From Mental Health Specialist to Travel Nurse + More.

I overcame depression, social awkwardness, low confidence, not knowing myself, and other limitations to becoming a mental health specialist for children, travel nurse, and health coach, all within my 20s. And in my early 30's becoming certified as a Personal Trainer, CBT Coach Practitioner, NLP Practitioner, Hypnotherapist, and Meditation Teacher/Practitioner. I learned that conquering your self-imposed limitations and continuing to level up different aspects of life is insanely life-changing. I take what I’ve learned and apply it to wherever you are in life right now, and help you level up.

I Want To Be Hokage...of Health.

I am a nurse that has improved and saved lives, graduated from Mississippi State University with a B.S in Psychology, and am a Health Coach graduate from the Institute for Integrative Nutrition. I have expanded even further by becoming a certified personal trainer through the National Academy of Sports Medicine. And I have also become certified as a CBT Coach Practitioner, NLP Practitioner, Hypnotherapist, and Meditation Teacher/Practitioner. I have much passion and experience in physical, mental, and nutritional health. All of this with a nice dose of nerdiness attached. Many look at Stephen and may not realize that he might have been in the same spot that many of you are currently in or have been through. This includes enduring and powering through the struggles of extreme shyness and dealing with anxiety attacks. I know the struggle of being a broke college student and a broke post-graduate. I also understand the frustration of not being able to beat some video-games from the early 2000’s without a Gameshark.

Over the years, I have become increasingly involved with spreading knowledge and awareness of things that can help improve our health. While many people focus on physical health and how one can look better, it is crucial to emphasize that mental health is a huge value and contribution for our overall health, as well. Through many of my struggles, I learned over the years, not only that our mindsets, perspectives, and such heavily influence us, but also learned ways to help conquer those struggles that many of us experience now. Athletics has been a huge part of my life and I have years of participating and learning about strength, conditioning, and speed training. In high school, I was very successful in football, track and field, and power-lifting. I will use what I know in many areas of life to help each of us reach out maximum level of health.

The Personal Story

Some Time After Spawning

At only 3 years old, I started getting involved with video games and at only 4 years old, I started getting involved with athletics. Of course, like every other kid, I was always looking for an opportunity to sit at home and watch all of my favorite cartoons, but I also had a huge interest in athletics. I saw things that my favorite characters were doing in comic books and in video games, so I let my imagine run wild and aspired to be like those characters. I wanted to run as fast as Sonic the Hedgehog, jump as high as Jumpman (minus the overalls and mustache), and be as strong as Captain America. You are welcome to laugh because I literally tried to run as fast as Sonic.

Video games, American cartoons, anime, comics, technology, and things within nerd culture was easily my safe-haven, because not only was I quiet and self-conscious, but I also was socially awkward. This all extended into my teen years.

Encountering My Own Monsters

In my later teen years, I experienced depression, lacked much confidence, thought my intelligence was below average, and was quickly denied by many girls, while I watched other classmates and even some of my friends get attention, without much effort.

But even after I started college, I thought things would change. In fact, it got worse. I didn’t realize how low my standards were in so many aspects of my life, that I placed myself in situations where I inevitably confronted disappointment and would often wonder what happened and ask where I went wrong.

That drove me to think even lower of myself. It didn’t stop there. Around 19 years I started to experience anxiety attacks. What made matters even worse is that the attacks would start to emerge more frequently, even in situations when I would be having a serious conversation with someone and it would start to get only slightly confrontational. This is when I started to experiment with simple breathing exercises, which then led me to investigate mediation. It helped...much more than I expected, although I became inconsistent with the practice.

One day, during my junior year in college, after a breakup, I got so fed up with feeling like I wasn’t in control. I wanted to take matters into my own hands. I wanted to stop thinking lowly of myself. I wanted to realize my potential and realize that I was more intelligent than I had ever realized. I wanted to better manage my emotions and not feel like I was a slave to my environment and my situations. Even more surprising is that I was already on academic probation for not performing well in my classes. It wasn’t because I wasn’t capable. It was because I was lazy. You couldn’t get me to see that then, but hind-sight is twenty-twenty right? I was not only lazy, but knew that I was smart enough to study at the very last minute and make a grade just high enough to get me to pass. No, I literally would sometimes start studying a minute before an exam and sometimes bomb it, while other times I barely passed with the lowest C you can get. This eventually caught up with me and I got academically suspended from the university. I was to sit out for the rest of the year, which included summer and fall semester and was to resume next spring. That was one of the hardest things I’ve ever had to tell my parents. It took me two weeks to finally tell them.

From that point forward, I knew my parents could no longer expect me to hold up my end when I say that I would do my best and succeed in academics. I learned that there was actually a way that I could get back into the university earlier, but it would involve going to talk to the Dean of Students. Imagine walking into this powerful administrator’s big office. You sit in this big chair, face to face with him and explain why you failed courses AND try to convince him that you deserve to get back into school early AND give nothing less than your best efforts.

We talked for a while, and he had me sign a contract, placed me in a remediation course, limited my course hours, said I had to maintain a certain GPA the following semester (Fall), and he would be keeping track of my progress. Even the remediation instructor reported both grades and behavior to the Dean of Students. Skipping ahead...I had one of the best semesters of my college career and never looked back. I graduated from Mississippi State University with a B.S in Psychology, where I then went on to work with children and teens that had behavior problems and disorders.

Leveling Up!

After a couple of years of that, I kept with the theme of overall health and became a nurse, where I started working on a cardiac unit. I have learned and seen many things about the human body, while working with patients from different backgrounds, languages, and all sorts of situations. Many times I go beyond what is required because I want the best for whoever I’m taking care of. That also includes ALL of my clients and everyone reading my article. I have literally saved lives working tirelessly with great medical teams. I ended up leaving the cardiac floor to become a travel nurse where I worked at a nursing home and then went on to work at a COVID-19 clinic, during the pandemic. Then I went on to do one thing I didn't expect; and that is working as a correctional nurse with inmates. So yes, I have dealt with a fair share of people and populations.

My passion and care for everyone only grows. I empathize with other nurses, psychologists, therapists, health coaches, and my lovely fellow nerds.

My interest and knowledge only grew when it came to the world of mental health. And it continues to grow each day because I am relentless in learning about our minds and learning how to best help myself and others. The way we talk to people, the way we communicate has so much more of a profound effect than most realize. Every single gesture, word spoken, handshake, and even the way we walk tells a lot about us. There are so many things that communicate information about us to others. I am incredibly fascinated by this and am constantly learning to utilize any cue I can to learn about someone to learn how to best help them whether if it's in person or over a video call. This pushes me to be as effective as I can of helping you.

Join My Party On This Adventure

I have grown to understand myself much more and have come such a long way. I am much MUCH more emotionally stable, rarely experience anxiety, can talk to and in front of almost anyone, taken steps to not only being healthy, but looking healthy. I feel as though I have officially leveled up, but I have much more levels to go. I want to reach my max level and want YOU to reach your MAX LEVEL HEALTH! Allow me to help you overcome what you may be dealing with when it comes to weight management, anxiety, confidence, and self-esteem.

I greatly appreciate you taking the time to read all of this! Below you can click "Press To Take Survey" to tell me a little bit about yourself. And if you are really ready....and I mean REALLY ready to begin changing your life, then take the first step and click "Press Start To Begin" below to begin your process of learning how we will get your weight loss and/or anxiety relief results!

“If you like nerds, raise your hand. If you don’t, raise your standards.” ― Violet Haberdasher