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Kelly Beaubien had always considered herself a strong woman. She had stood by her 12-year-old’s side after having open-heart surgery. She had supported her beloved Dad through cancer twice. She thought she could handle almost anything.

But when her 15-year marriage ended, she felt her own strength falter with the pressure and emotions of it all.

As she stood at her stove to cry, thinking her kids couldn’t see her, Kelly’s 10-year-old daughter Luciana looked her in the eye and said to her something she’ll never forget: “You just have to be brave, Momma, a lot of people go through this,” she said, “You’re just going to have to do this.”

It was then that Kelly realized that she had to dig deep within herself to build the resilience to get down the path that lay before her. “When you have kids looking at you in the eye every morning, you can’t spiral,” she remembers.

From there, Kelly made a conscious effort to build her resilience back. Through her faith, her relationships with her tight-knit family, and finding ways to ground herself, Kelly began to feel the days get less challenging to get through and that she had more strength in her than she thought.

What is resilience?

To Kelly, resilience is all about bouncing back and coming back stronger from life’s inevitable obstacles. It’s the ability to pick yourself up, dust yourself off, and move forward, even when things are hard.

There is a Finnish word sisu, which can’t be directly translated to an English word but is understandable in concept. Sisu can be roughly translated as “strength of will, determination, perseverance, and acting rationally in the face of adversity.” It’s not just about being brave in the moment, but the ability to sustain that courage. 

Part of building and sustaining courage and resilience is being able to find joy around you, even when things are tough. Kelly admires that the Finnish way of life embraces nature, and that Finns generally feel happy when fully embracing the tree- and lakes-covered terrain of the country. According to the Finnish Toolbox, Finns “go outdoors to relax and to feel a connection with nature, associating nature with serenity, energy, joy, security, closeness and togetherness.” 

It’s with these values that Kelly lives her life, and why she founded Marluca, offering clothing and apparel to accompany us as we celebrate our purpose of being here on this earth: to be happy, live joyfully, and love, and be loved.

Finding Grounding & Building Sustainable Courage

One of the biggest contributors to helping Kelly build back her resilience as she went through the end of her marriage was to engage in practices that ground her and bring her back to herself.

Kelly has practiced Pilates pretty faithfully for the past two years and she is floored by how impactful it has been to build her mind-body connection. “For fifty minutes in a day I get to take time for myself,” Kelly says, “I can just get lost in the mind-body connection and not worry about the rest of the world and all the stuff that I need to tend to.”

Learning to live in the moment by being trained in Transcendental Meditation (TM) has also been instrumental in Kelly’s journey of building her resilience back. “I learned that if you live in the past you live in depression, if you live in the future, you live in anxiety, so I try my best to live in the now,” says Kelly. She adds that worrying is like a rocking chair, and it doesn’t get you anywhere. “You just have to trust and have faith that it’s all going to work out the way it should,” she believes.

Kelly also credits Reiki as an important part of her toolbox on her path of healing and coming back stronger. “I started to feel like my authentic self and could voice what was truly happening in my life and realize what was actually going on,” she describes of the energy healing therapy.

Lean Into It

Now that she is feeling stronger than ever, Marluca is Kelly’s way of showing her kids that anything is possible. She wants Marluca to be evidence that when you lean into challenges you build strength and resilience, your sisu, and sustainable courage. 

“In a plane, you put your oxygen mask on before helping others,” Kelly reminds us. Marluca is Kelly’s mechanism to just lean into it; her way of showing her kids that yes, she’s had a rough couple of years, but she is going to work hard to have something tangible to show for how she has healed. She wants to continue to be an example of strength for when life throws them challenges.

As she launches Marluca and the first line “Homegrown”, Kelly keeps the words of poet Stephanie Bennett Henry at the forefront of her mind and pursuits, “Life is tough, my darling, but so are you.” 

Kelly Beaubien is known for seeing positivity in every life challenge. As the glue that holds her family together, she has the unique ability to insert thoughtful words and phrases into every situation that offer something to think about, or a poignant life lesson. Marluca is Kelly’s way of bringing her empowering words and phrases to the world through unmatched quality apparel with clever messaging to bring contagious joy to those who wear it. The intent for all who wear Marluca brand clothing is that they will not only look good, but feel good from the inside out, and thus, feel able to conquer anything in their day. 

Marluca’s first launch, “Homegrown” is an acknowledgment of “roots and wings”; a homage to Kelly’s hometown of Barrington, Illinois; a reminder to Kelly, her kids, and everyone of “B-Town” and beyond that you can go anywhere, and achieve anything, but never to forget where you came from. 

Future runs of Marluca’s clothing will be focused on themes, offering something for everyone.