Breaking Cycles, Answering the Call Forward

Hi Renetta, thank you so much for taking the time to share your story and heart with our readers. Your work centers on helping people break generational patterns and step into lasting transformation. Looking back, what first led you to focus your life’s work on healing old cycles and guiding others toward breakthrough?
I found myself at a crossroads & I didn’t know which way to go. I was telling friends & family members, but they kept gaslighting me-saying I didn’t know what I was talking about. I was telling them I needed help, but all they did was pour their problems on me. I was the fixer of everyone & myself. One day, I just started writing & then I heard look at your family tree. No one could give me answers, so I started digging alone. I found out so much of my ancestors. The more I looked the more o could hear them calling me forward. When I looked up, I was being asked to walk away from it all to start a hero’s journey. I said ok & I’ve been in it ever since. I’ve always asked others what was their family history. The thing is, you must be diligent as a FBA (foundational black American) to look. So many untruths were told & in searching for my ancestors I ran into truth.

You blend so many powerful experiences—being a U.S. veteran, a NY Times bestselling author, and a trauma overcomer—into your coaching and speaking. How have those chapters of your life shaped the way you show up for the people you serve today?
Yes. Very much so. I don’t judge others for what they’ve been through or going through. The main reason is, if I judge their process I get to judge my own processes. As a veteran, I was willing to lay my life down for people I hadn’t even met. The diverse wars & conflicts changed me forever, but also traveling the world I was able to change my perspective in so many different ways. In the NY Times bestselling author, I was sharing my life’s journey & how those journeys changed me in so many ways. You don’t know what you’ve been through until you write it down & really see it on paper. That’s when you break down, because you’ve been so strong for so long that at times we forget to be human. I need love just like everyone else but the trauma taught me to just be happy with what you are receiving. I decided I wanted the whole pie/cake and not just the crumbs that were being served to me.

Overcoming trauma took a lot out of me, because it ran in the family so long as I listened to the family (aunties/uncles) talk about what they went through as well. I would make up stuff around others because I was always the odd one out if I was completely honest with my upbringing. When I became honest with myself, I was able to face the things that were causing me to have nightmares, skin breakouts, & so many other things. I started making products based on my own journal entries, & I didn’t know I was going to release so many emotions (energy in motion) & my body has less stress to allow me to walk with my head held high no matter what anyone said anything about me. I love me & that’s all that matters. God played a big part in this, every time I became scared, I heard He say I’ve got you just keep going. I was so scared & more than I thought I could handle as I walked alone with no team or friends. I left the US to travel to Central America to find out what I really wanted & who I was under all of that trauma.

Through Life Success Results and Refuge Women’s Transition Center, you support both personal growth and women in major life transitions. What inspired you to build both a coaching practice and a nonprofit, and how do those two worlds complement each other?
It was first just the nonprofit. I was working in the corporate arena & I was always talking to God about doing something with the homeless. It broke my heart to see veterans who fought for the country without assistance or even care like they were thrown away. So I started making sandwiches, bought some huggie drinks, water bottles, & just started where I was. No videos, just listening to others’ stories as they found themselves in that demise. I found out some were doctors & lawyers who lost it all in the stock market. They were the bread winners & the family walked away from them after they took care of everyone else for all those years. I just listened & I was like I need to do something. I talked to others & even made a vision board of what I wanted the place to look like. People would tell me it would never happen & I would say with God nothing is impossible (Luke 1:37). I was driving to work & God would drop wisdom into my brain, because I was driving I would open the voice memo and speak it into my phone out loud in the car alone. Little did I know after it was over I had a simple business plan, SOP, budget plan, how many employees I would need, & how to do it. Everyone was like it’s so dope but you’ll never get it. They were projecting onto me their fears. I was fearless at the time because I said if God said we’re going to do it. They told me I had an overactive imagination & that I didn’t have the money to get it. I just kept believing & building on my dream quietly since they showed me that they didn’t see the vision like me, they couldn’t because it was my dream. Life Success Results came later after I left the corporate world in 2022. I started doing massage therapy & holistic practitioner on working with the body. I decided before I would touch anyone that I would center my body to be a conduit to help them heal.

After a while close to the end of 2023, I pivoted away from my hands-on job to start studying other ways to do things. I was always counseling my clients, so I heard let’s change careers. I said okay to start learning to train as a counselor. I was learning so much & then things didn’t work out as I wished. Then I was off to another adventure with God. I started having experiences that I couldn’t explain if I tried. Before I knew it I was taking in clients & it was exciting. Then people began to speak ill will over me & the business began to dwindle. Soon I was over another journey of leaving the US to go to Central America. This is where I’ve learned more of myself & healing my own wombs; so I put the business on hold for a minute to find out who I really was. It has been an amazing journey. There have been ups & downs. I never thought I would be walking away from my own family. The thing is I have won a court case to receive $1 Billion but never received it. My family tried to unalive me, so I fled to another country until the coast was clear. Look me up, you’ll see me & my story. The attorney on the case acted as if the money wasn’t available & ghosted us to start a new practice.

Your speaking style is described as direct, grounding, and spirit-led, with storytelling at the center. When you’re on stage or leading a workshop, what do you hope people feel or realize in those “aha” moments with you?
That just because they’ve had crazy moments in life doesn’t mean they aren’t worthy of every dream they have & worthy of going after it. I let them know that when they truly decide to go towards it. They will have to fight everything on the inside of them that repels the dream & that they can fight against it. They look at me like a deer in headlights until I completely explain it & then they’re like okay I get it now! The thing is to get to your dream, you get to fight lots of darkness that you didn’t know existed. Everything that our ancestors dealt with will come to the surface. Many don’t even start when they find out how much it will cost them to change so they stay on the shore. I said I was no longer going to stay on the shore, but go after everything that had my name on it. I sure am too. It’s never perfect, but the willingness to get up everyday to get what rightfully belongs to me & my ancestral line. They always say wow let’s go, but say I don’t know yet.

So much of your message is about identity, purpose, and reinvention. For someone who feels stuck in repeating the same patterns or beliefs, what’s the first small step you encourage them to take toward change?
The first step is the willingness to put one foot in front of the other & never quit no matter what is placed in front of you. To find your true identity, we must first see why we see ourselves the way we do. The process of asking what has affected everyone in your entire family. What is the pattern, look deeper. In the process, we find out our families were either the one causing the pain or the ones receiving the pain. There’s no, “My ancestors did this, not me”. I hear this more than I’d care to hear, & that means I won’t change-this is how it’s always been. So basically making excuses. So then I ask, if this was your own child what would you do? They say I would fight with no matter of stopping, so then I ask why not jump in? Then I hear, I will be all alone & I will miss everyone. Then I ask, maybe you’re the glue to everything & holding everyone together so what would happen if you stop.

So the first step 100% is, do I want to end in my bloodline or am I too scared? The next step is breathwork & centering the body to go forward in the direction that you wish to. No one is really stuck, they know what they need to do, but they are afraid of the first step because it goes into a path they’ve never seen before. When we’re not familiar, we coward & run away from what is needed to do. Look how many of us see we need to workout but make excuses. Don’t believe me, look at the social media posts of others showing us how to win but excuses stop us.

As you continue expanding into media, podcasts, and new audiences, what’s most exciting to you about this next season, and what kind of impact do you hope your message has on a broader scale?
I hope to show others that no matter how bad it looks nothing is impossible (Luke 1:37-with man things are impossible, but with God all things are possible; Hebrews 13:5-God will never leave or forsake me (God is my heart closer than a brother). I want them to see that no matter how dark it gets, we come from ancestors that went through “The Depression”, “Slavery of humans”, “Burning & destroying of all black towns”, “Destroying of the Tartarian dynasties, & learning to find the light in our every moment now.

We can do this! I’ve faced the deepest darkness within myself & I know the way out! I want to show others, yes it hurts & it’s going to feel like “The Never Ending Story”. If you keep going, nothing can stop you from getting to your ultimate goal, but you & your own personal fears. Throw the fears in the trash & hold onto the wisdom you learn on the journey to get there. You’ve got this & I believe in you! I’m doing it now & I’m going as hard as I can to see myself where I want to be.