Shonda Moralis, MSW, LCSW, Founder of Breathe Mama Breathe & Co, is on a mission to help busy moms create sustainable life balance.
As a psychotherapist, coach, and award-winning author, she has supported women through the ever-evolving seasons of life for twenty-five years (and counting).
Shonda serves on the board of Shanthi Project, an education nonprofit providing evidence-based mindfulness services to children and adults.
She lives in Pennsylvania with her husband and two kids, loves to play outside, endeavors to practice what she preaches, and is perennially fascinated by what makes people tick.
How Breathe Mama Breathe was born
It was 2011....
As a devoted mindfulness meditator and teacher, psychotherapist, and experienced mom, I was caught unaware when the birth of my second child a decade after the first left me feeling slightly unhinged. As a second-time mom, I had no delusions about the impending intensity of adding a newborn to our family. After the first few harrowing weeks with a newborn, once the haze of brutal sleep deprivation subsided, it became clear that my usual daily thirty minutes of meditation was not in my near future. Opposed to throwing the baby out with the mindfulness bathwater, I needed to find a way to stay connected to mindfulness in a more flexible, manageable way.
As the months ticked on, what really sustained me was unearthing small ways to infuse my life with brief mindful breaks. Not only was it a lifeline when things felt overwhelming, but a means of savoring the beautiful moments that arose within even the most monotonous of days with a newborn.
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Breathe, Mama, Breathe is my answer to an ongoing search of how to, as best I could, stay true to my deepest held values while juggling my many roles along the way. Working from my years as a therapist and my own life experiences, I’ve drawn on the science and research of Positive Psychology (the science of happiness and well-being) and mindfulness to offer simple five-minute mindfulness practices specifically designed with busy moms in mind.
I believe we have all of our answers inside if we allow ourselves a bit of time to get quiet, listen, and reconnect to ourselves. My aim is to teach busy moms simple ways to live more mindfully and with increased energy and calm. When we are feeling balanced, our family reaps the benefits of a mom who is thriving and modeling how to live with more presence, gratitude, and joy. What more could we wish for our children, our families, and ourselves? They, and you, deserve it. And the world needs it.
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Excerpted from Breathe Mama Breathe: 5-Minute Mindfulness for Busy Moms (The Experiment Publishing, 2017.)
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