Strength is Rooted in Mental Health
Friday, April 30th at 4:00pm
Mental strength is invisible because our inner voice is invisible. Our scars are very often invisible. Our shame is invisible. The masks we wear protect us from the world, but the shame and pain we suppress dismantle our strength. Our mental health relies on our choice to heal our scars, embrace our humanity and understand that embodying vulnerability is our power.
Exploring how we speak to ourselves, can allow us to see our relationship with ourselves. Through this process, we can begin to heal destructive communication and strengthen our mental health.
About Christina Helena
Christina Helena is a speaker, writer/performer and founder of My Scar is Sexy, based in New York City. She is redefining and modernizing the stigma behind trauma and pain with one simple thought: Your scar is the sexiest thing about you. At nineteen years old, she became one of the youngest Pancreatic Cancer survivors in the world and four months later she graduated with her bachelor’s degree in Communication Arts from Marymount Manhattan College.
Christina knows the physical and emotional toll that our scars have on our self-worth and ability to love ourselves. Given six months to live Christina asked herself: “What do you want more, your potential or to run away from the pain?” What does it take to not become the imprint of what happened? Against all odds, she trusted her intuition when she was nineteen years old. It saved her life.
Christina trained at LAMDA, The London Academy of Music & Drama where she earned a Master of Fine Arts in Classical Performance. A couple years later, she studied philosophy and theology at the University of Philosophical Research earning a Master of Science in Consciousness Studies. She offers a refreshing and captivating take on the soul, trauma, mental health and consciousness from a philosophical perspective.
Her experience and studies of consciousness and classical performance birthed SCAR, an autobiographical solo show currently in development for an off-Broadway production, to be directed by the award-winning director Larry Moss. SCAR is about the cycle of violence and the choice each individual has to become the reflection of their trauma or the choice to discover the Self. Forty-characters. One woman. One stage.
Most recently, Christina’s talk, “My SCAR is Sexy” from the Momentum Conference was featured on Goalcast where it received 8 million views. Her TEDx talk, “Dear Unresolved Soul, It’s Not Death You Fear, It’s Life,” given at the TEDxSouthLakeTahoe event, is about facing mortality and how death is the greatest catalyst to discovering the authentic self.
As a highly sought-after speaker on mental health, identity, resilience and personal development she is helping others reprogram their thoughts and identity that have been shaped by trauma. My Scar is Sexy is about ownership of our experiences, trauma and stories without shame. Her talks are filled with raw authenticity, truth and passion. Her blog, My SCAR is Sexy is a bi-weekly reminder that we are human.