“Reclamation isn’t about becoming someone new. It’s about uncovering the person who has been there all along.”
Audra Phelps
Featured Guest: Audra Phelps, M.Sc.
Neuroscience-Based Coach | Creator of RECLAIMED | Certified Hypnotherapist | Director of an International School | Mom of Three | Former Mormon
For many women leaving high-demand religion, the hardest part isn’t walking away from the institution. It’s discovering who they are after they’ve left.
That is the work Audra Phelps has dedicated her life to.
A former member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, Audra spent more than a decade wrestling with questions that challenged the beliefs she had built her life upon. After leaving the church in 2015, she found herself facing a new question—one that many people encounter after any significant life transition:
Who am I now?
Today, Audra is a leader in neuroscience-based coaching for former Mormon mothers. Through her signature RECLAIMED program, she helps women move beyond guilt, perfectionism, and inherited expectations with the goal of guiding them in the rebuilding of their identities with intention. Drawing on her background in education, child development, neuroscience-based coaching, and hypnotherapy, she provides women with practical tools, structured guidance, and a supportive community for lasting transformation.
Learn more: mamaaudra.com
When "Doing Everything Right" Doesn't Feel Right
From the outside, Audra’s life appeared to be exactly what she had been taught it should be.
She married.
She raised three children.
She served her church faithfully.
She followed the roadmap.
Essentially, by every outward measure, she was succeeding. Yet beneath the surface, another story was unfolding.
Anxiety.
Depression.
Irritability.
A growing feeling that despite doing everything she had been told would bring happiness, something was fundamentally out of alignment.
During our conversation on The Next Baseline, Audra described it not as a single breaking point, but as a slow erosion. And that description immediately resonated with me.
Within the C2R2E Framework, people often imagine Collapse as a dramatic event—a divorce, a job loss, or a public failure.
Sometimes it is.
Yet, more often, Collapse begins quietly. It starts as an internal whisper that eventually becomes too loud to ignore.
The First Clue Wasn't in Her Mind. It Was in Her Body.
One of the most compelling parts of my conversation with Audra centered on something many people overlook. Which is that the body often recognizes misalignment before the mind can explain it.
For Audra, anxiety was not simply something to silence or eliminate. It became information.
A signal.
An invitation to pause and ask whether the life she was living still reflected the woman she truly was becoming. And that insight reaches far beyond faith transitions.
Our bodies often reveal stress, tension, and inner conflict long before we can clearly name the source.
Listening does not mean jumping to conclusions. It means becoming curious enough to ask better questions.
“Sometimes the life that’s falling apart isn’t failing. It’s making room for one that’s finally aligned.”
The Courage to Question
Leaving a high-demand religion is not merely a change in beliefs.
It is the unraveling of an entire operating system.
For Audra, moving overseas became an unexpected catalyst. Surrounded by people from different cultures, religions, and worldviews, she began to see something that challenged assumptions she had carried for decades.
People outside her faith were not broken.
They were not lost.
They were building meaningful, joyful, deeply human lives.
That realization did not answer every question overnight. But it did something just as powerful.
It gave her permission to begin asking them.
And often, that is where real transformation begins.
Not with certainty. But with curiosity.
Reclamation Is Built, Not Found
One of my favorite moments during our discussion came when Audra described creating a family mission statement.
Without an institution prescribing every value and every decision, she and her family intentionally chose the principles that would guide their lives.
That, to me, perfectly captures the essence of Reclamation.
It isn’t simply removing old beliefs.
It’s replacing them with values you intentionally choose.
Identity isn’t discovered by accident. It’s built through repeated choices that align with who you want to become.
Community Changes Everything
One fear accompanies nearly every major transition.
“If I leave…who will I have left?”
Audra understands that fear personally. She spoke candidly about losing a built-in community while discovering something far more meaningful.
Relationships based on acceptance instead of performance.
Connection instead of conformity.
Grace instead of constant evaluation.
Those communities became part of her healing. Which for Audra, served as a reminder that transformation rarely happens in isolation.
People need people. Not to tell them who to become—but to create the safety that allows them to become themselves.
The Conversation Beyond Mormonism
Although our discussion centered on Audra’s experience leaving the Mormon faith, neither of us believes these lessons belong only to one community.
Every day, people leave careers.
Marriages.
Military service.
Businesses.
Identities they have carried for decades.
The details differ, but the human experience does not. And eventually, we all face moments when the old version of ourselves no longer fits.
The question then becomes:
What do we build next?
It is that question that sits at the heart of both Audra’s work and the C2R2E Framework. Not how to survive change. But how to intentionally create a stronger next baseline.
Final Thoughts
Audra Phelps’ story isn’t simply about leaving a religion. It’s about reclaiming authorship over your own life.
It’s about recognizing that inherited identities, while meaningful for a season, don’t have to define the rest of your story. Most importantly, it’s a reminder that transformation isn’t reserved for extraordinary people. It’s available to anyone willing to confront what no longer fits, realign with their deepest values, reclaim who they truly are, and continue growing toward their next baseline.
Listen to the Full Conversation
This article captures only part of Audra’s remarkable journey.
In our full episode of The Next Baseline, we explore identity reconstruction, emotional regulation, parenting after faith transition, neuroscience, community, and how the C2R2E Framework intersects with real-world transformation.
Listen to the full episode below.
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About the Author - Danny DeJesus
Danny De Jesus is a transformational resilience thought leader, strategic thinker, and the founder of Elevatus Coaching—a practice built to help people rebuild their lives after major change. Drawing from his own experiences with divorce, co-parenting, and career shifts, he created the C2R2E Framework to guide people from collapse to elevation with clarity and confidence. Through the Elevatus Blog, he shares insights for anyone navigating disruption, rebuilding direction, or shaping a new chapter with purpose.