My Spiritual Journey

Alongside my business career, I have long been a spiritual seeker and reading between the lines to my career, I’m sure you can see there have been some difficult times. Thus is the life of the ‘wounded healer’ - whose wisdom comes through experience.

We teach what we need, so after spending many of my earlier years feeling alone, different and unsupported, my solace and comfort came from a deep connection to spirit and nature.

Listed below are some of the teachings that I have taken part in, which amount to many thousands of hours of personal development, meditation and learning from nature. They have opened up my intuitive abilities over the last 25 years. I am also fortunate to have been supported by some incredible mentors.

My Chinese grandmother was a devout Buddhist and one of my earliest memories is burning my forehead on a joss stick at the temple. My mother has always been very intuitive and when I was seven, my European father had a near-death experience that sparked his own spiritual journey. He would often talk to me for hours about philosophy, most of which I don’t consciously remember, though I’m sure it planted seeds in my subconscious. I loved poring over his books on Hindu gods like Ganesh and Shiva.

From the age of eleven, I began attending many Buddhist teachings with him at what is now Plum Village in the Dordogne, France - founded by Zen Master Thich Nhat Hanh.

By my late 20’s I decided spirituality was where it was at, and for the next 10 years, I was a bit of a ‘spiritual junky’ going on many workshops, retreats and teachings. Going to a healer was like a spa day for me!

My forties? Well let's just say they brought me my biggest learnings - but that's a whole other story! Living in Aotearoa New Zealand for 18 years and raising children who are Tangata Whenua (people of the land), I developed a deeper connection to Maori spirituality. Like many Indigenous traditions, it sees the Earth and cosmos not as separate, but as sacred extensions of ourselves—something to honour, not exploit. This worldview resonated deeply with me and helped further ground my relationship with nature, ancestral wisdom, and plant medicine.

For the last 10 years I have had a strong daily spiritual practice and am so grateful for the stillness and joy I can experience through the simplest of things.

Here are just a few of the teachings I have experienced over the last 25 years:

Plant and Energetic Medicine

Quantum Essence Healing Practitioner course - 9 months lived experience with Karen Creighton and Stephanie Hunter
Reiki 1 training, Piha New Zealand
Traditional Herbalism Certificate Course, Malcolm Harker
Various Māori herbalism courses and teachings ( Rongoā Māori )
Energy exchange - learning from and assisting Amy McComb, Plant Rhythms
Homeopathic course with Robert Van Der Touw, The Rainbow Essences of Mother Earth.
Keen forager and lover of nature

Buddhist-based Teachings

Multiple Buddhist retreats and teachings at Mahamudra Centre, Coromandel Peninsula, and Jam Tse Dhargyey Ling Tibetan Buddhist Centre, Whangarei.
Numerous spiritual retreats including 10 day silent Vipassana retreat in Kaukapakapa, NZ and meditation and mindfulness at Mana Retreat Centre, Mt Manaia, Coromandel.

Healing Tribes

Qi Gong, yoga and somatic teachings and healings with Wilhemeena Isabella Monroe. Volunteer and part of the Soul tribe, Soul - Centre of the Body & Mind for 5 years until leaving New Zealand in 2020.
Member of the Rose Moon Tribe - fortnightly women’s circle in Crediton, England from 2024. Facilitated by Katherine Marsland, Rose Moon Priestess.
Jam Tse Dhargyey Ling Tibetan Buddhist Centre, Whangarei

Tantra

Tantric Training - The Enlightened Goddess Within and The Way of the Tantric Priestess - 6 months coaching, healing and 1-1 mentorship with Catherine Tiferet Levi from 2024
Tantric Training - 7 week journey with Emily Love 2022

Holistic Wellness Training and Modalities

Life Coaching Certificate - The Academy of Modern Applied Psychology
Certificate in Maori Ora – Te Wananga o Aotearoa
Body Brain integration training and regular healing from Johnny Harris, kinesiologist, Whangarei New Zealand.
Healings and guidance from Suzanne Morning
Access Consciousness Advanced Body Class
Doreen Virtue - some sort of pseudo certificate in card reading (before she got weird)
Avid astrologer - starting with Pam Gregory tutorials and ongoing through Gene Keys, Human Design and various pod casts

Other modalities that I draw on include EFT Tapping, inner child, visualisation, affirmations, voice healing, emotion code, breathwork, channeled guidance.

Thank you also to my very first inspirational authors including Louise Hay, Donna Eden. And earlier Business Mentors including Lysa Black.