Lived Experience + Advocacy
Lived Experience + Advocacy
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My relationship with mental health has been shaped by lived experience, long-term integration, and a deep commitment to understanding how we navigate crisis, healing, and responsibility.
In my twenties, during a period of professional success as an Executive Assistant, I experienced a mental health crisis that shifted the trajectory of my life. I was given a clinical diagnosis that offered one framework for understanding what I was moving through, but over time I came to recognize that my experience called for a broader, more holistic inquiry—one that honored the complexity of the human nervous system, inner life, and capacity for self-direction.
Rather than organizing my life around limitation, I chose a path rooted in self-study and foundational health. Through consistent attention to sleep, nutrition, movement, nervous-system regulation, and ongoing inner work, I rebuilt my life with intention. Spiritual exploration also played a meaningful role in how I learned to relate to my mind, emotions, and perception.
Today, I live without pharmaceutical intervention and with a strong respect for personal responsibility, discernment, and choice. I share my story not as a prescription, but as an invitation to question rigid narratives around mental health, capacity, and healing.
Alongside my work supporting entrepreneurs and creatives through OGSoul, I remain committed to advocacy that encourages more nuanced, human, and empowering conversations around mental health. My hope is to contribute to a culture that recognizes crisis not as a life sentence, but as a potential turning point toward deeper understanding and self-trust.
This work is offered in the spirit of awareness, responsibility, and respect for each individual’s unique path.
Upcoming Publication
Upcoming Publication
Reclaiming Mental Health
Anthology | Release Date: March 24, 2026
I’m honoured to be a contributing author in Reclaiming Mental Health, an upcoming anthology exploring more nuanced, human-centered perspectives on mental health, healing, and lived experience. This work brings together voices committed to expanding the conversation beyond diagnosis and limitation, toward agency, integration, and self-trust.
Featured Chapter
Featured Chapter
Keep the Earth Below My Feet
This chapter was written from lived experience.
Keep the Earth Below My Feet traces my journey through psychiatric diagnosis, hospitalization, and the long, non-linear process of healing that followed. It reflects on what it means to be labeled by a system—and what is lost when those labels begin to replace the human behind them: story, context, and self.
The chapter challenges current mental health systems while holding space for the humanity of those confined within them. It speaks to brutal truths, lived realities, and the quiet dignity of people whose stories are rarely witnessed or remembered.
At its core, this piece is about reclamation.
Of name.
Of story.
Of humanity.
It is both a declaration and a plea—a call to reclaim not only our names, but our inherent uniqueness in a world that too often seeks to number, label, and confine us.
Podcast Topics + Conversations
Podcast Topics + Conversations
In podcast conversations and interviews, I speak to lived experience, integration, and the deeper layers of human growth. The themes I explore often include:
Mental Health + Resilience
Navigating crisis, building capacity, and moving beyond limiting narratives with responsibility and self-trust.
Spirituality + Self-Discovery
Exploring intuition, meaning, and the inner work that supports long-term integration and personal growth.
Empowerment + Community
Self-advocacy, authenticity, and the role of supportive relationships in individual and collective healing.
Holistic Wellbeing
Foundational health, mindfulness, alternative approaches, and creative expression as pathways to balance and resilience.
Featured Podcast Conversations
Publications
Publications
I'm a contributing author in The Sovereign Volume 2, an anthology exploring sovereignty, resilience, and personal truth.
About My Contribution
In my chapter, Written in the Stars, I reflect on my lived experience with altered states of perception and the ways society often assigns limiting narratives to mental health. The chapter explores how moments of crisis can become gaetways to deeper self-understanding, meaning, healing, and purpose.
The Sovereign Volume 2 is available for purchase on Amazon.
For updates on publications, projects, and behind-the-scenes work, you can find me on Instagram at @dee_ogsoul.
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