Step Into Your Next Chapter with Clarity & Connection
Our Story
Sometimes, stepping away is the first step toward discovering what’s possible.
While walking the Camino de Santiago, Sandy found the time and space to pause and reflect. Her thoughts kept returning to the women she’d met over the years. Again and again, she heard the same words: “I’m not done yet”. Beneath those words was a longing for renewed purpose and meaningful friendships.
Walking through life with a heart full of peace and hope is possible.
Around the same time, Diane was on her own Camino journey, processing recent losses and the need for new direction. Each day brought fresh hope and healing. As she listened to others, she realized many other women shared that same need to find a path toward healing. She had always believed in the power of women coming together, and now felt a renewed purpose in creating caring connection. As Sandy and Diane shared their stories, they discovered a shared vision: to create a welcoming community where women in midlife and beyond could build meaningful friendships, encourage one another, and step into what’s possible. Together, they brought that vision to life through Kindred Vitality—a place where women reconnect, build lasting friendships, and grow together.
About Sandy and Diane
Sandy believes the second half of life is an invitation to embrace new possibilities.
A certified career, leadership, and retirement coach, speaker, and co-author of the International Book Award-winning Midlife, New Life, Sandy founded Demarest Directions in 2009 to help others do exactly that. Since then, she’s had the privilege of walking alongside hundreds of people—across all ages and stages—as they navigate what’s next, with a gift for helping them uncover what matters most and bring it forward into their life and work.
Along the way, Sandy’s coaching took on a life of its own as she began leading retreats and small-group sessions for women. What started as another offering became something she loves most: bringing women together to connect, encourage one another, and imagine what’s next for their own lives. She’s found that growth happens best alongside others—women supporting women through their own reinvention.
Reinvention isn’t just something Sandy coaches—she’s lived it. After 30 years in New Hampshire, she and her husband, Russ, took a leap to coastal Maine. The move brought new friendships, meaningful work, and renewed purpose. These days, home means time with their grown children and grandchildren, beach walks with their chocolate lab, Shelby, and writing, along with a newfound joy for watercolor painting. Through it all, she continues doing what she loves most—helping women write their next chapter.
Diane believes that compassion brings the freedom to live life fully.
Diane Hallenbeck is the founder and president of The Inspired Road, where she helps people discover new possibilities, create meaningful change, and move forward with greater freedom and courage.
Her unique gift is guiding others to recognize and quiet the inner critic that can keep them feeling stuck. By teaching people to let go of self-judgment they align their thoughts and emotions which allows healing of the heart. Diane helps them uncover their true potential and rewrite limiting stories through practical, empowering tools.
Diane has directed hundreds of retreats and spent decades guiding and encouraging women as they find their way forward. Her work is rooted in compassion, connection, and the belief that transformation becomes possible when we learn to see ourselves and our stories in a new light. An international author and speaker, her book Rejecting Fear Learning to be Led by Love has been translated into Bulgarian and is used for women’s retreats there.
While she treasures her work, Diane’s most cherished roles are wife, mother, nanna, and friend to many. She and Kevin have been married for 39 years; they have five children and three grandchildren. You will find her writing in solitude, hiking with Kevin, or baking pies and connecting with others with love and laughter.
contact@kindred-vitality.com