Karen Chaston says being made redundant was the “best thing” that’s happened to her.
After being retrenched from her role as the CFO of a publicly-traded company, she joined BraveHeart Women, a global community that encourages connection, expression and prosperity, all aimed at inspiring women to better create and collaborate together.
Previously just an online community, BraveHeart now has 400,000 members and provides tools to assist women around the globe. Chaston decided to work with BraveHeart Women after realising women are too often required to act like men in the corporate world.
“Within two weeks of being made redundant I got an email from Ellie Drake, the founder of BraveHeart Women, about a conference [an event in LA]. I’d been getting these emails for four years, so I decided, ‘I’m going!
“Those four days were totally amazing. It was women collaborating with each other out of our non-judgemental nature. I thought, ‘this is how women should connect, not trying to be men!'”
Following the conference Chaston was inspired to become a BraveHeart Women resonator and now leads events for BraveHeart in Australia in the hope of inspiring other women.
“We provide the tools so women can come out of adrenalin and truly embody their feminine energy, and access our masculine energy,” she explains. “You need to have that masculine energy to create and get ahead, but we shouldn’t live in it.”
Since becoming a resonator for BraveHeart, Chaston says she has learnt to better understand other women and why she needs to help others find a voice.
“I have to say, I just love the women that I have met and [are often] the women who used to annoy of me: The woman who doesn’t have a voice, that puts themselves last. I used to think, ‘Would you toughen up!’ Stop whinging and speak up and ask for it’,” she says.
“But now I totally understand it. They don’t have the tools to do it. That’s what I love about BraveHeart. I can help all sorts of women and help them to find their voice. Teaching women they can have the jobs they want without burning out. With my corporate background I’ve seen so many women burnout.”
This year Chaston helped launch a local BraveHeart Women community in Sydney.
“We learn what our fears are – our mind fears and our body fears – and how to embrace them and embody female energy so we have our female and male energy in alignment,” she says.
“I have been connecting all over Australia. The ultimate aim is for every female to do that transformation. We waste so much time on crap. Once you get rid of all that and you actually truly love yourself, have total self-awareness and self-acceptance, that’s when you can truly collaborate with other women.”