What is my purpose?

I am writing a personal post to begin this journey and start my business. By revealing some of my heart, I hope to inspire you to start contemplating your purpose in life or rekindle old passions.
For me this is the first time I have had the courage to step up and move from conventional GP to someone willing to explore other avenues along with that medical knowledge, whilst openly acknowledging that this is me, and what I love.
So how did I come to this point? Well, let’s start at the beginning, back in Sydney. I was fortunate enough to grow up in an area surrounded by patches of bushland. As kids, we would play for hours making cubbies or trying to catch tadpoles, or making up games involving potions and magic spells. As I grew older my forays into nature became an interest in camping and adventuring in the bush.
Even as a child, I was fascinated by how things grew and how the seasons changed. In autumn I loved picking up the liquid amber leaves and throwing them around. In summer I loved and still do love, swimming, the beach, looking in rockpools, and exploring. Digging my feet into the sand or into mud and dirt made me feel alive and rejuvenated. Little did I know that what I was doing was ‘grounding’ and connecting to my environment.
I started studying agriculture at school and my interest in the cycles of nature and the earth was inspired in more academic ways. So much so that I ended up completing a Science degree in Agriculture. I loved the course and the knowledge of how systems interact still fascinates me.
I left agriculture in Sydney for medicine in Brisbane to work with people full-time and loved this as well.
Then came kids and almost two decades of being too busy, being busy, to truly blossom. I loved being home with my kids and playing with them, doing crafty things, and having those birthday parties in the backyard. However, add in work and then the volunteering with four kids and different sporting commitments and I put myself to the side, thinking I was living my dream. On the surface level I was, on the inside, I was becoming emptier. I have been blessed with a great partner and great children, I just forgot to nurture me along the way. Honestly, I think I was too scared to step to the side, change things up too much, or consider my larger purpose, as I might have not been entirely satisfied with me. I kept being busy. As the kids grew and needed me less, I found I was lacking in true purpose. Something that inspired me and fired me up.
Over this time, I saw many patients come in with unexplained issues and then go away again with what looked like perfect diets and exercise regimes, yet they were not in optimal health or truly happy. I suggested social groups and yoga but didn’t practice myself.
Something was missing. I tried more education and learned a lot about reproduction, HRT, and how systems in our body flow, or should flow. I tried functional medicine and rekindled my fascination with the soil and how we “look after” our planet and the ongoing effect this has on our health. All essential pieces of the puzzle, yet still something was missing.
All doctors know the patterns of disease, it’s what we are taught. What if we could see the patterns of health too? They exist.
An old pediatrician, now retired, advised us as students, to ‘always listen to a mother’s intuition’ when she was adamant that there was something wrong with her child and nil could be seen. He stated it had never let him down.
Imagine if we could harness this intuition in our day-to-day life. We all possess it; we just need a moment of stillness to hear it. Hard when you are busy being busy!
Over the years I heard hundreds of stories of odd synchronicities that help people change, or the hindsight moments of ‘why didn’t I listen to that feeling and make that change’, that made me realise why we need to integrate other modalities into our lives. Health and vitality are not just a linear progression of eat well and exercise and you will thrive. It includes our history, our minds and spirit, and the environment.
With this in mind, I eventually did listen to that feeling in my gut, though it took a series of synchronicities that were quite absurd. I had many hints before this, and ignored them, after all, they were just in little pinches. I just needed random books to appear in my feed, the wrong podcast to come on, and ring a wrong phone number to get me to listen and start talking and making changes.
Take a moment to reflect, we all have stories like this. What is your moment of intuition? Or that aha moment where you realised there was more to life? Or maybe it was a series of odd events that lead you somewhere or to someone. I guarantee they are there if you stop and reflect.
Sometimes the stories we tell ourselves, or the changes we want to make incorporate big pieces of our lives and need big adjustments. That’s scary. Especially if it means changing the way we think of ourselves. That’s why I’m here, I know it is scary, and can offer support if you want to make changes. Science to help with the things we know and an open mind to help investigate other options you might like to explore.
Just like I realised I need nature and trees to be easily accessible to me to feel whole, I also know that this new path is simply an extension of what I have being doing all my life. It feels like my purpose, I feel a new sense of ease, even as I work. Connections in life, with nature, with grounding and love or kindness are what make me, me.
Thinking about things as a whole and how they integrate and change over time is what I love to do.