Meet
Florida “Flo” DeVaul‑Dudley
Founder. Ordained Minister.
Transformational Coach.
Advocate. Educator. Speaker.
Protector. Overcomer.
More than a survivor,
a Flourisher.
The Mask
For years, I was the one everyone counted on. I wore the badge. I led teams. I kept the books, ran the region, and showed up composed in every room. No one knew what I carried home.
I had lived through more than one season of harm that was never spoken of and never resolved. I learned early to keep going, and I became very good at it.
Then, after a near-fatal car accident in 2015, everything I had held down rose to the surface at once.
That season stripped away every coping strategy I had built. It also became the doorway to my freedom. I stopped surviving my story and started studying it. I pursued every form of understanding I could find: trauma science, the psychology of human behavior, the wisdom of Scripture, and the long, honest work of facing myself before God.
I did not heal by pretending it never happened. I healed by refusing to let it have the final word.
The Calling
In 2014 I founded a nonprofit serving survivors of sexual assault, domestic violence, and human trafficking, and I have led trauma services ever since. Through that work, and through national media appearances as a survivor advocacy expert, I have sat with story after story.
I noticed a pattern. Some of the most wounded people I met were also the most accomplished. Executives. Pastors. Founders. Artists. Leaders everyone leaned on, with no one to lean on themselves.
Florida Soars exists for them, and for every person ready to stop carrying in silence. I know what it is to wear the mask well. I also know what it is to take it off and finally breathe. That is the freedom I want for you.
Experience and Credentials
Florida “Flo” DeVaul‑Dudley, M.Ed., CMLC, CFTP, CTSS, is the Founder and Executive Director of Shining Light In Darkness, a general psychotherapist, Certified Victim Service Practitioner, former police officer, educator, coach, mentor, consultant, conflict strategist, project manager, speaker, and licensed and ordained minister.
She holds a Master of Education in Guidance and Counseling from Alcorn State University. Her training includes ASIST (Applied Suicide Intervention Skills Training) and Youth Mental Health First Aid, which prepare her to recognize concerns, offer initial support, and connect people with appropriate help. Her guidance and counseling education, victim service training, coaching credentials, executive leadership, ministry, and lived experience each lend a different foundation to this work. The thread that joins them is whole-person development: how experiences, beliefs, relationships, environments, values, and daily practices shape a life and its leadership.
She has appeared multiple times on TV One's Fatal Attraction as an expert in domestic violence and sexual assault, representing herself and Shining Light In Darkness. Founded in 2014, the organization has served more than 850 survivors as of August 2026.
How I Work
I hold your story with discretion, steadiness, and no judgment. I see where you are going, not only where you have been. I tell you the truth with compassion, because you deserve both. I work alongside your clinical care, never in competition with it. And I bring faith into the room only when you invite it.
Who I Serve
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Executives and senior leaders carrying private crises through public roles.
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Founders and owners whose businesses grew faster than their rest.
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Pastors, ministry leaders, and people of every faith tradition with no safe place to be poured into.
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Artists and public figures whose gift fills rooms while the person behind it goes unattended.
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Individuals and families ready to lay down what they have carried too long, through loss, incarceration, reentry, and change.
Our Partnership
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Every engagement begins with a private consultation and a signed agreement.
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Your identity and story stay confidential, without exception.
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We work one to one through the Florida SOARS™ Method.
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You receive honest counsel, practical tools, and direct support between sessions.
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You leave restored, with practices that hold long after our work concludes.