Colleen Azure Moyna
Colleen Azure Moyna is a biomedical consultant and author. As a consultant, she specializes in helping small and medium sized medical device companies establish and improve their Quality Systems including software implementation in a way that is customized to them and their budget and goals while also being compliant with regulations. As an author, she is committed to shedding light on abuse and the disordered relationships with food and body that can manifest in women as a result.
What were your initial years of growing up like? Tell us about your life before starting your corporate journey/venture/initiative.
In transparency, I had a really rough childhood and endured a great deal of child abuse. While it was a huge challenge in my life, it gave me grit and drive and compassion towards others. It is important for readers to know that people with rougher beginnings and imperfect families can go on to accomplish amazing things. In my opinion, the most important predictor to success is how hungry a person is for it and adult survivors of abuse and/or dysfunctional family systems can be the hungriest to change their life’s circumstances. I went into biomedical at a young age, while I was still in college, in fact, and worked my way through school. The phases of my biomedical career could be best summarized as: learn, contribute, show what one can do with a team, and show what one can create/ design. While working on my career, I also was forced to work on how the abuse I suffered was affecting my life. In the course of my healing journey, I was frustrated to not find a memoir that described in adequate detail what I was going through, so I decided to be brave and share my story in the hope of helping others. And now it is sold in multiple countries, has helped many women and is even used in universities.
Tell us something about your initiative/business. What is it about and how is it helpful for people?
My biomedical consulting work serves to help small and medium sized medical device companies establish and improve their Quality Systems including software implementation in a way that is customized to them and their budget and goals while also being compliant with regulations. As an author, I am committed to shedding light on abuse and the disordered relationships with food and body that can manifest in women as a result with the ultimate goal of guiding people on their healing journey and destigmatizing abuse and disordered eating.
While the global pandemic of COVID-19 is associated primarily with adversities, it has also brought about a true boom in startups, with successful entrepreneurship in many countries. The pandemic has impacted all of us in one way or another. Would you like to share your experience on a personal and professional level?
The pandemic has been a mixed bag. I have known a number of people who passed away from Covid and seeing how it affected their families and workplaces has been devastating. I also have family in emergency medicine and seeing how it affected them made my heart go out to them while also being inspired by them. On a professional level, it was humbling and meaningful to know that my work contributed towards products used to help deliver oxygen to patients with Covid. And on a personal level, I think one of the positives that came out of Covid was slowing down a little and spending more time with family and work/life balance.
What has been the response of the users/consumers towards your venture?
In medical device work, I have been recognized with an Outstanding Service award for developing a system to best capture and address customer inquiries. In my writing, I have been invited to speak at a number of podcasts and other speaking engagements. One that stands out, though, was being asked to speak at the California Association of Teachers of English Conference, where I was able to share with teachers how they can best recognize and help students who may be encountering abuse at home. There were a couple of special teachers who really helped me and it was an honor to be able to give back in that way.
How has your life changed because of your initiative/venture?
In medical device work, I love serving my clients in a way that is customized to them. I love the variety of project based work and being able to create something that really adds measurable value to the client. With writing, it has been so amazing to receive messages on social media from readers who share their story with me and tell me how sharing my truth impacted them. It has made sharing my deepest darkest secrets worth it.
Do you have anyone who is the biggest support system in your life? Please let us know.
My husband and daughter as well as my cousins, friends and coach are the best support system!
Would you like to share with our young budding women entrepreneurs the change you would like to see in the world if given an opportunity? OR Share a motivational message for the audience/women who are reading this.
To me, the root of many of our problems as humanity lie in abuse. It can lead us to misuse drugs, alcohol, food, and mistreat one another, perpetuating the abuse cycle. This is why healing abuse is so very important. The more healed we are the better we treat each other and the planet.