My journey began at rock bottom, having returned to my mothers house with my mental and physical health crumbling. The shedding of my immediate friends, most of my belongings and even the wasting away of my physical health aggravated by drug use merely reflected the shambles and chaos of my mental and emotional landscapes. 

Music was unbearable for the painful memories and anxiety it brought me. I cried daily in my mothers arms. I yelled and shook my fists at the universe for taking my dreams away from me. Regressed to a childish state, I couldn’t understand the world and why things had happened to me and in the way they had.

Just like a child I learnt how to continue in the face of such devastation, but this time as a spiritual being.

Not like the woo woo hippie stereotype. This was real. On the road to rock bottom even my soul refused to experience the life I was putting myself through on the physical plane – and it left my body. Or more accurately, I couldn’t stand it and I left my body to reconnect with the energy from which we all originate.

It was an out-of-body experience.

For about three months I existed not quite here on Earth but not quite in the spirit world. I felt like an alien stuck on another planet who couldn’t get home. While my peers were moving on with their Instagram-perfect lives, I had to go back to basics. Learning how to dress myself, feed myself, clean and look after my body. And most importantly, love myself.

Soon enough, I realised that if I didn’t start loving myself and investing in me (which I wasn’t) then I wasn’t going to make it out of rock bottom. At first, trying to make it out was a huge struggle. Every time I tried to simply acknowledge my emotions I would break down. Thankfully, through the unconditional love and wisdom of my mum, I learnt that the way out of rock bottom requires complete surrender to the universe. All you need to do is be real with yourself.

Go with the flow. Ride the wave. Lighten up, laugh and let go.

It’s not always as simple as that, our brains and egos complicate things. But I had seen the other side. Yep, there’s a light. And there’s nothing past the light because that light is the limitless energy of the source. So, it’s essentially where the greater part of our soul resides. And having seen the truth I knew that there would be a meaning, a reason behind everything I had been through.

The journey I’m on is the journey to understand how all my experiences are reflections of how I am treating myself. The thoughtfulness, care, love, hate, sarcasm - all of it. From there I can choose if I want to be true to myself and show me love where I need it, or ignore it and get stuck in the hamster wheel of external happiness.

I used to plan and worry and be so preoccupied with the future. But how could I make it to the future when I didn’t even love myself enough to take care of my own body today? The only thing that matters is that everything you do, say and think is simply reinforcing your love and care for yourself.

When I first popped out of my body I thought I was going to wake up any day being a totally new person, a superhuman version of myself. It took a year, slightly longer than expected. But good things take time to unfold and I have just opened up the best chapter of my life so far.