Backstory / About me
21 May 2017
In 2004, at the top of Ben Nevis as the sun was setting, I realised there was more to life than my job in financial services, where I felt like a bad actor in a bad play. Two years out of university and I was in the midst of a quarter life crisis.
This led me to South and Central America, where I was inspired by the people and their sense of community. After a year I returned to the UK. I really wasn’t living the life I wanted to so set plans in motion – which took a while! – to move to a career where I could be in service to something bigger than myself. I wanted to commit to something ‘real’; a more caring and nurturing profession.
I began working with charities, social enterprises and local community groups. and a lot of volunteering back in London, working with a variety of organisations: from project management at Bright One, a volunteer led and run communications agency, to communications at Lumos, JK Rowling’s children’s charity, to managing the media and PR for the launch of the Brixton Pound, a Transition Towns initiative which encourages people to care about their local community, and for the Urban Green Fair in Brixton’s Brockwell Park and the London Green Fair in Regent’s Park, exploring the green heart of London.
Spiritual growth led me to India for a month each year from 2011 - 2016 where I studied yoga and meditation. I’ve been practising and studying different forms of yoga since 1999. In 2015, unsatisfied with the spiritual path of ascension, I discovered the more earthy teachings of John Hawken and his Paths of Transformation (bioenergetics, magical power places, sexuality and power, shamanism, tantra and touch). I completed his professional Tantra Massage training and assisted on various courses with him.
I loved my horticulture course last year, am deeply interested in permaculture, and wish to integrate this into my yoga retreats and eventually live in an intentional community. I’ve been inspired by many great teachers, thinkers and doers - I’ve joined Satish Kumar and the Resurgence team to discuss youth engagement, heard Polly Higgins talk about the law of ecocide, Mark Boyle about his moneyless manifesto, and Mac Macartney learning the power of keeping alive the stories of indigenous wisdom. Then there's Charles Eisenstein, Joanna Macy, George Monbiot, Pat McCabe, Martin Shaw, Dougald Hine, Vivienne Westwood…. These inspirational people have taught me it’s okay to yearn for something more; I feel it is time for me to step into the role of teacher, thinker and doer.
Time to take positive action to help create the more beautiful world our hearts know is possible (thank you Charles Eisenstein). This January I found myself at Schumacher College embarking upon an MA, Ecology and Spirituality but after 3 weeks I knew academia and institutionalisation was not my path.