Hi there, I’m Shanna Haight, owner and founder of Sacred Renewal.
Long before Sacred Renewal existed, my life was shaped by experiences that led me to ask difficult questions about healing, resilience, and what it truly means to rebuild a life after a prolonged season of upheaval.
As a child, I experienced profound instability and trauma that eventually led to entering foster care before my ninth birthday. Those early years left lasting marks on how I understood myself, the world, and my place within it.
Like many people who have lived through trauma—particularly childhood trauma and abuse—I carried those experiences quietly, trying to make sense of them in whatever ways I could. At times, I turned to substances like alcohol and nicotine, food, television and social media, and even being a workaholic to keep myself too busy to think.
Throughout most of my life, I carried a deep sense of being alone, and a quiet belief that something about me was fundamentally wrong—even though I couldn’t explain why. It felt as if I was broken and unrecognizable and that I had to hide that from the world around me at all costs. Even into my thirties, I was convinced that I just wasn’t meant to be truly happy or feel settled inside.
Like many, I developed survival patterns and coping mechanisms to manage a growing sense of self-hatred and need to live up to others’ expectations while pretending I was fine and nothing had happened to me. What those patterns and mechanisms look like for each person can vary; for me, silently carrying those experiences led to people-pleasing, over-achieving, toxic attachments, impulsive and dangerous behaviors, an unhealthy relationship with alcohol, and—in my younger years—self-harm.
If you're here and parts of this story feel familiar, there may have been a moment in your life that finally made it impossible to continue ignoring your own pain. For me, that event was having my children. I realized I was going to unintentionally pass on the trauma I was pretending wasn’t there if I didn’t stop hiding from it and find a way to heal.
Like many of us when this happens, I then found a therapist, but therapy was only the start of a long, arduous journey.
The Beginning of a Healing Path
One of my therapists—my favorite and most impactful therapist—asked me to do some research at one point on complex PTSD and adverse childhood experiences (or ACEs), among other things. It opened my eyes to the vast array of information that was out there that I had been previously unaware of and whet my appetite to learn more, to read more, to understand more.
That journey led me to finding others with similar life experiences, learning about what I was struggling with and why, and books by some of the leading names in the trauma and emotional research space, including Peter Levine, Brené Brown, and others, as well as introducing me to buddhist philosophy and mindfulness through Pema Chodron and Thich Nhat Hanh.
As time passed, my search for more understanding and knowledge gradually became a deeper journey of healing.
I began reading widely about trauma, psychology, human behavior, and the ways people rebuild their lives after profound adversity, as well as the stories of people with experiences that were a lot like mine. I realized there was capacity for deep and meaningful change in my life, and discovering I wasn’t alone and finding a community of others like me gave me the courage to continue along this path.
Before long, I was discovering practices that brought healing not only to the mind but also to the body—mindfulness, movement, reflection, and the quiet work of learning to listen to my own inner experience.
Over time, I began to recognize something important.
Insight alone was not enough.
Understanding our stories intellectually can bring clarity, but lasting transformation often emerges when insight is paired with embodied experience—when the mind and body are both invited into the healing process together.
For me, that embodied experience began with yoga and learning to breathe—to really breathe. To follow my breath in and follow it out, to feel the expansion and contraction of my lungs. At first, this was a big challenge for me, and I was only able to do so for more than one breath at a time once I got a mala and passed a bead between my fingers with each breath.
A few more important pieces in the puzzle had snapped into place, but there were more.
Writing as a Path to Understanding
Writing has been an important part of my journey for as long as I can remember. Stories were one of the first ways I began trying to understand my experiences and the world around me. Over time, writing became both a creative outlet and a way to explore difficult truths about trauma, resilience, and healing. I abandoned the written word for a number of years, but returned to it early in my healing journey and it was critical in continuing my healing journey.
Under the pen name Katherine Turner, I have written several books that explore these themes through both fiction and memoir. My memoir, resilient, tells the story of my childhood and early life experiences navigating trauma, abuse, and the lasting impacts as I tried to find a sense of self.
Since its publication, I have received many messages and reviews from readers sharing that the book helped them feel seen in their own struggles and reminded them that they were not alone. Those reviews and conversations reinforced something I had begun to understand more deeply:
Stories have the power to help people recognize themselves and begin imagining new possibilities for healing.
Not only that, but writing our stories—whether drafting a book, publishing a blog, or simply journaling—provides another method for confronting, processing, and healing from painful experiences. Writing resilient was one of the most healing periods of my life. Writing was yet another piece in the puzzle for cultivating inner healing, peace, and balance, as was sharing my story with the world so it could then help others along their own journeys.
Influences That Shaped Sacred Renewal
As my journey unfolded, I was influenced by many thinkers, teachers, and traditions exploring trauma, healing, grief, somatics, and the deeper dimensions of human experience.
Among those who have shaped my thinking are Brené Brown, Robin Wall Kimmerer, Francis Weller, Malidoma Patrice Somé, Thich Nhat Hanh, Pema Chodron, Stephen Cope, Martín Prechtel, Shelley Tomczyk, Joe Dispenza, and others.
Drawing on insights from their work—along with my own lived experience—I began integrating perspectives from psychology, mindfulness, somatic practice, cultural wisdom traditions, and reflective practice.
Over time, these influences helped shape an approach centered on gentleness, curiosity, compassion, and embodied awareness.
The Creation of Sacred Renewal
Eventually, it became clear that the ideas and practices that had helped me transform my own life could also help others navigating their own healing journeys.
Sacred Renewal grew out of that realization.
It is a space where intellectual insight and embodied practice come together—where people can explore healing with curiosity, compassion, and patience, reconnecting with their own inner wisdom and capacity for growth.
Sacred Renewal is not about fixing what is broken.
It is about remembering the wholeness that has always existed within us, even when life has made it difficult to see.
Training & Continuing Study
My work is informed by ongoing training in embodied practice, mindfulness, grief work, and somatic healing.
Registered Yoga Teacher (RYT-200) – Yoga Alliance
Certified Meditation Teacher (CMT-200) – Meditation Alliance International
Certified Mindfulness Coach
Grief-Tending & Grief Ritual Facilitation Apprenticeship (in progress), in the lineage of Francis Weller
Somatic Healing Studies (in progress)
Pranayama Certification (in progress)
Life Beyond the Work
Outside of my work, I’m happiest spending time with my children, reading, writing, knitting, on my yoga mat, and in nature—exploring both the vast beauty and wonder of the universe and the quiet spaces where reflection and renewal become possible.
What Comes Next
My work at Sacred Renewal will grow and evolve as I deepen my knowledge through study, personal practice, and experience. Just as walking the healing path is ever-evolving, so is the work of bringing together the various modalities to share that healing path with those ready to walk it. I will continue to broaden my education and training as well as solicit and incorporate feedback from clients in order to expand and hone my offerings and practices that will support your through your transformation journey so you move through each day of your life deeply present, connected, and empowered.