About the Contributor
This story was written by Larisa Vakulina, shared as part of The Impactful Voice Project™ — One Voice. Infinite Impact.™
Larisa Vakulina is a transformational mentor, healer, and founder of Askara Sanctuary, guiding others to reclaim their power through energy alignment and self-sovereignty. Drawing from lived experience, she helps women heal, awaken, and lead with authenticity and inner truth.
🔸 Category: Survivor | Creator | Entrepreneur
🔸 Country: Australia
🔸 Connect: https://larisavakulina.com
“Empowerment is not becoming more. It is remembering the wholeness you already are.”
-Larisa Vakulina
I still remember the day when my life as I knew it ended.
My husband pulled the car to the side of the road, and my heart knew before his words confirmed it. Our home, the place where my two young boys and I had shared laughter, stories, and daily rituals, had been robbed and burned to the ground. In an instant, everything I called familiar was gone.
What I felt in that moment was not just grief, but the terrifying pull of the unknown. That night, while sitting in the car, we made the decision to leave Russia for a faraway continent we barely knew, Australia. It was not an easy choice. We had built a life, accumulated wealth, and started a generational home. But when safety dissolves, priorities crystallize. We jumped from the cliff of familiarity into an ocean of uncertainty, guided only by the instinct to protect our children and create a life where violence and corruption could not dictate our future.
Looking back now, that was the first time I tasted true empowerment. Not because I was fearless, but because I chose to act from the deepest part of myself, despite fear screaming otherwise.
Feeling Unempowered
Empowerment is rarely linear. When I arrived in Australia, my degree in Engineering and Economics was not recognized. I was 33, with limited English, two children to raise, and no career path. Later, when I completed an MBA at the University of Adelaide, I thought my qualifications would secure me a professional role. Instead, I was told I was “overqualified.” Too much. Too different.
Yet in that moment of rejection, I discovered an untapped strength, an inner authority that refused to wait for permission and instead chose to create its own path. I felt a knowing that if no one could see my worth, I would prove it by building something extraordinary from the ground up.
Externally, I was climbing, running an international trading company that became one of the fastest growing businesses in Australia, serving as an advisor on the Reserve Bank’s Small Business Panel, and receiving awards for entrepreneurship. But inwardly, I was shrinking. Every title I acquired, every award I received, only deepened the void inside.
That is the paradox many high-achieving women face: the more we achieve, the more invisible we feel to ourselves. I looked successful on paper, but at night I battled insomnia, emptiness, and the relentless whisper that something was missing.
Then came the ultimate confrontation with powerlessness, my diagnosis with breast cancer.
It stripped away every illusion of control I thought I had mastered. Yet, what began as fear became my greatest teacher. It forced me to stop striving and start listening. It invited me into a space of surrender, curiosity, and humility, where I had to face every “unknowing” question that my intellect had avoided for decades.
Cancer was not a punishment. It was a profound initiation. It dismantled the woman I had performed as and revealed the woman I truly was, raw, intuitive, and infinitely wise beneath the noise of achievement. It became the threshold where I began to understand that true empowerment is not about fighting life but choosing it and aligning with it.
Who Empowered Me
Empowerment rarely comes from grand gestures. For me, it came in small but sacred ways. My husband’s quiet presence when chaos raged around us. My children, who picked up English faster than I did and became my teachers. And later, Barbara Ann Brennan, whose work on the human energy field spoke to me like a long-forgotten truth.
But perhaps the most profound empowerment came through my illness. Breast cancer became my guide. It slowed me down enough to hear my own soul whisper. It taught me to become deeply curious not just about how to survive, but how to live in alignment with truth.
When I asked not why it happened, but what it was showing me, I began to see the deeper ecology of my own being and how stress, disconnection, and
overachievement had been speaking through my body all along. That realization became the compass that led me to heal myself through surrender, energy coherence, and the restoration of inner truth.
I choose to heal naturally, without any medical intervention. The choice that confronted all. But I knew and followed! I turned inward, listened to my body, and allowed my intuition to lead. I surrounded myself with nature, silence, and the language of energy. I learned to read the subtle messages of my body and to respond with compassion rather than fear. That process taught me that healing is not something that happens to us, it is something that unfolds through us when we chose life, return to harmony with our soul’s and body’s intelligence.
And in the deepest hours of that healing journey, I understood the great paradox of life, that we always have two choices: Life or Death. One choice is to live from our truth, from the soul that knows, from the well of inspiration that continually regenerates, sustains, and expands our consciousness and creative force, allowing us to contribute beauty and love to the world. The other is to suppress that voice, to obey the noise of others’ demands, instructions, and expectations, draining our life force and disconnecting from our potential and life task. I choose Life, not as survival, but as a conscious act of devotion to my soul’s purpose.
Enrolling in the Barbara Brennan School of Healing in Florida was the next natural step. Unlike my MBA, which was chosen by my intellect, this was chosen by my essence, by heart. Those years of study cracked me open, showing me that empowerment was not about more titles or accolades, but about reclaiming the fragments of myself I had abandoned in pursuit of approval.
When Leadership Went Wrong
There were times I led poorly, though on the surface it looked like success.
In business, I became a Master of Performance, negotiating, expanding, and making our company thrive. But I ignored my intuition, my body, and my emotional truth. I sacrificed sleep, health, and relationships in the name of achievement.
I wore the armour of the “strong woman,” believing that to show vulnerability would invite disrespect. That armour eventually became a prison. I was exhausted, brittle, and disconnected, admired by many, but known by none, including myself.
When Leadership Went Right
And yet, there were moments of true self-authority and leadership. They always happened when I chose my life and authenticity over performance.
When I followed my quiet inner practice, what I call “Follow the First Thought”, I found clarity. It was a simple daily ritual of sitting in silence, breathing, and catching the first thought after three exhales. “Call your sister.” “Rest.” “Write.” “Finish slides.” These whispers, when followed, opened pathways I could never have planned. They were small acts of obedience to my inner compass and inner state that restored my power.
In my MBA, I discovered that my accent, once a source of shame, made my classmates listen more attentively. What I thought was a weakness became a gift. Later, in building Askara Sanctuary and THE ASKARA PRINCIPLES™ methodology, I learned to lead not from force but from resonance, weaving my healing journey into a space where other women could find theirs.
True leadership, I realized, is not about knowing more than others, instruct, control, performance and deadlines. It is about coherence. It is about leading yourself so fully that others feel safe to lead themselves.
Top 3 Tips to choose Life:
Take radical self-responsibility. Stop compromising and outsourcing your freedom to external systems or people. Your power is in total self-honesty and the choices you make daily from that place.
Trust your individuation point, I call ID. Your essence is your unique truth. No title, role, or accolade defines you more than your inner knowing. You are the best expression of this divine plan, as each and every one is.
Nurture relational ecology. Empowerment is amplified when your relationships are grounded in respect, honesty, and mutual growth. When we learn to build ecology of relationships, we rid of any comparison and competition, we begin to create freely and effortlessly.
Final Thoughts
When I left Russia, I thought empowerment was about building a safe, successful and wealthy life. What I’ve learned is that empowerment is about listening, truly listening, to the quiet inner voice that knows the way. True empowering is to know the self, deep enough to see clearly how you want to live your life, express your true self and share your inner genius.
Every woman carries her own Askara within, her inner resonance, her divine compass. Empowerment is not about chasing more, proving more, or performing harder. It is about choosing to trust that compass, even when the path ahead looks uncertain.
I invite you, dear reader, to pause. To breathe. To listen. And to follow your first thought, that first whisper that rises when you are still. It may look small, but it holds the seed of your sovereignty.
Empowerment begins here.
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Larisa Vakulina is a multi-award-winning entrepreneur, healer, and founder of Askara Sanctuary in South Australia. With an MBA from the University of Adelaide and studies at Harvard Business School, she built one of Australia’s
fastest-growing international trading companies before devoting her life to guiding women into soul-led success.
A graduate of the Barbara Brennan School of Healing, Larisa created The ASKARA PRINCIPLES™ methodology, a transformational method that integrates business acumen, emotional intelligence, and spiritual mastery. Having self-healed from breast cancer without any medical protocols and rebuilt after profound loss, she embodies the essence of resilience, grace, and conscious evolved leadership.
