Welcome. I get it.

Hi everyone. I’m Casey Salminen.  I want you to know, I get it. For the last 20 years I’ve attended the Master Class of Grief.

• I’ve  buried loved ones.
• Moved across the country and started over five times in five different states.
• Survived cancer.
• Left jobs I’ve loved by my choice and others not by my choice.
• I’m the mother of 5, Grammy of 4, lover of beagles, books and black and white movies.
• Join me on the way at Blessed & Inspired where we remember, learn and grow through the loss.

I founded Blessed & Inspired because women kept approaching me, “How do you do this? I gotta tell you…I’m hanging by a thread here. How do you do this? How do you smile and keep your composure?” Ladies & gentleman, that is what we do at Blessed & Inspired. We make the journey with you. In a world where the glass is half full, we look at through the prism of faith, family and fun. Blessed & Inspired is a new way to handle the difficult in your life. We do it together two by two with gratitude, optimism and hope.

Please stop by and take a few moments to sit still long enough to take a new direction. Create a new path…one filled with opportunity and promise. Don’t settle for the life you have…build a life that matters-with meaning and purpose.

Join us ON THE WAY, where the journey is slow, the friends are fabulous and the laughter is real.

Hard stuff happens to good people.

I remember my grandmother, saying “We’ve got it pretty good.” She meant it.

The woman lived in a 600 sq foot home in St Louis. 1 bedroom, 1 bath on $326.00 a month. There were no dinners out ever or afternoons at the movies. The woman was widowed at 46, with 10 kids, 7 at home. She ended up burying 4 of those children.

Yet when you visited her…she was ALL SMILES. She rose above her circumstances. She greeted you with a smile & a hot cup of coffee eager to show you the family bulletin board, with pictures of cousins far and near. I loved seeing those pictures on her wall…my picture on her wall. It meant I belonged and “had people”. Over coffee she told us stories about the 1929 crash, the Depression, 1941 & the bombing of Pearl Harbor and the day Kennedy was shot. What did she do? She poured the coffee, made the biscuits and just kept going.

What about you?

What do you do when you get really bad news? How do you handle it?

Do you go inward or outward? Withdraw or text all your friends?

Some of us do those things…some of us take it a step deeper to forget that pain. We stew & fret, we lose sleep. We ditch any semblance of taking care our our own physical, emotional or financial needs. We will do anything to be “busy”, work, shop, gather or go. We click that site and charge the credit card, stress out and stress eat.

According to WebMD, heart disease, asthma, obesity, diabetes, headaches, depression, Alzheimer’s, accelerated aging and even premature death caused by extended stress.

Blessed & Inspired gives you the tools and provides you with the community to deal with the stress brought on by grief and loss. The pain is so deep and so numbing, it is hard to remember who we are in the struggle. It is a club that none of us wanted to belong to…it is a club that no one wants to join. The #NOT-IT CLUB or #THE ISLAND OF MISFIT TOYS. Take your pick, you get the picture. Still, as one dear friend, a Cancer Survivor, told me when I was diagnosed with cancer, “You wouldn’t wish it on your worst enemy, and once you get on the other side of it…you wouldn’t trade it for the world.