Wow, I never thought I would ever arrive at this place in my life where I could joyfully, authentically and truthfully accept myself for all that God designed and created ME to be. Becoming the person or bearing the fruit that God created to emanate from my seed design or brand blueprint has been no easy task. In fact becoming me was a very long and hard 53-year journey and I actually just turned 53, 23 days ago today-6/13/2023). To arrive at this place I have traveled through and experienced 53 years of ups, downs, confusion, depression, turmoil, pseudo victories and colossal defeats. However, the one thing that has remained consistent and steady in my life is Jesus. My problems never started with Jesus, but He was always ready and willing to jump into the dirt with me and do the heavy lifting to set me free. I can gladly admit now that the problem between He and me was always ME. My lack of understanding, faith, trust and real love kept me settling for mediocrity and Christ didn’t die for the me I was creating.
The eye opener came when God introduced me to my 4 M’s and the reality that He had called, created and died for me to become the authentic brand that He had in His mind when He formed Me in my mothers womb (Jeremiah 1:5). The more focused I became on His word, the more I desired to become all of ME and God was ready and willing to do in me what I needed to become WHO I was, WHOSE I was, WHAT I was and to show me WHERE He destined me to arrive at the conclusion of this earth journey (MISSION). He was also eager to help me uncover my WHY (MOTIVES), so that when the going got rough I would learn lean on my real motivation. Uprooting all of my self limiting beliefs would be the key to the development of my real gifts, talents and skills (METHODS). It was crazy how the enemy had planted so many weeds in me that I didn’t know what was good about me. It would take the gentle hand of the Father to put me back together again. Lastly, I learned that my forecasted goals and the fruit I was bearing were completely and totally out of alignment with God’s plan. As a matter of fact God showed me that I had fallen in love with fake fruit and that wasn’t pleasing to Him. He wanted my goals and His goals to be in alignment and they weren’t. I was celebrating when He wasn’t and I was crying over things that made Him smile. He worked hard to align His plans and mine so that my forecasted and realized fruit were perfectly aligned with His plan, ways and timing (METRICS). My 4M’s Blueprint would lead to the uncovering of His game plan for my life and I wanted all of the smoke. I was ready to allow God to Make My Brand.
To tell the story actually, the making of my brand began in Elk Grove, California on, Wednesday, December 5, 2018. I had flown in that afternoon from Southern, Ca for the Tapestry Network Christmas event. Ironically, I was experiencing this weird sadness before the night even got started. I believe God was preparing me for the breakdown that was about to occur. As soon as the event speaker, Jackie The Street Preacher, began to share her testimony that evening my whole life got flipped and turned upside down. I was so triggered by her story that I had a very public breakdown. God had brutally exposed my very fractured root system. Even though I had been in a very committed relationship with Jesus, there was some fake fruit on my tree and weeds that were preventing me from bearing the real fruit that I had been created to bear. I needed to be Rooted and Rebooted, but I didn’t even know what that was or that I would be the one that would create it. I needed to Know Myself, I needed to Own My Choices and I needed to Become My Own Champion and only God knew the plans that He had designed to make that happen for me (Jeremiah 29:11). All He was asking me to do was surrender to the His process and quit accepting mediocrity as a way of life. I chose to allow God to Rescue ME, Rehabilitate ME, Redesign, Reinvent, and Reimagine ME. When He was finished with the R’s He started in with the B’s. I stepped into the second semester of Rooted and Rebooted, confident that I had learned to BE content with exactly who I was and where I was, but I knew I wanted more. Next, God and I began to BUILD the life that I and He truly desired for me. He surrounded me with spiritual sisters, mothers, friends, and parents to help me shoulder the load of my cross. He gave me safe places where the real ME could BELONG like The Tapestry Network. There I was finally surrounded by a community that accepted me exactly where I was and wasn’t turned off by my growth and development process.
The Tapestry women lovingly empathized, understood and supported me. Lastly, God and His people helped me to BECOME the me that is now the face of the Unite and Change the World Together movement, the CEO of SLB Enterprise, President and board member of the US Circle of Global Business Women’s Network, CCO of The Platform and founder of Shawnyvale Global Community’s, Rooted and Rebooted, SLB Global Media and TV. All of those methods were living down on the inside of me waiting to bloom and now I can enthusiastically and proudly say that I AM finally ME and ME is ENOUGH!
-Shawn L. Brown
