Compassion Archives - Chantal Breytenbach Coaching

What do you believe you deserve?

In 2024 I led a private coaching group called Living As If You Matter. At the completion of this group, I gave each of the participants a small silver journal. I invited them to treat the journal as a Dreams and Desires Journal and to write down 100 dreams, desires, longings, or wants in it. I also promised each of the participants a complimentary conversation if they wrote down their dreams and desires, and then reached out to me to let me know that they had completed their list.

The other day I invited a client to guess how many women reached out to me after receiving their dreams and desire journals. My client said, “Well I would hope all of them reached out.” I asked her why, and she said that she would have a hard time coming up with a list of 100, and that she hoped someone else had the courage to come up with a list of 100…

My client captured the essence of what I have heard over and over again during the past seven months in conversations with women about thriving. People are struggling to let themselves thrive. Why? It’s very simple really, they don’t believe that they deserve to… […]

What to do when you feel overwhelmed – Take 10…

Posted on March 23, 2026By ChantalPosted in Compassion / Connection / Courage / Emotional Agility / Failure / Fear / Future Self / Happiness / In the muck / Inspiration / Integrity / Leadership / Life / Mindfulness / Mindset / Perfection Detox / Purpose / Resilience / Self-care / Slow down / Thriving

I’m not someone who tends to write about the steps you need to take to overcome something, or fix something, and today I want to talk about something Alison Armstrong shared that landed and resonated deeply. And it’s directly connected to our willingness to let ourselves grow, stretch, and ultimately thrive… So, I hope you will indulge me in sharing with you what you could do if you are currently feeling overwhelmed. […]

What’s the relationships you have with your body?

Posted on March 21, 2026By ChantalPosted in Compassion / Courage / Gratitude / Grit / Happiness / In the muck / Life / Love / Mindfulness / Mindset / Perfection Detox / Perspective / Rejection / Self-care / Thinking / Thriving / Transformation1 Comment

This past weekend I spent time in a workshop with Michael Neill. It was a conversation about health, and it got me thinking about the relationship we have with our bodies. And so today, I want to invite you to consider: what is your current relationship with your body? […]

Will you leave a legacy of surviving or thriving?

Posted on March 15, 2026By ChantalPosted in Commitment / Compassion / Failure / Fear / Future Self / Gratitude / Grief / Happiness / In the muck / Inspiration / Leadership / Life / Love / Meaning / Purpose / Story Matters / Thriving / Transformation

When I was completing my master’s degree, our professor would always talk about living your dash – which was perhaps a not so elegant way to talk about how we choose to spend the time between our date of birth and our date of death.

Today marks the one-year anniversary of my father’s passing, and it has me thinking about how he lived his dash, and how all of us live our dashes. […]

What is Love?

Posted on February 14, 2026By ChantalPosted in Authenticity / Commitment / Compassion / Connection / Life / Love / Meaning / Mindfulness / Mindset / Self-care / Thriving

Today large parts of the world are celebrating Valentine’s Day. I find it so strange that we live in a world where we have commercialised everything to the point that even the most important things in our lives can lose their meaning and significance.

I have always found the idea of Valentine’s Day a little absurd since love cannot be bought or sold. Love is not a commodity. And creating a day where we remind people of their own loneliness, disconnection, and insecurities seems like the opposite of loving to me. It seems almost cruel. I’m not saying don’t appreciate your significant other, but I am questioning why you need a reminder to do that, or why they only get to be seen and celebrated on ONE day of the year.

Love isn’t a feeling either. The feeling you feel when you say that you are in love, is infatuation, desire, or lust. Love, real love, is an ACTION. Love is a way of being in the world. It’s the opposite of judgement. […]

The value of facing our Demons…

Posted on November 12, 2025By ChantalPosted in Compassion / Connection / Courage / Emotional Agility / Failure / Fear / Future Self / Grief / Happiness / In the muck / Inspiration / Integrity / Leadership / Life / Love / Meaning / Mindfulness / Mindset / Perspective / Resilience / Self-care / Slow down / Story Matters / Thriving

I want to start this article a little differently to how I would usually start a post. I want to start by sharing this funny video that captures my evolution with KPop Demon Hunters in 15 seconds. And if you don’t know what KPop Demon Hunters are, welcome to the movement. May it inspire you as much as it has inspired me.

If you are not a fan, that is totally fine too. I feel a little sad for you. And, you don’t need to a be fan, or even have watched the movie, to get value from this article. It’s just my starting point, and it doesn’t need to be yours. So, just hang in here with me for a little bit as I provide some background to why this movie, why this article, and why now? […]

It’s OK if you are NOT OK

Posted on November 2, 2025By ChantalPosted in Commitment / Compassion / Courage / Emotional Agility / Fear / Grief / Grit / In the muck / Integrity / Leadership / Life / Love / Meaning / Mindset / Self-care / Slow down / Thinking

A minor car accident a month ago was a wake-up call for me. It made me pause and had me face the truth of where I am right now. It’s been seven months since my father’s passing. Since then, my mother, my mother-in-law, and my father-in-law have all been ill this year. And the day before my birthday, my aunt passed away. I have felt myself reeling with shock and confusion over the past eight weeks. I wish I could tell you that I was wise and calm during these intense weeks, but I have not been wise and calm. Far from it. I have fallen into old defensive patterns in a futile attempt to make myself feel safe… […]

Are you judging how you are showing up?

Posted on September 15, 2025By ChantalPosted in Compassion / Courage / Decision-Making / Emotional Agility / Failure / Fear / In the muck / Inspiration / Integrity / Leadership / Life / Mindset / Perspective / Self-care / Story Matters / Thinking / Thriving

During the Summer I took a trip to Whistler with my family. Whistler is a town north of Vancouver, British Columbia, that’s home to Whistler Blackcomb, one of the largest ski resorts in North America. People go there to ski in the Winter, and they go there for adventure biking in the Summer. There is a cable-car (gondola) that takes you up Whistler Mountain. Additionally, there is another gondola that takes you between the two peaks of Whistler Mountain and Blackcomb Mountain. This is called the Peak-to-Peak gondola and is an epic ride up the mountain.

Once you are half-way up Whistler Mountain, there is an option to take an open chairlift to the peak of Whistler Mountain. The Peak Express chairlift is your access to the Top of the World Summit, Cloudraker Skybridge and Raven’s Eye Lookout. This chairlift ride is an exhilarating experience that takes you over top of an ancient glacier while cresting over a 100-foot vertical cliff at the top.

I have a morbid fear of falling – not heights, I’m pretty ok with being high up. I’m terrified of falling though, so I don’t like feeling like I might fall. So, going up the mountain in an open chairlift was not an option I was even considering. It was clear in my mind that that was something I could not do… […]

The significance of 9/11

Posted on September 11, 2025By ChantalPosted in Celebrations / Compassion / Courage / Gratitude / Grief / Life / Listening / Love / Meaning / Self-care / Slow down / Story Matters / Thriving

Today, the day that everyone remembers as 9/11, is also my father’s birthday. And I find it fitting that his birthday is on a day that has had such historical significance for those of us who were alive on 11 September 2001. That day started like any other day and so many people did not get to see the end of that day…

And I remember exactly where I was on that day…

This year, on what would have been my father’s 69th birthday, there are three things I’m doing differently that stem directly from deep life lessons learnt in watching my father suffer in his final days and losing him. […]

The Truth about Perfectionism

Posted on August 6, 2025By ChantalPosted in Authenticity / Celebrations / Commitment / Compassion / Courage / Emotional Agility / Failure / Fear / Goals / Gratitude / Grief / Happiness / In the muck / Inspiration / Integrity / Leadership / Life / Love / Meaning / Mindfulness / Mindset / Passion / Perspective / Purpose / Resilience / Slow down / Story Matters / Thriving

In April of this year, I did a thing. With the gentle nudging of my coach, I participated in a professional rebranding photo shoot. The photo shoot took place in the midst of tremendous grief and sorrow. I was still reeling from the shock of my father’s passing. If I’m being honest, I’m still reeling from it now. There are days where the grief of it is so intense that my heart physically aches, and the tears have a valve of their own that cannot be turned off…

And yet, the photos are more real, more authentic, more true than any photos I have ever taken. They reflect someone who is more grounded, more present, more connected to herself, Life, and others. They reflect who I am without any filters or pretense. They are raw and real. They are vulnerable. They are beautiful.

This photo shoot in April was not some spur of the moment, spontaneous event. It was part of a much larger agreement with my coach to start to see myself more clearly, to claim the value of the work that I do, and to realign my brand to clearly reflect that. It was part of a project called “Seeing Myself”.

Why am I sharing this with you, and what does seeing myself have to do with the title of this article? Everything really. When we slow it down… […]