If you have come through Real in the last few years, you most likely know me. Maybe you know of me, or maybe you know me well, but in any case, I would like to share my journey with you. It is my turn to pick up the talking stick.
My REAL journey started over 9 years ago when I was 24. I was told about a Workshop called Real Woman. I had no idea what it was about, but something in me knew that I needed to do it. My life was not bad, looking in from the outside, but inside I was completely lost, feeling like I was just emotionally drifting through my life carrying so much emotional pain that it was all I could do to function.
I decided to jump in; really, I clutched onto the idea of this Workshop that I was told could change everything and give my life the meaning that I was so desperately seeking. I was truly hoping this was the answer I had been looking for so many years without really even knowing my question! Yet still, even once I had enrolled, I had no idea what it was all about. I know now that a deeper part of me knew that I needed to go to ‘The Mountain’ as those who had been there called it. It seemed fitting, as everything in my life felt like an uphill climb. Maybe, just maybe, this was the place!
Arriving at Registration I was so nervous but it was an excited nervousness, like something huge was coming! And well, I was right. My world got tipped upside down. It took me a little while to realise though that this was the right way up and it was my whole life beforehand that was upside down. Never before had I felt so free, so understood, so loved, so home. This truly was a magical place of healing and transformation. I left that ‘Mountain’ a different person, a woman, a Real Woman!
The journey didn’t end there, though. I had developed a deep yearning hunger for more, more growth, more freedom, more confidence! I was a single mum with a toddler, and I distinctly remember sitting on my lounge room floor and deciding that I would do it all! Every event Real had to offer, I would do it. I knew that in order for my life to change, I had to change, and let’s face it, I had no idea how to do that, but the people at Real did!
Over the following 24 months, I somehow managed to do everything! Real Life Design, Real Woman 2, Real Relationships, Real Coach Program, and all of the integration programs, I even started on Crew for the Workshops and Seminars as soon as I was eligible! It was a blur, but I did it! Never before had I ever felt so alive, so accomplished, so capable, and so proud of myself.
That 24 months of going for it, emotionally, financially, and physically, was the best thing I have done for myself ever.
My life is unrecognisable now; I am unrecognisable now from the lost girl that I was then. The pain of the past, the aching in my heart, the sorrow, the doubt, the fear no longer grips me. It no longer tortures me and holds me under the waves of regret of life lost to not knowing how amazing I am, what I am capable of, and how much love and joy I can experience.
I started working at Real in 2009 and have been involved in this work in so many ways since then, shapeshifting, innovating, and evolving my relationship with Real as I grew and changed.
On reflection, I realise that I have grown beyond what I could have imagined when I went to the ‘Mountain’ that first time, and I have been a part of the growth of countless people over years of being on Crew, working at Real, and collaborating on the writing and development of the current programs that our grads are experiencing.
I found my home, my life partner, my calling, and my tribe. I found my right way up!
I am eternally grateful to Karen Seeto for being the instrument of my change. Thank you, Karen, from the bottom of my heart, for introducing me to the ‘Mountain’.
‘Ho’
Real Sister, Ra
