Today we’d like to introduce you to Deborah Rudell
Deborah, we appreciate you taking the time to share your story with us today. Where does your story begin?
I grew up in a small town in British Columbia, and as a child I found solace in my stuffed animals and imaginary friends. As a preteen, my grandmother taught me about reincarnation, Edgar Cayce, yoga and Jesus.
In my twenties, my partner and I started a spiritual community on eighty acres of land. Several years of practicing rebirthing and affirmations led to India and a spiritual teacher who came to the United States and established a commune in Oregon.
We lived with Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh and thousands of other disciples in a spiritual community for the next four years. But it all came crashing down when the leaders of the commune were exposed, arrested, and imprisoned for bioterrorism and attempted murder. Completely spiritually disillusioned after the ranch folded, another adventure called my husband and I to Kauai to rebuild an old boat.
The five years rebuilding Elixir were a time of healing as I endeavored to integrate my life experiences and make sense of the “unspiritual” world of boats and the sea that I found myself in.
And then of course, we had to learn to sail, and cross the Pacific Ocean through gales, debilitating seasickness, and a skipper overboard.
Currently, I am a registered dental hygienist and teach dental hygiene in a community college in San Diego. Over the last years of living a regular life ashore, I have had time to reflect upon, and write about, some of the amazing adventures I have been fortunate to experience.
We all face challenges, but looking back would you describe it as a relatively smooth road?
Smooth is definitely not a word I would use to describe my life journey. But then, smooth might have been too boring.
Struggles would include falling in love with a married man, feeling betrayed by a spiritual teacher, co-parenting with ex-spouses, learning to build a boat, doing an ocean crossing without any prior experience, getting a university degree as a mature student, learning to write and now being on the publishing train.
Appreciate you sharing that. What else should we know about what you do?
I am embarking on a new venture of being an author. I have written my story to inspire other women to know that we can do things that lie outside of our comfort zone or in what traditionally has been a man’s world. I also have written my story to reassure anyone who has been on a spiritual path that disillusionment is a necessary and powerful part of our journey into even more of a connection to who we truly are and our authentic connection to the Divine. (something bigger than ourselves)
We’d love to hear about how you think about risk taking?
Risk-taking has been the single most important thing in my life. And, having said that, I will unashamedly admit that fear has been with me every step of the way! Even today, embarking on being an author and doing an interview, putting myself and my story out there, is terrifying. However, I will do it anyway, because I know the richness learning new things brings to my life, and how experiences outside of my own comfort zone expand me and my limited ideas of who I think I am.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://www.deborahrudell.com
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/deborahrudellauthor
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/deborahrudellauthor
- Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@DeborahRudellAuthor
