Over the last few months of my life, I have experienced one of the most challenging moments on my journey, the end of my marriage, and I decided that I was finally ready to share with you what I’ve learnt and how it could help or benefit you. I tell stories so you may need to read carefully to uncover the lesson. If you miss it, don’t worry. It’s at the very end.

I am no stranger to challenge and I have embraced it at every turn, without fail. This challenge, however, was like no other. After 5 years, spending my life with one of the most incredible people I have had the pleasure and honour of knowing, my marriage came to an abrupt end. For those of you who have been married, been in a long-term relationship or lost someone to a death, you may be able to relate to what I will share with you. For those of you who haven’t, which may be a little unlikely, keep reading.

5 years ago I met a woman that literally stopped me dead in my tracks. Her blue eyes, bright smile, porcelain skin and unmistakable accent had me hooked from the moment she opened her mouth and started talking to me. Although I initially dismissed her, in my mind, the universe has a way of bringing things together that need to be together. And so, it did. We got on like a house on fire and from that moment forward, we started our journey together.

Just so you know, this isn’t a tale about my relationship but more a story of how this relationship helped me rediscover who I am, how I’d love to live my life and who I would love to be. This relationship opened the pandoras box of hidden beliefs and limitations that, once exposed, has changed the very trajectory of where I’m heading in my future. Some people call this type of life changing moment or event a Murphy’s Law event, which is one that cannot be ignored, dismissed or overlooked. It seemed that this event has called me into action, so here I am sharing it with you.

Over the course of our relationship, unbeknownst to me, I wasn’t being my true self. Neither was she. We had caught ourselves in an endless cycle of ‘two ships sailing past each other in the middle of the night’ and it was incredibly difficult to alter that path we were on. We had somehow dishonoured our own values and core beliefs to share this time with each other. It happens. This is normal and although, I wished to ‘fix’ it, the universe had other plans for both of us.

So here I am, separated from a human being that literally assisted me to change my life and uncover my true value, not only to myself but to others as well. You might be wondering, “well how did the end of your marriage help you live again?” Would you like to know? I’m about to tell you.

For many years in the early parts of my childhood, I was bullied for having big ears. My perception, whether accurate or not, was that people didn’t like me because of the way I looked. I stood out and somehow, I thought that it bothered people. Eventually, when my family decided to migrate to Australia when I was 15 years old, I chose to have cosmetic surgery done on my ears. I wanted them pinned back. I knew I was starting a new school and a new life, in a new country and I wanted to put myself in the best position that I could. The operation was a success. I started school and for the first time in my life, I started getting noticed but not like I had before. I was getting the kind of attention a 15 year old boy only hopes for. Girls seemed to think I was cute. From that moment forward, my life changed and I am here today, watching the ship sail away, because of how I chose to play it out.

I stepped into an alternate reality and took on a whole new identity, when I pinned back my ears, but since I was still scared that people wouldn’t like me, especially girls, I over-compensated with my affections and intentions. I did so because I wanted to keep the attention on me, which was a selfish desire within me to get what I perceived I wanted and needed. These were things I was unable to give to myself due to a lack of self-love and appreciation.

Fast forward quite a few years ahead in time. I was working as a chiropractor for someone I admired and put on a pedestal. He was, or so I thought, my ‘guru’. I admired him so much that I literally did almost anything he asked me to do. In turn I was able to work in one of the most prestigious chiropractic clinics in Australia. Over time, however, I started to become increasingly narcissistic. I felt I had no power and wanted to have more control within my career and in my life. Throughout most of that period I was heavily involved with my wife-to-be.

Around 2012, after reading Richard Branson’s ‘Losing My Virginity’, in entered Dr John F. Demartini and his groundbreaking method. I attended his program, The Breakthrough Experience and from that point forwards, my life started to change. I empowered myself, took control over my career and left chiropractic in order to pursue my vision of running my own company and serving people through coaching and personal development. It was at this point, where the cookie started to crumble and the layers of my unconscious beliefs started to unfold, piece by piece. I saw a vision of myself and what I wanted to do with my life. I wanted to start giving back to myself and honour my worth and value. This strong yearning and desire within me posed many challenges in my relationship and, out of fear and guilt, I subdued my inner desires although silently working on them in the background.

Cut to today and now I am single once again with the world at my doorstep and opportunities waiting to be explored, uncovered, discovered and revealed. For so long in my life I had stopped myself from being who I am. Someone who stood out from the crowd. Someone who could never fit in because of the way I looked. Yet I tried so hard to be somebody I couldn’t be. I tried to please others and give them what I thought they wanted so they wouldn’t leave me or abandon me. I tried till the very end of my relationship too. The universe wouldn’t let me continue, no matter how much effort I put in. I was being called to action by my own mind to remember who I am, what makes me unique and to go and share that with the world. It seemed that my mind finally had enough of seeking praise, attention, recognition and appreciation from others. Instead, my mind wanted me to find all of that within me.

My wife was and is the greatest blessing I’ve ever received. She honoured her own journey and let me go and, in doing so, has helped me find and re-discover that big eared boy all over again, give him a great big self-hug, tell him how much I love him and appreciate him for who he is and what he has to offer and to say – “It’s ok to be who you are and it’s ok to be different”.

Sometimes we need to go through extreme crisis and challenge in order to experience our greatest truth about who we are. It’s never fun. It’s never easy and it certainly comes with its fair share of sadness, pain and loss but it also reveals the happiness, relief and gain that comes with it as well. So if there is one message to take away from this post today, it would be this:

Stay true to who you are, honour who you are, be ok to stand out and don’t be afraid to be different. It’s what the world needs more of.