Time to bare my soul

Life can only be lived forwards – but understood backwards.

I have spent most of my life searching for answers, driven by a deep desire to understand, and find freedom from, my own suffering. I think we all do this to a certain degree, knowingly or not, but I am of the view that I am quite an extreme case.

I have explored so many avenues and tried so many things, and it’s only relatively recently that I have been able to look back and be grateful for everything that I experienced – for it has led me back home.

I have come to see that I was not a problem to solve or a basket case to fix. On the contrary, just as with every single one of us, I am a unique expression of life itself. I don’t think there is a more valuable recognition one can have.

To quote T.S. Elliot:

“We shall not cease from exploration
And the end of all our exploring
Will be to arrive where we started
And know the place for the first time.”

This recognition of what I am (and we all are) is such a profound one, and makes me grateful for every twist and turn that has led me here. I am by no means the finished article. I don’t believe anyone is – and if they claim to be, I suggest you remain suspicious.

But I have come such a long way, and my life is filled with a pervasive sense of awe, understanding and gratitude that I could never have anticipated when I simply set out to stop feeling bad.

And so, I have decided to share my story, and in granular detail. The good, the bad and the seemingly ugly.

Over the coming weeks and months, I am going to be revisiting all the key twists and turns, and share moments that I have never spoken about before, as well as the insights and lessons I have learnt along the way. I hope that my story may help anyone who sometimes feels lost, broken, and questions ‘what is it all about?’

Here are a few things I will be diving into.

• Being perceived as confident and even arrogant – while feeling insecure and broken.

• Faking illness to get off school, only to end up having major surgery that night because I was too scared to admit my deceit.

• Developing intense anxiety, which can still impact my nervous system to this day, and self-medicating, not least with weed.

• Uncovering and healing my attachment wounds, which showed up in the same pattern repeating time and again in relationships.

• Changing from being a hardened atheist to someone who knows without doubt there is far more to life than our senses and disembodied culture acknowledges.

• Drinking ayahuasca on several occasions and the brutality of those experiences, and how they changed me in a deep way, virtually overnight.

• Recognising that we are all challenged to learn lessons, that appear to keep repeating in one form or other until we transcend them.

• Understanding why it is more important to lose someone else than ‘lose yourself’ - and how that showed up in my life.

• Learning the true power of authenticity – and how that fortuitously led me to a book deal (and Caitlyn Jenner’s living room).

• The understanding that expressing our unique gifts and keeping our hearts open, - even during conflict - are two of our greatest callings.

• How I came to connect with my unique essence, which is quite different from the ‘survival’ persona I have tended to put out into the world.

• Why getting in touch with the ‘loving background aware presence’ has been transformative, not least by providing a safe haven from where I can turn and face the human scars and conditioning we all carry.

• The best lessons I have been able to take from each ‘healing modality’ - from psychoanalysis to psychedelics.

That is just a brief summary of some of the things I will be writing about. I hope in sharing my own journey, and the lessons I have learnt along the way, it will help others to understand themselves and perhaps even life a little better.

To join me on this deep dive, with no holds barred, please do consider becoming a paid subscriber.

If my work has helped or resonated with you - whether through my book, podcast, youtube or this substack - by supporting it I will be able to devote more time to creating quality content, and ideally move away from sponsorship and advertising. I will still be sending out newsletters for those of you who are free subscribers, just this ‘bare my soul’ stuff I will save for my paid community.

Like I said, I am so grateful for everything I have experienced. And I mean everything – even those moments when I have been deeply distressed. And I know the lessons will keep on coming. There is no end point – and that is a beautiful thing.