you were moving through that grief how did you get to a space of like, accepting it and now moving forward into the life that you wanted to create? What did that process look like?
Speaker 2:So it was definitely a process.
Speaker 2:I'm glad you said that word. It was not one specific moment that I just woke up and said, okay, I'm done grieving, now I can do this, let's move on. You know, it wasn't like just a monumental moment that changed everything. It was absolutely a process. So the whole time through high school, as I'm still continuing to lose a significant amount of sight, as I'm in that mindset of I can't, this is just too hard. As a teenager, I don't want to do all this. This is I. I'm having that mindset. The support around me was teaching me and showing me literally through their actions this is hard and we'll figure out a way. Yes, so what I mean by that is it was the my parents who they would literally say to me obviously, blindness is new to us as a family. We don't know, anything about blindness.
Speaker 2:But we'll figure it out.
Speaker 2:We'll do the research but, most importantly, we'll take it day by day and so many people would say to my parents and say to me, and say to my brother what's the plan? How's to my brother? What's the plan? How's this all going to work out? You know all the questions about the future and our answer was the honest answer we don't know, but we'll figure it out day by day by day.
Speaker 2:Yes, and initially, as they said that, I was frustrated because like well, that doesn't make my depression better, that's not helping me literally in the second. So that didn't feel like a solution. But what I realized over time was that was one of the greatest gifts I could have received, because they were teaching me how to live. They were teaching me the mindset to create of no, you don't have to be completely overwhelmed and shut down with the whole future, rather just live your life literally day by day, by day, by day by day. So that was an incredible source of strength is just their ability to teach me through their actions, ability to teach me through their actions. We will take it day by day.
Speaker 2:And the other major gift that they gave me as support was they continue to treat me as their daughter, as they always had. I still had chores, you know, even though I didn't want chores, right? They still held those same standards, yes, and so they didn't pity me. They didn't talk louder and slower, they didn't do. All they did was make accommodations while still holding the same standard. Yeah. So again that me, slowly over time. Oh, maybe I am still me, I just can't see as well. Maybe I can keep going and I still have gifts and purpose. I just do things in a different way. It might take longer to do a task, but I can still accomplish the cat, the task, with support and just with more time. So just their actions of supporting me gave me that foundation to start healing in exactly what you said that acceptance process and another major part of that healing was my brother.
Speaker 2:Having an older brother who just just again continued to treat me as that annoying little sister. You know that was again in the moment I was like, oh, but don't you feel sorry for me, you know. But again I realized over time that lack of pity. Continuing to treat me as that annoying little sister, that was a gift of healing, yeah, because again he was teaching me through his actions. You're still you, I mean. I so remember being in the driveway with you know, he's five years older. So his older friend you know his friends who are older than me would come over and they're playing basketball in the driveway and I would go out and play with them. And at this point my vision had.
Speaker 2:I'd lost a lot of vision, but I still had enough as long as I was up close you know, in that setting I could still play basketball.
Speaker 2:You know, I was like, wait, don't move out of the way and give me a free shot. And they're like, absolutely not, and they would guard me harder, Right? Oh, wow Again. My initial reaction was but just give me some like, help me out here, Feel sorry for me. Yes, Again, I didn't realize what they were teaching me. What I finally learned was they were teaching me you're still you, we're not just going to baby you and just give you a free pass because you can't see as well.
Speaker 1:That's right.
Speaker 2:Clearly they're going to make accommodations in the real world when I need accommodations, Right, but yet they're still going to hold me to that standard.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so it was my parents, the community around me, the teachers that made the adaptations that I need in school. It was all those moments that, over those high school years, moment by moment, I would say, okay, I don't feel like I can, but maybe I can in this moment, maybe I can for one hour, maybe I can for two days. So that's, that's how I eventually moved into the acceptance process.
Speaker 1:You know, I'm hearing some real key things that I think are critical for ourselves individually, for myself, just for people we connect with in the community, and I think you know parents are parenting children. You know what I heard from you that community was very important. Your parents are very important and there's value in having our parents, there's value in having a community that supports us, but also, if they need to make some type of accommodation, they will, but there's a level of expectation and a standard that they had for you and I love that because what it shows is that, no matter what barrier or obstacle we face, we still can rise to the occasion, you know, and we can still stretch ourselves and I love hearing that. You know whether it's, you know, me trying to live healthier, just you know. Just you know just things in small increments. You know I don't have it figured out, you know three weeks ahead, but I got this today.
Speaker 1:You know, got this tomorrow you know, and I, I, I just totally, uh, can relate, um, when I experienced the loss of one, uh, one of my younger brothers.
Speaker 1:It was painful at that moment, but just being able to take it and, and you know, break it down like, hey, I don't know what this looks like in a year, but I know what it looks like right now and I know that I have to get up. I have to get up, yeah, and I have to move in my purpose and give some talents that I've been given with and that could speak to anybody with their children. And I have, um, some, some good friends of mine that have children with special needs and or, and I have other friends who maybe kids don't have special needs, but maybe they're facing a challenge. The fact that you said, you know, still have that standard, still have that expectation, maybe they can do it, maybe they can't, but if we, if we enable them not to do it, you know, we want to harness their empowerment and their greatness. And that's what I hear from you, your story with your family and your parents. I think that is extremely powerful.
Speaker 2:Yes, because that is the greatest gift I could have received. It's exactly what you said the expectation they still had, the expectation that you're you, you're our friend, you're our daughter, you're our sister, you're our community member. That hasn't changed. You just need to do things in a different way.
Speaker 1:That's right, yes, wow, what is? Use grit it, and that's a source of strength for you. Define what grit means to you.
Speaker 2:Yes, so to me, let me start with what it doesn't mean. What it doesn't mean is just let me push forward, be strong, plow through life and just somehow get through, have the strength to get through. It doesn't mean just that that force pushing through even though we're we're struggling mentally inside. What it means for me is choosing moment by moment, what is my goal? What do I need to achieve for this moment? Yes, so again, a very practical example was when I was starting my senior year of high school. I was obviously facing a new academic year. I needed to apply to colleges and I was also making the decision am I going to use a guide dog or have a cane? And all those decisions needed to be made in the you know from like August to November, in a very short time period. So for me that was overwhelming to try to think about and process all that.
Speaker 2:But the grit came in when I knew all I had to do was one day, think about which schools I wanted to apply for, and then the next day all I had to do was narrow down that list. And then the next day all I had to do was focus on the test, whatever test was coming up in the classes in the senior year. So for me grit is breaking life down into literally moment by moment sections. Another example, emotionally, how it helped me I was in a constant state of panic, like I lived in a panic attack. It wasn't I had panic attacks, it was just. That was my constant state of being. So the grit came in when I could say okay, I'm thankful that today the panic attack was two hours less than yesterday. The next day, I'm thankful that it was four hours less than the day before.
Speaker 2:So again, that emotional grit, the physical grit, the spiritual grit is taking it day by day by day, literally hour, by hour by hour.
Speaker 1:Yes, oh, I love the fact that you know really just breaking things down into measurable steps. Breaking things down into measurable steps.
Speaker 1:Because I think people can get overwhelmed with the big picture and the fact that what I heard from you too is just being present. If you're not present, you can get caught up in anxiety. Future thinking is good, I think, but then it could be it's like a double-edged sword. We've got to, got to, got to plant, you know, got to make goals for the future, but at the same time, if you're dealing with something, thinking about that goal can cause panic, it could cause fear, it could cause anxiety, and then just breaking things down and measurable goals I think is like so doable for a lot of people, and I think there's so many people that are in a state of being frozen because they can't move forward, because they're just frozen in that moment of panic. And so I think your story speaks to that and how you were able to get into the grit, and that's just not like forcing yourself through it.
Speaker 1:This is like actually being very self-aware and being present and saying this is what I'm going to focus on today. I'm going to be present for this today and then, when tomorrow comes, this is what we're going to build from there. Yes, I love it. How did you begin to move forward after you, once you got into the grit? Forward after you? Once you got into the grit, like, was there anything you built onto that that just kept propelling you forward to where you are today with this, with your new mindset today?
Speaker 2:yeah, so two perspectives. One was the, what you were referring to just a minute ago about the, the day's build on itself. Yes, so for me, an incredible source of empowerment was allowing all those small moments to each build on themselves. Wow, I just got through a whole week. I just got through a week and a half, you know, allowing those small moments to build on itself, almost to give my, to teach me and give me the mindset of look what you've done the past two weeks so you can keep going for two more weeks. Yes, so that was incredibly healing to move forward and still a mindset that I I have in the perspective that I have today, of focusing on the present moment while allowing the past to be proof that, okay, you've, you've done it in the past, keep going day by day. That's, that's the perspective, that's healing.
Speaker 2:The other part, the what balances out the grit, is the gift and the healing resource of gratitude. Yes, and that all started by a conversation that I had with a mentor of mine. So I didn't wake up one day and say, okay, I'm just gonna be so grateful that that I have grit and I'm so grateful for this blindness. Let's just be grateful and positive. Gratitude was never in my mindset yet. That all changed through a short, brief interaction with a mentor. So one day towards the end of high school, a mentor. I don't even remember our conversation or why we were connecting, but I just remember her saying okay, laura, I want you to start writing down every day, at the end of your day, three things that you're grateful for go back of your day, think back through the day and write down your three people, three situations that you're grateful for.
Speaker 2:And my immediate thought was okay, you're not a good mentor Because here I am depressed, anxious, have lost almost all of my sight at this point and you're telling me to be grateful. Yes, that's not good advice, right, that's not going to work. So in my teenage studies stubbornness my whole perspective was I'm going to prove her wrong. I'm going to show her that being grateful is not a good resource in this situation and someone going through major life change. Yes, what I realized over a short amount of time was she was not saying. What I thought she was saying was be grateful for the blindness, wake up and be happy and positive and you know, be smart, have smiles and be happy that you are blind.
Speaker 2:That's not what she was teaching me at all. What she was teaching me was was teaching me at all. What she was teaching me was notice and recognize what you're grateful for as you navigate through the change. Yes, so she was teaching me be grateful for the guide dog that you receive as you start college to help you physically navigate the world. Be grateful for the brother who still treated you as that little normal sister you know. Be grateful for the parents that may still made you do your tours every week, even though you didn't want to. You want to use the blindness as an excuse to get out. Be grateful for, for what helps you get through each day. Yes, and that I can't put into words how, how healing and how that led to acceptance.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and that balance, that with the grit.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I love that, that like the spirit of gratefulness. I think it's so key, like what you said, and just being grateful for those, for those things, like the guide dog you know your parents like, and just being grateful for those for those things, like the guide dog you know your parents like. And I think, if we can reflect on our own life, you know, whatever that, whatever we're dealing with, you know, whether it's our sight, whether it's our physical aspects, whether it's, you know, some type of challenge that, uh, what I think happens is that you begin to give that challenge so much power over your life. Yes, you forget the blessings that you have around you, that you're connected to, yes, and then, once you elevate, you know and these are not corny type things, like you said you're going to prove your mentor wrong, right, yeah, like you know, like what does she mean? Like being grateful for the blindness?
Speaker 1:No, but it was being grateful for the things that were attached to you, that loved you, that supported you, that guided you, that nurtured you, that were there to assist you to your, like, next level. And so I think, if we all have that that gratitude piece, no matter what we're facing in life, it's really going to take us to another level of our purpose and gifts and talents. So I really do love that. How did you because I'm sure you had to be courageous through this experience what gave you the courage to move on, to move forward? So what?
Speaker 2:gave me the courage was what helped me change from that I can't mindset to I can. So the courage was living in the grief while also choosing to move forward.
Speaker 2:So, what I mean by that. Another interaction that I had with a mentor was so incredibly healing and it gave me that courage I was getting. This was the first mentor about. The gratitude was in high school. An interaction that I had with another mentor. I was getting ready to start my freshman fall of college. You know, getting ready to start new beginning, you know, exciting. I was thinking, oh, this group thing I've done, I've checked that box, that's, that's over. Now I'm going to move forward.
Speaker 2:And I was sitting in her office and she just very calmly but very confidently said Laura, I just want to let you know you think you're through this grieving process. You think that's something that you did in high school and now you're done and you're ready to move forward. I just want to let you know that grieving will be a part of your every single day, the rest of your life. And that is not a weakness. That does not mean you haven't accepted your blindness. That doesn't mean you're not moving forward. It's just part of your new normal. Yes, so I want you to accept the grief and just live with it as you move forward.
Speaker 2:Yes, so I share that experience to say for me, the having courage is choosing to live with the grief while also choosing to move forward, to do both at the same time.
Speaker 1:Yes, that is powerful, because I believe that all of us experience some type of grief at some point of our life and we will continue to experience grief on some level, whether that's physically, mentally, spiritually. We're going to be impacted by grief and so, and it could, to be impacted by grief and so and it can be vicarious grief that's multiple griefs coming to you at once, you know, yes, and I think that once we and I love the fact how you spoke to courage is like deciding to move forward in the midst of the grief, deciding to not stay where you're at and to move forward and know that this is going to be a part of your life that you know you're going to experience as you journey through this life.
Speaker 1:You're going to experience it. Will it paralyze you or will it empower you? Right, right, yes, and what it definitely has done to you it's empowered you because I can be speaking to you here today has done to you. It's empowered you because I can be speaking to you here today If you didn't move forward. You have an organization that helps others facing challenges, and I think that the more people we have to model that for us, the more that we know that we can do it, no matter what we're facing in this life, that we can do it.
Speaker 1:And grief doesn't discriminate. You can be any age, any race, any culture, any gender, any class status. We're all going to experience it. And I think we see people who function in it and you know and do what they need to do to get through it. And then we have people who model maybe not the best behavior because they don't have the coping skills or the support that they need, and so the more we talk about this, the more that people can really understand that.
Speaker 1:You know, and if people are experiencing a job loss, you know I meet people who experience. You know, right now we're going through a transition in our economy and I think you know some people are like, hey, this is going to take me down. But there's other people that are saying, nope, this is my opportunity to learn something new, this is my opportunity to stretch, this is my opportunity to build my business. I may have been laid off, but this is not going to define me. And yes, I may grieve the job loss, but there's an open door for me down the way if I continue to be self-aware and present. I think we just model that greatly. Another thing that I have is you spoke about mentors a couple of times and how do you think it sounds like they've really spoken to your life and really empowered you. What do you think is important about a mentor or a coach in people's lives?
Speaker 2:Yes, so for me and my own experience, the power of a mentor is that they for two perspectives they are holding the space. So as we go through intense change, intense loss, intense grief like in my situation as I'm going through intense, initially adjusting to life without sight, those mentors, they can hold that space because they're not emotionally going and physically adapting to the change. They can hold that space in a way that I can't for myself because life is changing so fast.
Speaker 2:So, they can hold the space while also supporting us. So again, it goes back to that supporting us. So again it goes back to that. They didn't. It wasn't the pity, it wasn't the enabling, it was that I know you're going through intense change and I still believe in you. Yes, you can still move forward. So it's almost like, even though their lives were totally different and they weren't going through what I was going through, they were modeling. You can keep going, and here's how. Yes, I will guide you forward.
Speaker 1:Yes, Wow, that is amazing. You know, I think that's so important and critical. You know, and it's an investment in yourself as well. They're just pouring into you something that they have and I like the fact that they say they may not have been personally experiencing it to you something that they have, and I like the fact that they say they may not have been personally experiencing it, but they're really there to hold you accountable and to guide you as well on to your next step. You know, and so I generally love that. I know we're winding down here for the last couple of minutes and I just have a couple more questions. The one other question that I do have is what advice would you give people who are experiencing change in their life, whether it's physically, mentally, emotionally or spiritually. It could be all of them or it could be part of them. What advice would you give people who are experiencing change?
Speaker 2:My major advice would be give yourself the space to acknowledge the difficulty of the change. Yes, so, as I first talked about, I entered that denial period and then that I can't mindset I was not giving myself the space just to sit in the sadness, the grief, the pain of the loss. So my advice would be, whatever the change might be physical, mental, spiritual, all of it just give yourself that space to sit in the that. This is really hard. What you're going through, what you're experiencing, is very, very difficult. And then, once you acknowledge that change, the next step is to know that you're enough. And you spoke to this very, very clearly and powerfully earlier. In the midst of change, we're so focused on the change we lose all other focus of the gifts and the presence and the purpose that we do have.
Speaker 2:So, my greatest advice is to first acknowledge the change and the difficulty and then choose to remember that perspective that even in the change you are enough.
Speaker 1:Yes, that is amazing. Even in the change, that's a message right there you are enough and that's no matter. You know what space we're in. You know whether we may feel like we're so impacted we may not think we're enough. You know, whether that's on a work site or in a family or whatever relationship that could be a blow to our self-esteem. But even in the process of the change, if we stand firmly in that, we are enough, we are valued, we are purpose and we're gifted that we're going to get through it and, like you said, it's OK to sit in it to accept it for a while, just because we have to acknowledge it. We don't want to scathe over it, you know, but just to you know, acknowledge it and just know that, as we're going through this, we are enough. My last question and then I'll give an opportunity to give your web link and your where people can purchase your book as well is what gives you hope as you continue to journey through this life? What gives you hope?
Speaker 2:What gives me hope is the passion to be, that strength that I received, yes, in those early days, as I received that foundation of the community the parents, the brother, the friends, the teachers just sometimes it was even complete strangers is I received that foundation. My hope, going forward each day, is that I can be that foundation for other people.
Speaker 1:Oh, yes, that is amazing. Thank you, laura. If my listeners want to get in touch with you and purchase your book or your services, or have you speak, or or wanted to hire a coach or mentor to connect with you and find out more about what you have to offer, what is your web link that they can go to?
Speaker 2:is laurabrattencom and that's the best place for the speaking, the coaching and the to purchase the book as well.
Speaker 1:so all the information is on the website. Okay, laurabrattencom, when I complete editing the video and the podcast, I'll make sure that it is in the description so people can find that information there as well. Lord, it has been a pleasure today. You have given so many great seeds of wisdom and insight for others to move forward as they go through this journey of life, and they may be experiencing grief through the change, but the message you ultimately gave is that there are enough and there are people in the community whether that's a community member or a family member that are there to support and hold people accountable and have the standard. Maybe have to make some accommodations, but to empower you to live to your fullest potential, and I just want to thank you. It has been extremely amazing, thank you.
Speaker 2:Thank you for the opportunity. Thank you.