Through the Shadowlands

overcome hidden obstacles to your potential & life satisfaction
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You’ve Done the Work—So Why does it still feel like you’re hitting an invisible wall?

You’ve been to therapy, explored mindfulness, and tried the self-help tools.

Maybe you even guide others in these places.

And yet—something still feels off.

You’re managing the same struggles, looping through cycles of overwhelm, avoidance, or dissatisfaction.

Deep down, you hoped for more—more alive presence, more engagment, more forward movement in how you show up in life, work, and relationships.

But the truth is, most traditional approaches leave out the full picture.

They offer useful insights and tools but often fail to integrate the deeper, generational and existential influences shaping your life. Without addressing these hidden forces, progress feels fragmented, temporary, or out of reach.

How Hidden Patterns Keep You Stuck

You might not see these deeper influences, but you feel them—showing up in ways that don’t make sense for the amount of work you’ve already done:

  • Internal Conflict: You feel torn between competing desires, unsure of what you truly want or how to move forward.
  • Invisible Walls: You know what you need to do, but something stops you—leading to avoidance, self-doubt, or endless busywork.
  • The Weight of Responsibility: You hold everything together, but letting go feels impossible—a classic catch-22.
  • Belonging & Worthiness: You struggle to take up space, to be seen fully, or to feel at home in your relationships or work.
  • A Search for Meaning: Life feels directionless or shallow. Even when you achieve something, the fulfillment never lasts.
  • Persistent Emotions: Anxiety, guilt, sadness, or loneliness linger beneath the surface, even when things seem “fine.”

These aren’t just personal struggles. They are generational imprints and existential dilemmas—hidden patterns that have been shaping your life without your conscious awareness

This Isn’t About Willpower—It’s About What You’re Carrying

You are not broken. You are not failing.

If self-help, mindset shifts, or nervous system work could have shifted this, they would have by now.

The truth? You might be running up against something deeper.
These patterns don’t start with you.

They are generational binds, unprocessed events, and inherited emotional imprints—echoes from your lineage that influence your sense of identity, purpose, and belonging.

That may sound overwhelming. But you don’t have to navigate it alone.

This is the work I do:
Helping people like you uncover the real forces behind these struggles—so you can finally move forward with clarity, strength, and momentum.

Hi, I'm Sara Taylor, PhD.

I help deep thinkers and creatives who feel dissatisfied with life despite years of personal work—especially around anxiety and depression—access more potential, meaning, and momentum.

As a former behavioral neuroscientist, I specialized in understanding how stress impacts mental health.

But over time, I realized that a life worth living isn’t found in symptom management alone—it requires addressing the hidden generational patterns and deeper existential dilemmas that shape our experience and sense of meaning.

Now, I integrate my background in neuroscience with systemic family constellations, existential inquiry, and somatic-energetic techniques to help clients uncover and shift the deeper forces shaping their lives.

THE SHadowlands PROCESS

 

Entering the Shadowlands:  Through generational and personal exploration, we track the unconscious patterns influencing your work, relationships, and sense of purpose. Some are yours. Many were set in motion long before you.

Re-weaving the pattern: Instead of resisting what holds you back, we engage with it directly. Using a blend of 1:1 constellations, somatic practices, and existential inquiry, we create openings where there were once only walls.

Integration & Embodiment: You’ll develop practices to reinforce these shifts,  and learn to meet old patterns without collapsing into them.

Walking Forward (and Circling Back When Needed): This work unfolds over time, often continuing to move for at least a year. Some patterns shift in a few months; others require deeper engagement, depending on the complexity of your family and personal life.

 

Through the shadowlands supports you to clear generational blocks and make sense out of the complexities of life.

Through the Shadowlands guides you through the deep waters of your inner world, making space for you to:

    Insight & Resilience

    • Resolve internal conflicts so you can move forward.
    • Integrate difficult emotions and past experiences, so you can be more present.
    • Enhance adaptability and resilience in facing life’s inevitable changes.
    • Understand yourself and past experiences in ways you may not have experienced before.
    • Free up energy for work and life, creating more flow and less resistance.

    Clarity & Momentum

    • Understand your blocks and patterns with less self-blame and more self-compassion.
    • Cultivate self-trust for clearer, more aligned decision-making.
    • Increase presence and productivity, while reducing anxiety and overwhelm.
    • Connect with a solid sense of drive and purpose, even in uncertain times.
    • Increase your ability to initiate and sustain projects with greater ease.

    Connection & Legacies

    • Shift relationships, whether personal or professional, to a healthier place.

    • Rediscover your place in the world, strengthening connection and belonging.

    • Transform inherited patterns into sources of freedom and strength, creating new possibilities for yourself and future generations.

    • Carry forward new perspectives, changing how you see yourself, your family, and your role in the world

    through the shadowlands Program Details

    • Phase 1: Clarifying and focusing your goals, exploration of your biographical and ancestral history to uncover patterns and the underlying drive of recurrent challenges. (1 month colloborative written process + ancestral research + a roadmap session)
    • Phase 2: Deep work with identified patterns through the tools of Generational & Existential Self-Reclamation.  We maintain focus on your goals as we navigate and transform these challenges into strengths and unblock the stuck places that hold you back. (6 sessions)

    What’s Included in the Five-Month Process:

    • One month of deep exploration (asynchronous, collaborative support to clarify goals, ancestral themes, and biographical patterns).
    •  Seven 75-minute 1:1 sessions to uncover, engage, and shift the patterns holding you back.
    • Ongoing support (five months of email or Voxer access for updates, reflections, and questions).
    • Personalized generational & existential pattern research (up to three hours of my study time, mapping key influences).
    • Resources and supportive practices tailored to help reinforce your insights and integrate new ways of being.

     

    Investment:

    • $2250 ($450/month paid over 5 months)

    Optional Continuation: ongoing three-month containers ($360/month) are available for those continuing the work.

    Client Feedback

    Sara has been like a companion, collaborator, and guide walking me through this work with compassion, understanding and a good sense of humor. 

    Being able to see the connections between events of the past and how they created these patterns that affect how I show up in my life has been really surprising.

    I feel less overwhelm and less controlling and that leaves me open to possibility.  

    This work is a good fit for people who’ve worked with other practitioners and are doing their own work but continue to feel stuck, like they can’t move past something.  

    This falls in the top three of best money I ever spent. 

    Client Feedback

    This work has improved my relationship with my parents. I have a lot more compassion for them and I really truly think I see changes in them from this, which is crazy, and just like their willingness to be more open about things. 

    I can recognize when I’m taking on responsibility for other people, and realize that I am trying to end human suffering by myself and let that go, and be like oh that’s not my job!

    I don’t know how to make that sound as big of a deal as it is in words, because it is a big deal. 

    And I have way more ability to be okay with the fact that people may have thoughts and feelings about that or me but I can just be more confident in myself and what I offer. 

    I am owning a level of confidence that was so unattainable and even impossible to think about. 

    Client Feedback

    I wanted to work with Sara because I thought that maybe some of my life issues could have to do with my ancestors. 

    I learned that my mom’s feelings of helplessness caused me to fix things for her to save her and myself since early childhood and I am practicing to let go of fixing things for her. 

    I most benefited from your perspective on my overzealous loyalty to my parents, versus to myself and my husband, to the point where I was giving up my own happiness for my parents’ sake.

    All of this is helping me to stabilize my emotions.

    The coaching on a regular basis on such hard issues that I was going through helped me because no one else was able to help me work with my pain.

    Ready for to get support navigating the shadowlands?

    The first step is a Shadowlands Consultation, where we’ll explore the patterns keeping you stuck and create a personalized path forward. Through your own reflective writing and our 75 minute 1:1 session, you’ll gain: 

    • Clarity on recurring patterns and challenges in your life.
    • Insight into generational and existential influences shaping your experience.
    • A clear path to help you move forward with greater ease and momentum.

    Beyond quick Fixes:

    This isn’t about temporary relief or quick fixes. It’s a deep process designed to help you uncover and transform the patterns keeping you stuck, so you can move forward with more ease, momentum, and satisfaction.

    Many clients find that the changes initiated here continue to deepen and evolve for months or even years, offering ongoing clarity and resilience.

    While we don’t necessarily “fully resolve” deeply ingrained patterns in a few months, this work equips you with the tools and insight to continue growing long after the program ends.

    This is about changing the trajectory of your inner or outer life. 

     

    Science Meets Spirit:

    Worried this might feel a bit too “out there”? As a former neuroscientist, I combine the rigor of science with deeper explorations of generational and existential patterns.

    Together, we’ll engage in transformative work in a way that’s grounded, approachable, and respectful of your unique experiencese, cultural, and spiritual background.

    Many clients find that, over time, their sense of intuition and self-connection naturally deepens through this work.

    However, this is not for you if you actively engage in dogmatic fundamentalism.

    STRuctured Support for Deep Work

    Diving into the depths of generational themes like life, death, and core emotions such as grief, fear, and anger requires readiness.

    Through the Shadowlands is ideal for those who’ve already done therapy, somatic, or personal development work.

    While change and emotional work can be messy, each session is carefully structured to ensure you leave feeling contained and stabilized. We tackle this work in manageable segments, ensuring the emotional and energetic shifts are within your capacity.

    The program also includes ongoing support, so you don’t feel alone.

    Ready for to get support navigating the shadowlands?

    The first step is a Shadowlands Consultation, where we’ll explore the patterns keeping you stuck and create a personalized path forward. Through your own reflective writing and our 75 minute 1:1 session, you’ll gain: 

    • Clarity on recurring patterns and challenges in your life.
    • Insight into generational and existential influences shaping your experience.
    • A clear path to help you move forward with greater ease and momentum.

    Client Feedback

    I was drawn to work with Sara because she’s been a neuroscientist and combined science with woo, for lack of a better word.

    Client Feedback

    I don’t trust a lot of coaches but I do feel like your background and experience and your openness with it all and my own journey and all the modalities that you’ve played with, made me trust you and want to work with you.

    I like people who can do a variety of things. 

    Client Feedback

    Sara was so incredibly understanding.  Even when things were difficult for me to put into words, she was working with me to verbalize what I was feeling.  

    She is intuitive, sensitive to so many emotional issues, so compassionate, knowledgeable and patient.

    Sara is safe to get deep with.  She is trustworthy and really listens to hear what is going on with someone.  I would almost say, don’t use Sara if you don’t want to get to the issues.

    Frequently Asked questions

    How do I get started?

    I like to do good and efficient work and I’m sure you do too. The best way to know if it is worth investing in this work is to take a little bird’s eye view of things to make sure you have the foundations in place to be successful.

    We do this by starting with the Shadowlands Consultation.

    Based on your written reflection and our 1:1 time I will also be able to make specific recommendations and projections about what is going on, what you might be able to expect and what else you’ll need to do to get what you want.

    If in that session we determine this program is a good fit for you now, you will be invited to sign up.

    If you’ve already done a consultation, you can email me at sara@sarabtaylor.com to initiate the program or to ask any remaining informational questions.

    What is the committment expected of me?

    Early on, there will be some additional time spent doing a bit of genealogical investigation.

    The majority of change is initiated within your sessions, however, there will be practices that come out of many sessions that you’ll want to have the ability to incorporate into your life.  We make them as easy as possible to get down, often they only take a minute or two on a regular basis.

    At the end of sessions, we’ll have time for you to write down the insights (often images or sentences) for you to continue to reflect on and contemplate as you allow them to influence your decisions in life.

    I'm not sure I'm ready for this

    That makes sense.  This is big work and does require that you have some coping tools already.  This is part of what we assess in the Shadowlands Consultation.  

    If you’ve joined my email list you’ll also have access to seasonal single sessions and other low risk opportunities to see if we’re a good fit.

    Trust your gut. It could be that another time is more appropriate or another practitioner. 

    Will this clear all my generational trauma?

    I believe that it is neither your responsibility nor a possibility to clear all your lineage’s trauma.  It’s one of those things that “takes a village”  over many generations, you know?  Instead, we focus on what you want and tackle what’s in your way, because it is the most effective, potent, and rewarding way to go.  What we do in this 6 months is set you up to have experience working with the relevant boulders on your path, so that when you come upon a similar stone later on you know what to do, or can get targeted help if you get stuck.

    Depending on what you want, and how much generational trauma is behind you and how it’s been held, you may want to continue working with beyond this 6 months.  You can do this with single sessions or a 3 month container to help you continue to carry your fate with more ease. 

    What If I've already done ancestral work with you

    If you’ve already completed work with me that involved an extensive ancestral history (previously called “unbound”) I recommend continuation work through a 3 month container or a single continuation session.  

    Just email me at sara@sarabtaylor.com to initiate or ask any informational questions you might have. 

    Do you have a guarantee?

    As someone with a scientific mind, I sure would love to control all the outcomes.

    I work with what is available to be seen in the lineage and that your body and internal wisdom present as ready to be worked with.  Sometimes the route is more circuitous than we might like, but I’m not here to force.  This in and of itself begins to rewrite old trauma patterns around boundary violations and stuck threat responses like freeze.  I do my best to always reflect where we are in a larger change process too, so you know what’s going on.  In addition, one of the first things we do is create milestones or evidence markers to know that what we are doing is having an effect.

    Through this work, you will discover the deeper layers of patterns going on, and will have choices to make that open up new paths.  Sometimes folks don’t want to make those choices and I absolutely respect that. I will support you in your no and your yes.

    So while I can’t make guarantees, we can really make sure it’s a worthy investment with a Shadowlands Consultation.  I can generally get a sense for what kinds of paces we’ll be working with and that helps us to create reality-based expectations for the work.

    And if we start working together and find it really isn’t working or you have a major life change, we can part ways once the time I’ve invested into your case has been compensated.

    who is this a good fit for?

     This is a good fit if most of the following are true:

    • you’ve got some fight left in you.  I can’t make you want something you don’t want.
    • you are able to be honest and not “do the right thing” based on what you think I expect or anyone else.
    • you value the idea of generational healing, connecting with your lineage/ancestors, and leaving a legacy for others
    • you want to deepen the ancestral influence on your calling or profession
    • you are at a relatively stable place in your current relationships.  While some relational conflict is normal and fine, if you’re in the middle of a break-up or divorce we won’t make much headway in other areas, like your career.
    • you are not using this work to make you money and fast.  This is absolutely not a get-rich-quick route.  I’d be highly suspect of anything that claims to be.
    • you are not pregnant or in the 4th trimester, that is not a time for these shifts, with potentially rare exceptions.
    • you have moved past the stage where the only way to feel okay about yourself is to throw your parents under the bus.
    • you do not have a complex personal history of sexual or physical abuse.  This can absolutely be worked with, slowly, over longer periods of time. While I have been trained to work with these dynamics, I recommend that we try smaller steps into the work.  Single seasonal sessions (available if you are on my email list) may be a good place to start. 

    take the first step

    Shadowlands Consultation

    Uncover insights into elusive barriers and ancestral experiences that hold you back, while reassessing your strategies and support to identify why you’re stuck and navigate a way forward.