The about page is one of my favourite parts of any web-based business. The “about page” helps me understand who this person is or who the company or organisation are. It can give me a sense of their values and my possible experience; and perhaps on this site, it will provide you with a deeper understanding of the person behind what you read, see, hear, or you may work.

I follow a similar process when I find an author or creative whose work I enjoy. I like to listen to interviews, presentations, and podcasts to understand better who the person is and what underlies what they create. I find it gives me an increased understanding of their work.

So, what follows is some stuff about me, who I am and perhaps why I think the way I do. None of us knows entirely who we are or what our deep motivations can be, but the discovery journey makes life fascinating. It can enable us to find an undiscovered country of abilities, attitudes, and deeper understanding. The thrill of living a vibrant life is rewarding. Not always pleasant, but who said something must be pleasing to be rewarding. Ask a mountain climber.

Gabor Mate, in his seminal book “When the Body Say’s NO”, writes —

“… people do not become ill despite their lives but rather because of their lives. And life includes not only physical factors like diet, physical activity and the environment. But also the internal milieu of thoughts and unconscious emotions that govern so much of our physiology though the mechanisms of stress and the unity of the systems that modulate nerves, hormones, immunity, digestion and the cardiovascular function.”

Well, that was me.

I Became Ill Because of My Life.

By the time I was in my late 30s, I couldn’t work for nearly six years — at all. Some of it is because of the choices I made knowingly and others because of events that unknowingly caused me to make poor choices. And other circumstances entirely outside my control.

All this is set against the background of my individual makeup, the world I was born into, my genetic code, and the interplay of the spiritual lives we live, regardless of whether we are aware of them or not.

I had spent the preceding years working in sales, both direct and business to business. Then, producing, show calling, and managing live events, some of the biggest in Australia’s corporate history, where 15,000 people were not uncommon at events. Sometimes as a team of producers, sometimes on my own.

I was asked to speak to 100’s and sometimes 1000s of people about what I knew. And I also had the opportunity to create five successful music albums for an industry that was unique for its time.

I saw friendships made and lost, ego’ clashes, and power struggles, ideological, personal, and even theological destroy lives. And some lives improved so amazingly that old photographs were the only clue to their past.

I went to film school, had fun shooting footage all over Australia and the South Pacific. I did all the above, sometimes all at once…. I had almost no social life; you can see why.

I have gone broke a couple of times, sometimes because of my faults and others due to naivety and fate.

I even studied for the ministry of a church whose faith I no longer hold.

So when, in my late 30s, I looked in the mirror, I was prepared to give it all away. Give it away if it took that for me to achieve health and a measure of happiness.

I was ill because of my life, so I took it apart bit by bit and rebuilt it, starting from my spirit up. A skilled Chinese Medicine Practitioner told me that my physical strength would be the last thing to return. I would have to go forward in life with hope, trusting that my physical health would return.  I would have to spend time rebuilding every aspect of my life, brick by brick, following the constant whispering of my heart’s calling.

It has taken many years…a journey that continues.

What I learned from those years and continue to learn, I share here. Hopefully, it supports and encourages you on whatever path you find yourself.

And remember… no one, and I do mean no one, has figured it all out!

But that’s the fun of it – and remember to register for updates.