“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.”
T. S. Eliot
I believe that learning changes lives. Through self-driven learning, I broke the bonds of poverty and ignorance and built a life of significance and service. I want to give everyone I meet that gift.
Learning doesn't have to be formal. Any challenging situation is an opportunity for learning.
I believe that self-awareness and self-compassion are key to building a more enlightened world. I'm driven by a deep love for humans, and the need to encourage every person I meet to discover what they could bring to this world if they were more self-aware and more self-accepting.
How I work
I listen deeply
I hold space for what is being said and for what is not being said. I receive and observe, and then I share those observations in ways that bring about deep understanding. When I coach, my goal is to help you go deeper than anyone has ever been willing to go with you, so you can see the stories you tell yourself, and come to new insights that can then be applied in practical and life-changing ways.
I engage personally
My goal is to engage with you on a deep and personal level and to build a mutually beneficial and sustainable relationship. I am committed to loving and serving you always, even long after our coaching time together has come to an end.
My journey
I grew up in a broken family, experiencing abandonment and hardship from an early age. Those experiences shaped a fierce self-reliance in me. I paid my own way through university while working multiple part-time jobs, determined to build something different.
My professional life began in higher education, teaching and developing leadership programmes for academics. I later joined an executive search firm, where I worked on strategy and created staff development initiatives, including outplacement services and executive career coaching.
The more I worked with people, the more curious I became about what truly drives human behaviour. That curiosity led me to complete a Master's degree in Personal and Professional Leadership and Coaching, followed by a PhD in Workplace Spirituality. I trained in the Co-Active Coaching Model, and over the years I have immersed myself in the thinkers and methodologies that have most shaped how I work — Byron Katie's Self-Inquiry Method, the Principles of Spiritual Psychology from the University of Santa Monica, Brooke Castillo's Thought Model, Nancy Kline's Thinking Environment, Kristin Neff's research on Self-Compassion, Alison Armstrong's exploration of men and women in relationship, and the work of Barbara Huson and Lynne Twist on women and money. Steve Chandler's coaching philosophy has profoundly shaped how I show up — both in my practice and in my own life. The Enneagram is one of several lenses I draw on.
My most significant investment, though, was working with my own life and business coach. That process fundamentally reshaped how I see myself and the world — moving me from self-reliance and control toward openness, vulnerability, and trust.
My husband was my first safe place. He gets me on a deep level, and he is my greatest support. So much of what is beautiful about my life is thanks to the partnership I have with this incredible person who loves me so deeply. We have had our struggles, and most of them came from my unhealed trauma — from not having the skill to ask for what I needed, communicate what was occurring for me emotionally, and the desire to control the outcome, because I believed that would keep me safe.
I carried so much unresolved anger from my childhood, and only once I was willing to slow down and look at it did I discover the fear, grief, guilt, and shame underneath. It has taken me well over six years to heal the trauma and the shame that came with it. Learning to let go of the need to control the outcome has been some of the hardest, and also most meaningful, work I have ever had to do.
We struggled to conceive, and had given up on the idea of having children, when I finally conceived. My pregnancy and birthing experiences were the most powerful teachers of surrender I have walked through. My first pregnancy was one of pain, worry, fear, and negative-future forecasting — and yet, ultimately, Life was inviting me to surrender and realise that I do not control the outcome of anything. After my daughter's birth, I fell into a pit of darkness, and my journey through post-natal depression started a healing journey that I didn't know I needed.
Four years later — and three years after immigrating to Canada — my son arrived in the middle of the global COVID pandemic. I learnt for the first time what it really meant to take one day at a time, and to be present to this moment.
My children are my greatest gifts. My daughter teaches me about joy and deep gratitude for the abundance in my life. My son teaches me about inner peace and focused attention, and the value of really slowing down to the speed of life. I have learnt more from them than I could ever teach them.
In 2017, I immigrated to Canada and rebuilt my life — for the fifth time. I launched a coaching business while simultaneously doing some of the hardest inner work of my life. Eight years of intentional, sustained effort have brought me to a place of genuine peace.
In March 2025, I lost my father after a tragic and horrific illness. I showed up to his final days with a strength and courage I did not know I had until the moment called for it. Watching my father die was both one of the most painful and deeply transformative experiences of my life, and the lessons I have learnt from this time will continue to shape how I show up in my life and work. I also know that all the work I had done over the eight years since moving to Canada prepared me to show up the way I did. I would not have brought the level of presence, love, compassion, and forgiveness I was able to bring, had I not been willing to do the hard and deeply meaningful work of healing from trauma and the false stories that held me back.
I now serve resilient, driven individuals who are ready for greater fulfilment. I have learned that grace and compassion amplify our effectiveness far more than relentless effort ever could.
I am a woman who has walked through the fire, and now creates the space for others to do the same.
“The most important work we can ever do is not to be the best of ourselves, but to learn to love the worst of ourselves.”
— Chantal Breytenbach
Ready to begin?
For more on my journey and the insights I've gained along the way, visit the blog — or let's just talk.