About me

My father was killed when I was eight years old, an experience that profoundly shaped my early life.  My mother, a stay-at-home mom at the time, was suddenly left to raise four boys on her own. I was bullied at school, struggled to find my place at home with my older brothers, and rarely felt that I truly belonged anywhere. Life felt unsafe.

Somewhere amongst the unprocessed trauma, loneliness and confusion, I learned to completely disconnect from my heart and my emotions as a coping strategy. My mind became my safe place.

As a young adult, I became independent, driven and determined to create a life that would somehow settle the restlessness, emptiness and insecurity I felt inside. I chased success, money and the material things I believed would finally make me feel secure and fulfilled.

But I felt increasingly disconnected from myself and, without realising it, from what I cared about most – my family. I was numb, distracted and agitated, blinding me to the truth that I was taking the most precious parts of my life for granted.

Until I lost them.

My marriage ended. My daughters and their mom relocated to a different city and were no longer part of my everyday life. Within a relatively short period I also lost my mother to cancer, lost the money I’d accumulated through desperate and irrational investment decisions, and with it much of the confidence and sense of worth I’d built my identity around.

My life fell apart.

And it was the best thing that ever happened to me.

For years I’d been trying to solve an internal restlessness by changing my external circumstances. Eventually, there was nowhere left to look but within.

What followed was a long and sometimes confronting journey of healing and self-discovery through family and systemic constellations, breathwork, somatic work, vision quests, men’s work, IFS, plant medicine and other deeply experiential approaches.

I began reconnecting with the wounded parts of myself I’d spent years running from. I discovered the intelligence of my emotions and body. I learned to meet myself with compassion rather than judgement.

And perhaps most importantly, I began to understand that every part of me belonged.

Even the parts I had judged, rejected or desperately wanted to change had developed for a reason. They were trying, in their own imperfect way, to protect me.

That understanding changed everything.

I came to see that we are not defined by what happened to us. We can learn from our past without remaining imprisoned by it. And beneath the conditioning and protective patterns we’ve accumulated is something that was never damaged in the first place.

Our capacity to love.
To create.
To connect.
To experience joy.
To be fully ourselves.

The approaches that profoundly changed my own life became the ones I went on to study deeply, practise and eventually bring into my work with others.

But perhaps the greatest measure of that journey wasn’t what I learned, but who I became.

My relationship with my daughters completely transformed. We became deeply connected again. I learned to forgive myself and others for the mistakes of our past, and experienced firsthand what becomes possible when we stop fighting our history and begin taking responsibility for what we do with it.

My leadership style also changed radically. I discovered that caring deeply about people didn’t compromise performance.

It enhanced it.

I made sure the people I led knew that I genuinely had their backs. Their wellbeing mattered to me. And at the same time, I expected their very best. No compromise. 

Something shifted.

People didn’t give their best because they had to. They wanted to. As they felt increasingly seen, acknowledged and valued, they gave more of themselves — and our division went on to exceed expectations, consistently.