Today we’d like to introduce you to Brook Barney.
Brook, we appreciate you taking the time to share your story with us today. Where does your story begin?
We all have a story, but not everyone experiences healing or awakening. My story, in short, started at the young age of 19 with an autoimmune that left me bedridden and hopeless, fighting for my life. While bedridden, I heard this internal call to turn to nature, so I asked my mom to bring me all the books she could find from the library on natural health. As I read book after book, there was a repeating message that you can heal through proper nutrition, mindfulness, and movement. NATURE HEALS. I followed this message and found a mentor who guided me back to a healthy state of living. My autoimmune became dormant but not gone. This was the start of my journey, but as life has it, it was just the beginning.
I then went on in life getting married, having a son with disabilities (who is a blessing) and a daughter(another gift), and working a high-profile demanding career for 15 years with lots of challenges and beauty in between. During this phase of living under high stress, my autoimmune became unmanageable again, and at the end of my 15-year career, I was challenged to walk again. So, I started back at square one-NATURE HEALS.
Through my personal experience, I have had two life-changing healing phases. Those experiences and my story led me to follow my purpose of opening Natured Balance Health & Wellness. A place where I provide a safe space, support, and guidance to individuals who are stuck in life, disconnected, and faced with health challenges. A place where I can offer education, accountability, and compassion as they are working through their health journey.
Would you say it’s been a smooth road, and if not what are some of the biggest challenges you’ve faced along the way?
The most significant obstacle to improving your health state is knowing where to start and being willing to put in the work to bring your body/mind/soul back into balance. We are all provided with an inner guidance system that leads us in life, but it’s easy to lose that inner guidance unless you are mindful and connecting with it daily. When in a diseased or imbalanced state (mentally, emotionally, physically, or spiritually), your connection to self is often lacking, and the pain is so deep that you feel helpless, numb, or overwhelmed. At this point, individuals may turn to conventional medicine to mask the problems/symptoms and bypass the root cause.
It takes a lot for a person to invest in changed behavior as it requires a changed lifestyle, mindset, practice, determination, and time. The struggle I have experienced as a health and wellness practitioner is attracting individuals willing to drop the “quick fix” mentality and accept that healing takes time, is bio-individual, and requires a changed lifestyle and commitment to work. I believe it is more work to stay in a state of imbalance, disease, and discomfort than to learn and invest in the path to a balanced state.
My intention in my practice is to provide individuals with a starting point. I offer a place of non-judgment, where we work on your timeline, a place to explore what your body, mind, and soul are asking of you, and tools to listen to your inner guidance that will lead you to heal and elevated health and wellness.
Thanks – so what else should our readers know about Natured Balance Health & Wellness?
A bit about my business: I am a Certified Integrative Nutrition Health Coach through Institute for Integrative Nutrition who guides individuals through their health journey physically, emotionally, mentally, and spiritually back into a balanced state. When considering going back to school at age 40, I knew integrative holistic health was my path as this method brought me back into a healthy state.
My focus is restoring energy and health, reducing stress and pain, life transitions, and renewing balance and purpose through mindful practices, awareness and connection, nutrition, movement, and nature.
By providing a safe, confidential space to explore and transform, I offer support and guidance in developing new sustainable lifestyle changes, patterns, healthy habits, and self-alignment.
In my practice, I take an Integrative approach focusing extensively on the emotional connection to self rather than working solely from the “outside” with a diet and exercise plan. It’s essential that my clients learn about the body, mind, and soul connection and that food and exercise are only one part of health. Through this emotional awareness connection process, you begin to understand your true intentions and purpose and start living from a state of awareness and consciousness. This is where the healing begins, your habits become sustainable, and you start living life AWAKE.
I also focus heavily on stress reduction and management. You can have the perfect diet and be moving your body, but living in chronic or elevated stress can cannibalize your efforts and goals. Chronic or sustained high stress slows and impairs digestion and immunity, alters oxygen and blood flow, and leads to inflammation, and imbalanced hormones, which manifest in the body’s physical, mental, or emotional disease.
I offer 1:1 and group classes (in-person in Ogden(Weber/Davis area) or virtual) and am a Master guide on Vivaya Health & Wellness online platform. For those interested, I also provide health coach sessions during a hike to experience nature at work, her support, guidance, and healing powers.
My passion is all things outdoors, movement, travel, family, friends, and community. I am a mother to 2 kids, an Ogden, UT native with a pure intention and passion for bringing more health and wellness to our communities, work environments, and homes.
Have you learned any interesting or important lessons due to the Covid-19 Crisis?
Oh, where should I start? The Covid-19 crisis brought to light how unwell our nation is and how overfed, undernourished, disconnected, and over-medicated our people are. Aside from physical distress, the emotional strain and lack of human connection were just as damaging. The depression rates have skyrocketed, and with that, physical signs implode. I am grateful that I was in a position to be there for the individuals that turned to help. I witnessed some excellent client results, mainly in the education and medical field, which were hit the hardest.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://www.naturedbalance.com/
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/naturedbalance/
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/naturedbalance
- Other: https://g.page/r/CWuPN5S4PrB0EAE
