Here’s a hard truth I had to face.
No one forced me to walk down Coldharbour Lane in the middle of the night to score a rock. I went there of my own free will.
Not even real danger stopped me from walking a self-destructive path.
Because what was driving me wasn’t outside of me — it was inside.
My nervous system remembered pain.
My subconscious learned it as familiar.
What feels familiar pulls us back repeatedly. We don’t return because we want to suffer. It’s because unhealed parts repeat what they know.
At the time, I didn’t understand any of this.
I just knew that something inside me kept leading me back to places that hurt.
The Moment That Changed Everything
I didn’t stop smoking the pipe because I suddenly loved myself.
I didn’t stop because I felt enlightened or healed.
I stopped when the man who had almost beaten me to death stole my neighbor’s bike.
That was the moment something shifted.
It was not because I was afraid for my own safety. It was because I realized I was becoming a risk to the people around me.
That realization was brutal.
For the first time, I could see that my life wasn’t simply happening to me.
I was participating in it. I did so through unhealed wounds and fractured self-worth. Inner patterns formed long before I had any language for them.
The problem was:
I had no idea how to heal any of it.
So I Did What I Always Did — I Ran
I left the country.
I crossed an ocean.
I told myself I was starting over.
A new place.
A new identity.
A new life.
But you don’t leave your inner wiring behind when you move.
You carry it with you — quietly — until it’s finally addressed.
No matter how far I traveled, I couldn’t outrun myself.
The breakdown of my marriage only confirmed what an inner voice had been whispering for years:
You’re not enough.
You’re unlovable.
You’re a failure.
When I returned to Europe, I was living under a heavy cloud of self-pity. I also carried a weight of self-hatred. This burden was so heavy that it pushed away some of the kindest people in my life.
When Life Makes It Impossible to Look Away
And then came the moment that cracked everything open.
I had to take my best friend to A&E.
Two terminal brain tumors.
In an instant, life showed me how fragile it is.
How quickly it can end.
How little time we actually have to keep postponing ourselves.
No one forced me to change.
Witnessing how easily life can disappear was eye-opening. It made one thing undeniable. If I didn’t take responsibility for my inner world, the same patterns would keep replaying. They would just manifest with different faces, places, and losses.
That was the moment I chose responsibility.
Not blame.
Not shame.
Responsibility.
Finding the Root Instead of Replaying the Story
I explored many paths after that.
Some helped temporarily.
Some offered insight without relief.
But shamanic healing was the first approach that reached the root.
It didn’t ask me to relive my trauma.
It didn’t ask me to endlessly analyze my past.
It worked beneath the story — where the pattern was actually held.
That’s where the grip loosened.
That’s where the suffering softened.
That’s where life began to reorganize itself from the inside out.
Why I Share This
I don’t share my story to shock you.
And not to dramatize pain.
I share it to say this:
You are not broken.
You adapted.
And what adapted can be gently realigned.
If something in this story feels familiar rather than inspiring, you’re not imagining it.
That recognition is often the beginning.
I’m here for those who are ready to stop running from themselves —
and start living from the place that has always known the way 🌿
Shamanic Healing 