By: Sabriya Dobbins, Founder of Project Passport

“Don’t worry about the big picture logistics, just focus on the end of the day each day. That is what I did. Your only job is to get through the end of the day.” 

Such positivity flowed through the voice of Author, Speaker, and Psychotherapist, Tara Miller as she shared her unspeakable story of tragedy and triumph. As people, we often feel like life events will take us out and we will not be able to bounce back. Tara is adamant in the self-regulation work she teaches, whereas she urges people to lean into the hardships and understand that they are building a form of resilience that is unshakable. 

“I grew up privileged. I was a white girl in Canada with married parents living a lower middle class life,” Tara reflects. She distinctly remembers the only major problem she faced was her own personal health concerns. Despite the many surgeries and illnesses, she experienced as a child, she felt a deep sense of optimism inside. 

Being a dancer, she remembers giving some of the most amazing performances of her life filled with sheer confidence, but by the time the curtain closed, she was coughing and wheezing, gasping for an inhaler. No matter what, she was defiant to her illness and she knew that she was built to live a full life. 

After graduating college and creating the cookie cutter life that she thought she was supposed to live, Tara found herself in a job she did not like and in a toxic marriage with a husband who abused alcohol. With her two young children in tow, she became a 34 year-old single mom.

Life took a turn for the worse. Not only was she suffering financially from being a divorced, single mother, but she experienced two horrific car accidents and barely survived a life-threatening MRSA infection. Before long, her 3-year old experienced severe health issues resulting in a leukemia scare. 

She started therapy and was introduced to the world of “self-regulation” where she would begin to learn how to control her nervous system through systematic techniques. This treatment was life changing for her but just when Tara thought life would be back on track, her ex-husband committed suicide. This suicide was so brutal because it left her with a foreclosed home and almost $100,000 in debt. 

The following Christmas, she would spend with her children at a food bank feeling defeated. Hope slowly began to return when she won lawsuit money from her car accident allowing herself to attend graduate school. She knew exactly what she wanted to do: To help people find light in the darkness like she did, and without the help of medication. 

One month before graduation, the new love of her life she had met died tragically in a motorcycle accident. Determined to finish her grad school period strong in spite of this loss, she presented her final projects, in between secret panic attacks in the bathroom- regathering composure, doing it again, and repeating until she finished that last month graduating with distinction.  Because of the earlier work she had done, she was able to bend, without breaking, despite this last trauma feeling like it was the worst. 

“When you are out of the ashes you get perspective. Anyone going through a tough time… even though it feels like is going to last forever, it won’t,” she states.

Today, after 8 years in private practice, Tara is on a sabbatical writing her second book and creating magic in the lives of others. Her children are thriving and she could not be more proud for what life has to offer. 

“Pick your time to make it through each time of day. 100% of people make it. If you know hard times are happening, know that your resilience is being built,” says Tara.

Project Passport is proud to announce that Tara will be leading our Costa Rica Resilience Retreat in March 2021. Learn more at project-passport.com/wellness-travel-retreats

Learn more about Tara at: Taradawnmiller.com

Download her E-Book: The Resilient Mind

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Project Passport is a proactive mental wellness company that aims to bring mental wellness retreats, workshops and other services to company teams. We also help women create joy in their lives every step of the way. To learn more about our company retreats and services, click here. To learn more about our tribe community for women, click here. Our travel retreats will resume in the future as the world reopens.