Seeing Beyond Limits: Laura Bratton on Resilience and Radical Hope

In this deeply moving episode, we explore grief, radical acceptance, the courage to rebuild identity, and what it truly means to find purpose on the path you never planned.

In this episode of Broken Beautiful Me, Kelly sits down with Laura Bratton — author, speaker, coach, and founder of UB Global. Diagnosed with a progressive eye disease at just nine years old, Laura spent her teenage years navigating the devastating emotional reality of losing her sight entirely — going from legally blind to completely blind between ninth and twelfth grade, with no timeline, no formal diagnosis, and no roadmap.

What looked like the end of the life she had imagined became, over time, the foundation for an extraordinary one. Laura went on to graduate from Arizona State University with a BA in Psychology, and became the first blind student to receive a Master of Divinity from Princeton Theological Seminary. She is the author of Harnessing Courage and dedicates her life to coaching and speaking for people navigating grief, loss, and radical life change.

Her message is not about overcoming blindness. It is about the universal human experience of rebuilding yourself from pieces — and discovering that those pieces hold more strength than you ever knew.

In this episode, Laura shares:

🪟 What it was like to lose her sight gradually as a teenager with no timeline and no answers

💔 Why the hardest part wasn't learning new skills — it was believing she was still worthy

🧠 The three steps she used to rebuild confidence and that she now teaches others

🤝 Why receiving support isn't weakness — and why she specifically uses the word trust

😡 The difference between validating sadness and validating anger — and why anger is the harder one

📖 How writing Harnessing Courage was simultaneously healing and deeply painful

🙏 Why gratitude is her anchor — and what real, grounded gratitude actually looks like