2020
The year of stillness and awakening—was also the year of our wedding. Just as the world was shutting down, our new lives were starting—we got married on March 21, 2020. We did not get the dream wedding we had planned for 18 months. In the midst of it all, we still chose each other. We got married on a whim in my parents’ front yard. Click here to read our full love story.
Marrying Miguel was a revolutionary act that led me to starting questioning everything. Why do I believe what I believe? Where did these beliefs come from? were common questions that led to my spiritual awakening.
By September, I had read, watched, inhaled all that I could. I was bursting with information with no outlet.
I was driving out to the river when I heard my intuition very clearly. It said, “You are going to start a podcast and it’s going to be called Grounded Spirits.” Even though I hated the name, I instantly started recording on my voice memo notes. Read the full Grounded Spirits evolution story here.
2021
We bought our first house in Redlands! Belasprii was born right before we moved out of our apartment. It made its debut with the Bel-Esprit Interaction: Balancing Tradition & Progression. Around this time, I also started working on the Chakra Journal but didn’t know anything about publishing and was too embarrassed to be too spiritual so it didn’t get published until the following year.
2022
I spent most mornings outside either talking to God, playing fetch with my two dogs, or spending time in my garden. I downloaded so much information about the cosmos and myself. From April to October, I published ten books through Belasprii.
Miguel started working on Oblivion 99 Fitness, his first gym brand.
2023
In January, PubLish was ideated as a app for changemakers and creatives to meet up.
In April, ILA Institute was born to facilitate my first course “Unleash Your Inner Leader.”
Two years after moving in to the date, we moved back to LA.
I went back to my PhD program to finish my dissertation. I knew I wanted to do something with ILA—integrating intuition and reason. I began by wanting to incorporate every academic subject and all esoteric, occult, spiritual, and indigenous knowledge. Now, they are neatly packed into the terms reason and intuition.
2024
Though I had the intuitive nudge to begin ILA Radio in 2023, it premiered on April 5, 2024, with the introduction to a self-imposed Polymath Challenge.
It was also in 2024 that I began understanding the educational potential of museums and diverted my polymath challenge to a museum challenge. I went to almost all free LA museums.
Grounded Spirits started appearing on YouTube.
2025
We named the whole. The Ornelian was unveiled as the unifying vessel for our life’s work: a living philosophy of luxury, alignment, and legacy.
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