When Grief Meets Grit | Faith, Creativity & Courage to Rise & Build Again

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ABOUT THE BOOK

What does it truly take to rise and build?

In When Grief Meets Grit, Marilee shares a deeply personal journey of navigating loss, rebuilding purpose, and rediscovering hope.

After losing her father and brother to cancer, beloved family as well as her entrepreneurial mentors, life as she knew it changed forever. In the midst of grief, she began to see how resilience, faith, and creativity could transform pain into purpose.

This book explores the emotional side of entrepreneurship, the spiritual strength required to rebuild after loss, and the courage it takes to keep creating even when life feels uncertain.

Inside these pages, readers will discover encouragement for navigating grief and life transitions, insights on faith, resilience, and personal growth, as well as inspiration for turning creativity into purpose-driven work, and honest reflections on rebuilding life and business after hardship.

More than a story about grief, When Grief Meets Grit is an invitation to rise again—to live with courage, express your gifts, and shine your light even after life’s darkest season

Cover Design Compliments of

my Good Friend and Impact Authority:

Brandon Hintz

✨ I believe hope is stronger than hustle. A smile is power. And creativity? That’s your divine spark. ✨

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

If you’ve landed on this page, chances are you’ve walked through a season that asked more of you than you expected.

Maybe life didn’t unfold the way you planned. Maybe you’ve carried grief, disappointment, or a dream you quietly tucked away because the timing never felt right.

I understand that place more than you might realize.

I’m Marilee — a mentor, entrepreneur, designer, podcast host of Express Light, and author of When Grief Meets GRIT. But more importantly, I’m someone who has learned that our hardest seasons often shape the courage we didn’t know we were building.

This book grew out of those lessons — the moments that asked me to look honestly at my story, rediscover my courage, and trust that even the quiet dreams in our hearts still matter.

Today, I help women like you reconnect with that courage, uncover the purpose within their story, and take meaningful steps toward the life and impact they feel called to create.

And if this book does one thing for you, I hope it reminds you:

Your story is not finished,

Your dream is not random,

And the light within you was never meant to stay hidden.

Every once in a while, a book arrives that speaks directly to the part of you that you’ve tried to silence — the part that still hopes, still imagines, still longs to build something beautiful even after life has left its mark. Marilee has written that book.

With breathtaking honesty and contagious courage, she weaves together grief, creativity, faith, and entrepreneurship in a way I’ve never seen before. This is not a highlight reel of the happy moments. This is the sacred, unseen work of becoming — the work every woman must walk through when she wants to heal, create, and rise.

In these pages, you will find a storyteller who doesn’t pretend to have it all figured out. Instead, Marilee hands you her heart and invites you into the holy tension between loss and purpose, fear and bravery, calling and confusion. She shows you the emotional side of building a business, the spiritual side of rebuilding a life, and the resilient side of rediscovering who you are after everything changes.

What makes this book so rare is that it’s not just inspiring — it’s activating. You don’t simply read it; you feel it. You walk with it. You find yourself dreaming again, remembering again, believing again.

If you are a creative woman — a maker, writer, designer, builder, or dreamer — this book will meet you where you are and lead you toward where God is calling you next. It is tender, powerful, deeply relatable, and overflowing with hope.

I cannot recommend it enough. This is a book you’ll underline, revisit, and share with every woman who’s ever wondered if she could rise again. With Marilee as your guide, you’ll discover that not only can you rise — you were made for it.