Some of you may know, who have been following my blog posts over the last year, of the challenges that I’ve faced within my personal life and career. I can say that these last 10 months have been some of the most emotionally taxing, mentally draining and equally as uplifting and fulfilling that I have ever experienced.

For those of you who don’t know, about 10 months ago my wife and I decided to separate and I had to leave her and face a life changing direction in a way that I had never expected or even anticipated. The whole experience literally turned my world upside down and I was faced with a reality that I didn’t think I’d ever be able to make it through. I left Canada, where I was living at the time, and returned back to Australia to be close to my family and to heal.

I went through so many emotions, I can’t even begin to count – from sadness to loneliness to grief to anger to frustration – the list could go on. I was an absolute mess and totally lost. Never in my wildest dreams did I foresee what I was faced with. There were moments when my emotions were so overwhelming, that I didn’t know whether it was worth being where I was. In my mind, it wasn’t what I had planned and I couldn’t accept what had happened.

Thankfully, I was able to hold it together and I started the slow and often confronting journey of healing this very raw and open wound. I spent most of my time isolated from the world, working on myself, speaking to very close friends who were there to guide and support me through the process. I put myself into my career and the work that inspired me. I did what I could to push myself through, while doing all the personal development work to get me to the other side.

I had relapses along the way and fell into moments of depression and deep sadness and then about 4 months ago, in February of 2014, I hit a brick wall that I hadn’t seen before. And believe me when I tell you, I had hit many of them in the last 10 months. I remember walking into my parents room at the time and just feeling totally lost. I had no idea who I was anymore, what I was supposed to be doing with my life or where I was meant to be. I seriously felt like giving up and then, by chance, the universe delivered someone into my life who brought me back from the abyss I found myself in. For the first time in a very long time, I hired a coach to help me out.

We spent 6 weeks working through my stuff and it was in those six weeks that I found who I am. I remembered who that guy is. I discovered my purpose, tapped back into my mission and I found the love I’d lost hidden in my heart the whole time. After 9 challenging months being separated from the one person that has meant so much to me in this world, I found her again in my heart and literally, 5 minutes after I had that experience, she contacted me.

This post is dedicated to her and to those of you out there who choose to stay hidden and don’t allow your true self to shine through. Since that breakthrough and the start of what I look forward to being the career I’ve been dreaming about, my heart has opened like never before. I have felt connected to others, embraced others and chosen to go down a path of really giving so much of who I am to so many people out there who really need it.

I’m not sure if any of you have ever truly felt the loss of someone who means so much to you but if you have, you will all know how painful that can be. The loss of my wife was excruciating but it taught me something that, through our marriage and the many years of my life before that, I hadn’t yet understood or learnt. I learnt that it’s ok to be vulnerable. It’s ok to open yourself up and let people in. It’s ok to show who you are and that doing so does not mean that you are weak, inferior or not worth it. In fact, being vulnerable is what lets people share in who you are. It’s what allows you and others to embrace each other and feel connected.

It’s not often that people can say that they love the person that they were once with and it’s less common for someone to say that they love them even more. In my case, I can say that I feel this way. My wife tried so hard to teach me how to be who I want to be in my life and because of my own history with being bullied and feeling inferior, I built a wall that kept her out and many others in my life. I protected myself from pain and hurt and sadness only to experience it in the most confronting way. I have been able to see the impact bullying has had on my life and it has made me incredibly sad but also incredibly fortunate. I have developed the awareness of how to be different within my own life and to show other people how to do the same.

To end off, I will definitely say that, in this crazy life that we live, when you least expect it the universe delivers a blessing into your life. We often take these blessings for granted and it is only after the fact that we learn to appreciate them for the ways in which they contributed to our lives. Please make sure this doesn’t happen to you. Whatever your struggles are or whatever pain you’ve been through, find a way to heal those wounds instead of allowing them to interfere and create even bigger and even more overwhelming challenges to face in your lives.