We were lucky to catch up with Sonia S recently and have shared our conversation below.
Sonia, we’re thrilled to have you on our platform and we think there is so much folks can learn from you and your story. Something that matters deeply to us is living a life and leading a career filled with purpose and so let’s start by chatting about how you found your purpose.
From a young age, I always wanted to help people. I was the oldest North-American born in my extended family and quickly became the “helper”, whether it was with language barriers or helping babysit my little cousins. I knew from a young age that helping people was a calling, I had the patience, willingness to learn and empathy to understand other peoples’ perspectives.
I went to nursing school in my late teens and learned I had great people skills, was competent and I gained the self-esteem I needed to know that I was on the right path. The only trouble was that I never felt like I was in the exact place I needed to be. There was a disconnect between helping people and that troubling feeling that I was also hurting people with the medicines I was delivering & witnessing physical trauma with invasive procedures that were being performed on patients I was caring for. I always felt like there should be a less invasive or harmful way to heal.
In my mid-thirties, I got sick. There were compiling symptoms that spanned over a year, and as time passed, I was getting weaker & sicker. The symptoms crept up on me & I quickly became unable to cope. I went to doctors (holistic & naturopathic) to get answers and after months of bloodwork & testing, I was diagnosed with Hashimoto’s, an autoimmune disease, and it was so far advanced, by body was starting to shut down. I was in flight/flight for so long that my body was severely rejecting itself. So, I decided it was time for me to fight for my own life. I started by researching, reading, removing toxic foods from my diet, and then eventually removing toxic & harmful items from skincare, hair products, environmental products and the list goes on.
With that said, I learned that minimal & simple ingredients were best, so I could identify what exactly it was that I could develop a reaction from. That was hard to find on a shelf, so I started researching again, but this time, I was ordering single ingredients to formulate & make my own skincare items. I took formulary courses and chose to not be shy regarding my journey. I quickly learned that a LOT of people had similar individual challenges… and so, my business was launched.
Thanks for sharing that. So, before we get any further into our conversation, can you tell our readers a bit about yourself and what you’re working on?
My business is centered around helping people heal more holistically, without compromising the quality of their skincare routine & healing journey. I have over 300 formulations/products (some of which rotate as seasonal items) that I have formulated and produce myself, always in small batches, and we are as organic as we can be. The business is also autoimmune friendly, allergen conscious & paraben, phthalate & hormone disruptor free, and vegan. We call it – NO CRAP! to keep it simple.
In addition, I am a medical medium & reiki practitioner, so a lot of what I do is also intuitively led & infused with high vibrational energy. This goes with both product production & client sessions. I mostly offer individual client sessions during the week, as I am occupied with pop-up events on most weekends.
Most of our products are available online – www.theradiantalchemist.com – in addition to booking reiki or medical intuitive sessions, with the understanding that if you are more than 20 miles away from me in Michigan, you can always book a phone or Zoom session. Yes, as a medium, I am just as “tapped in” over the phone as I am in person!
Looking back, what do you think were the three qualities, skills, or areas of knowledge that were most impactful in your journey? What advice do you have for folks who are early in their journey in terms of how they can best develop or improve on these?
Having been an RN, and my thirst for knowledge & growth, I am so thankful for my journey in developing autoimmune disease & everything it encompassed. I had the drive & knowledge-base to understand the depths of autoimmunity & the interest to dive deep into its understanding at a cellular level.
Developing Hashimoto’s forced me to re-evaluate & change so many aspects of my life, not only with my food choices, but re-evaluating stressors, my job, the people I kept in my life, how I did not prioritize my own well-being, it was a full on 360° change that had to be made, and I was determined to not only feel better, but to live better, for ME.
It was the first time in my life that I prioritized my wellness, physical, mental, emotional & spiritual, before that of others’ in my life. I was a full-on people pleaser, and that came to a halt when my life was in jeopardy.
The feeling of not constantly putting others first was the most liberating feeling at first, as it allowed me to hone-in on bringing myself back to center, understanding my physical body, what it needed & what it was rejecting. What it was feeling, from an emotional standpoint & learning what it meant to have emotional womb or childhood traumas. Each of these revelations spiraled into rabbit holes of research and buying up books, signing up for conferences and summits available around the world. I was wrapped up in this journey of coming back to self for a solid four years. It was stressful and amazing – all encompassing – my own journey to rediscovery!
It was during this time of self-reflection & self-preservation that I truly tapped into my mediumship abilities. Without my own journey of self-understanding and true NEED to show up for myself, I would have never tapped into this beautiful gift I was given on such a deep level.
Advice? Honestly, be patient with yourself! If you are on a healing journey, it’s just that, a journey. We all have good days and more challenging ones. No need to hold onto the “failures” if you can learn from them and let them go. It is always better to let go of the negative shit and celebrate the wins! We are human, not robots.
What is the number one obstacle or challenge you are currently facing and what are you doing to try to resolve or overcome this challenge?
Marketing! Having to constantly be present for everyone and “in your face” with social media is challenging for me. I am not super tech savvy & also don’t enjoy seeing myself on camera. This will be the first piece of the business that I will hire out! I know what content I want to reach my customers, but having to write it all out, put it in pretty formats that work for all the different platforms, and schedule them out, or create them on the spot feels time-consuming, and it is, for someone who runs a business on their own.
I would love to hire a college student in marketing that has a love for natural skincare. Do all the videos, write all the emails – the job is yours!
I currently try to combat the marketing overwhelm by scheduling things in advance. I throw everything into excel and plan ahead. My current Instagram page (@TheRadiantAlchemist) is scheduled out for the year, with daily posts to both FB & IG. So, I currently only have to focus on “on the spot” videos and stories.
I also try to batch write emails that are sent out to customers, so that I am not having to think and write on the fly every couple of weeks. Because there are so many different platforms to work off of, it is hard to place my attention in multiple places at once, so batching is the easiest way to do it for me.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://www.theradiantalchemist.com
- Instagram: @TheRadiantAlchemist
- Facebook: @TheRadiantAlchemist
Image Credits
Dee Hues Photography for portrait shot
Luminous Lux Studio for lifestyle shot (green dress)
so if you or someone you know deserves recognition please let us know here.
