Jessica Amos McElravy: Finding peace, starting with yourself

When Jes­si­ca Amos McEl­ravy’s daugh­ter was born nine years ago, she came to terms with a dif­fi­cult real­i­ty.

In order to give her daugh­ter, Haven, the best she could, she need­ed to do the same for her­self.

So with some help, she addressed her anx­i­ety and the tox­ic things she’d been hold­ing on to. She learned tech­niques to live with­in her own nature and to avoid self-shame.

Now, she guides oth­ers through a sim­i­lar jour­ney through her busi­ness, Stay With Your­self.

At TEDxSalem, Jes­si­ca will share the process she goes through to soothe her anx­i­ety and fears — the dread­ed emo­tions we all have felt. The unique part of Jes­si­ca’s talk is that she will most like­ly be feel­ing those very emo­tions while stand­ing on stage and speak­ing to you.

The thing that stands out when speak­ing with her is that she does­n’t try to ban­ish fear or extin­guish anx­i­ety. In fact, she acknowl­edges them, then finds ways to work around them.

The key, Jes­si­ca says, is to avoid build­ing the neg­a­tive feel­ings even more by judg­ing them.

“Rec­og­niz­ing my needs and pro­vid­ing for my needs is the trick most of the time,” she said. “Tak­ing care of myself is the biggest com­po­nent.”

Jes­si­ca’s ulti­mate goal is to remind her TEDx audi­ence that they are not alone and that they are capa­ble of find­ing inner peace.

If every­body could find that peace, life and the world would be a much bet­ter place.

“I think that’s real­ly good news and def­i­nite­ly worth spread­ing,” she said.

If you want to see Jes­si­ca in per­son, get your tick­ets now at the Elsi­nore The­atre or http://tiny.cc/TEDxSalem.