From “I Disturb People” to Finding Her Voice: Lucia Engel’s Story of Becoming

April 29, 2026

Watch the full Story of Becoming in the Living in Harmony Community here: https://www.facebook.com/share/p/17fimioBks/

There are beliefs we carry so quietly that we don’t even realize they are shaping the way we experience life. For Lucia Engel, one of those beliefs began very early. Not because anyone directly told her she should not exist… because of how life felt.

Growing up in Holland, Lucia’s world looked calm and stable from the outside. There was a beautiful neighborhood, good schools, nature, and loving moments within the family.

But underneath the surface, there was emotional tension between her parents that her nervous system absorbed deeply, and important life quality and direction giving guidance was missing. This meant the relational landscape was chaotic and tension always present. She describes her home as “not doing emotions”.

Nothing felt fully safe. There was love… and then distance. Connection… and then disconnection.

Over time, Lucia adapted and became highly aware of everyone else’s emotions. She was careful, observant and responsible for harmony.

And somewhere beneath it all, she formed a painful belief: “If I exist… I disturb.”

At the same time, another part of her knew something was not right. She loved feeling life deeply.

The warmth of the sun, the birdsong, nature, good food, creativity, and beauty.

Even as a child, she sensed there had to be more than survival, emotional disconnection, and people-pleasing. So she spent years searching: therapy, sports, groups, religion, and self-development - trying to understand why she felt disconnected from herself and others.

The real turning point however, came through a question: “If you only had a short time left to live… what would you truly want to experience?”

For Lucia, the answer arrived immediately. She wanted creativity. Freedom. Travel. Nature. Connection with people and cultures. She wanted life.

At twenty-six, she booked a one-way ticket to Guatemala. And something inside her began to open.

In Guatemala, Lucia came alive creatively. She became a jewelry designer, opened a shop, connected with artisans, and built a beautiful artistic life surrounded by color, culture, and expression.

At one point, pieces from her jewelry collection were even featured in a Frida Kahlo exhibition at the Denver Museum.

From the outside, it looked like freedom. But internally, the deeper emotional patterns she carried had not yet healed.

Lucia entered a relationship that mirrored the emotional instability she had experienced growing up. The relationship became painful, unsafe, and emotionally abusive.

Still, she stayed. Because survival patterns often feel familiar.

Then her daughter was born. And everything changed.

Lucia describes realizing one day that the light in her daughter’s eyes was beginning to dim in the same way her own had years earlier. That moment broke something open inside her.

“This stops here.”

Leaving was not simple. It required enormous courage, awareness, and emotional rebuilding. But Lucia knew she could no longer continue repeating the same pattern into the next generation.

And slowly, she began creating something different. Not perfection. Not fantasy. Not performance - Safety.

For herself. For her daughter. For her future.

And this became the true beginning of her healing journey.

Lucia began understanding that she had spent much of her life adapting, pleasing, minimizing herself, and disconnecting from her own voice in order to survive emotionally.

For the first time, she started asking different questions:

·What do I actually feel?

·What do I want?

·What feels safe?

·What feels true?

And through meditation, nervous system awareness, creativity, storytelling, and deep self-inquiry, Lucia slowly reconnected with herself in a new way. She discovered that emotions were never the problem - disconnection was.

She describes emotional awareness as something essential to being fully human, almost like one of the senses. Without emotional connection, people lose connection to themselves, to others, and to life itself.

That realization eventually became the foundation for the work she now offers in the world.

Today, Lucia leads the Soul Spark community and facilitates Voice Lab - a trauma-informed creative space where people reconnect with their voice, emotions, creativity, and authentic expression through storytelling, imagination, embodiment, and safe connection.

Her work is not about performance. It is about remembering - Remembering who you are beneath the survival patterns. Remembering what you love. Remembering how to feel safe enough to speak, create, and fully exist.

Throughout the conversation, Lucia returns often to the importance of creativity. Not as something reserved for artists…but as something deeply human:

·The smell of pasta cooking.

·The feeling of sunlight through trees.

·Music.

·Color.

·Conversation.

·Beauty.

To Lucia, these are not small things. They are signs of being alive. And perhaps most beautifully of all, she shares that the relationship with her daughter today is completely different from the one she experienced growing up.

They laugh together. Talk openly. Spend time together willingly. The generational pattern shifted. Not because Lucia became perfect… but because she became present.

Her story is not about becoming someone entirely different. It is about reclaiming the parts of herself that were always there beneath fear, adaptation, and survival. And in sharing her story, Lucia offers something many people quietly need to hear: You are not ’too much’. You are not wrong for feeling deeply. And your voice is not something you must earn.

Sometimes becoming begins with one quiet realization:

You no longer have to disappear in order to belong.

Connect with Lucia at: www.luciaengel.com and https://www.facebook.com/groups/soulsparkhere