Meet Shayna Grajo

We’re excited to introduce you to the always interesting and insightful Shayna Grajo. We hope you’ll enjoy our conversation with Shayna below.

Shayna, sincerely appreciate your selflessness in agreeing to discuss your mental health journey and how you overcame and persisted despite the challenges. Please share with our readers how you overcame. For readers, please note this is not medical advice, we are not doctors, you should always consult professionals for advice and that this is merely one person sharing their story and experience.

I own that as a visionary, I’ve pushed my limits and experienced uncommon depths of understanding. I am no stranger to mystic trance, states of insight, and shamanic initiation (“severely psychotic episodes as a sort of calling,” to reference Rev. Jen-Mitzuke Peters, Doctoral Candidate, LPC, E-RYT).

I ran into a gamut of hospitalizations following Zen sesshins (meditation retreats of up to 7 days) from 2014-2016. I’ve lovingly joked that my hospitalization profile should go on my C.V. I was hospitalized in Sheffield, Massachusetts; in Orlando, Florida; in Los Angeles, California; and in Ithaca, New York. I was later hospitalized in 2020 in Puerto Princesa, Palawan, Philippines, during a relapse into the trance state.

I could be described as a recovering meditation addict and am happy to report that my latest prolonged trance in June 2024 in Southern Spain was hospital-free.

My initial run-ins with the reality police have endowed a deep humility and empathy for mental health states and perspectives. I’ve led multiple years of fundraisers for the nonprofit Suicide Prevention and Crisis Service.

Flowing with the gift of visionary experience, what’s helped me the most is being able to find community where I’m either understood or embraced for exactly who and what I am. And therapy! I have a great therapist. Doing my current work to recognize systemic oppression also helps me to unpack the interconnectedness of oppressive systems. Without justice, there is no true healing.

Let’s take a small detour – maybe you can share a bit about yourself before we dive back into some of the other questions we had for you?

I’ve decided to focus my copywriting work through the liberation lens, specifically the intersection of wellness, luxury and equity. For instance, I am interested in how spas, retreat centers, holistic practitioners, and services incorporate equity or collective liberation.

I am soon launching a Substack and podcast to continue the conversation! See the Equitable Wellness Podcast and my newsletter on Substack.

If you are a business owner, service provider, coach, personal brand or artist who is passionate about equitable practices in holistic health and healing arts, I would love to hear from you and feature you on the pod.

If you had to pick three qualities that are most important to develop, which three would you say matter most?

The body or physical wellness grounds me. Miguel Ruiz writes in The Four Agreements, “Respect your body, enjoy your body, feed, clean, and heal your body. Exercise and do what makes your body feel good. This is a puja to your body, and that is a communion between you and God.”

The spirit and respecting the spirit is also impactful in my journey. The teachings of Spirit say that we are innately and divinely enough, that just our beingness is why we’re here. The teachings of capitalism say we have no inherent value and have to prove our worth and why we’re here. I want to flow toward Spirit and let that flow be gentle, graceful and intuitive.

Finally, because I’m a copywriter and moved by the Buddha’s encouragement to integrate Body, Speech and Mind, I’ll mention speech. The Ninth Mindfulness Training of Thich Nhat Hanh’s Plum Village is that of Truthful and Loving Speech. Look that one up, it’s beautiful. “Aware that words can create happiness or suffering, we are committed to learning to speak truthfully, lovingly and constructively… We will not spread rumours nor criticise or condemn things of which we are not sure. We will do our best to speak out about situations of injustice, even when doing so may make difficulties for us or threaten our safety.”

One of our goals is to help like-minded folks with similar goals connect and so before we go we want to ask if you are looking to partner or collab with others – and if so, what would make the ideal collaborator or partner?

Yes! I am eager to connect more with partners and collaborators in the health and wellness space who are passionate about equity and liberation work. Please reach out to me on Substack or the links provided to be featured, share your story, or simply connect!

Contact Info:

Image Credits

Inma Blanca Photography

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