The essence of my life story is testimony of the fact that I have been there, I have lived through it, and I have come to a beautiful place in my life where I can look back and appreciate the gifts every experience has given me. -Marie Olivier

 

I have experienced illness and emotional turmoil in many forms.

I know about the shock when you get a diagnosis like cancer in your family – about hospitals, doctors, confusion, desperation and the endless fight against a deadly disease.

I know about the impact that mental and physical disabilities can have on a family and the consequent daily challenges.

I know about taking care of a terminally ill loved one, consulting with up to 4 dieticians at a time, trying to find the best possible diet to improve quality of life, while at the same time finding your path through the heart-breaking process of acceptance of what is.

I know about the constant seeking of a cure or solution for a mystery illness, like chronic fatigue, adrenal fatigue and depression.

I know about the anxiety and desperation when your child struggles with severe ADD and ADHD and can’t cope in a normal school set-up, with the consequent merry-go-round-effect of therapists and specialists and medications and programs and teachers.

I know about crisis-control and burn-out, while trying to deal with a thriving business (and the fluctuating demands, emotions and temperaments of staff, horses, children and parents), working up to 17 hours a day to ensure that everything runs smoothly.

I know about the isolation and hopelessness that a broken heart can cause and the path of slowly losing yourself in a desperate attempt to get the love and affection from your husband that you crave and believe to be crucial to feel complete.

I know about betrayal and infidelity and having the best intentions to micro-manage your relationship, in a desperate attempt to save your marriage, while in effect becoming the controlling, blaming wife, creating an even more resentful husband, who seeks approval from other women.

I know about debt and paralysing financial struggle, while trying to cope with the devastating pattern of a husband with a brilliant mind, feeling unfulfilled and changing from one job to another, while developing a gambling addiction with the consequent lies to try and conceal it.

I know about the process of disbelief, disappointment, broken trust, anger, counselling, forgiveness, hope, relapse, more counselling, miraculous turn-arounds, rebuilding and refocussing.

I know about being an empath and the consequences of getting caught up in narcissistic relationships and everyone else’s emotional worlds.

I know about the stages of grief, because I have experienced it.

But I also know about solutions, breakthroughs, triumph and peace, because I found it!

 

I have learned during the first 2 decades of my life how precious health is and during the next 2 decades I have learned how important emotional well-being is. These experiences are the driving force behind everything I do.

As a truth seeker and solution finder I really believed from a young age that life started at 40, and everything before that only to be research!

At the age of 40, I want to share the lessons, insights and choices that I have discovered so far on my journey, and I want to invite you to join me on the rest of this exciting journey of alternative choices and unlimited possibilities, to a life of abundance and well-being.

I believe it is my life’s purpose to bring energies of change to people, with a deep understanding of the powerful possibilities and choices that we have in every moment.

I experienced a wide variety of challenges and hardships during the first 40 years of my life, but I have no regrets. I did the best with what I knew in each moment, and it made me who I am today. I have made peace with all the mistakes I have made, I have asked forgiveness and I have forgiven. I understand that we all act from our past wounds and that behaviour is influenced by our experiences in life.

I have found that everything showing up in our lives, gives us an opportunity to consciously work through our wounds and negative belief-systems to get to a place of healing. I have come to embrace these opportunities and situations over a period of years, and have worked hard on things as they surfaced and came to my attention.

I am thankful for the grace I’ve received and I believe that my mistakes and experiences made me more compassionate towards others, and have put me on a spiritual journey where I have realised how my small human mind cannot possibly grasp the true greatness of an omnipresent God. This realisation has helped me to lose the picture in my head and rather just experience His unimaginable presence everywhere.

In my desperate quests for solutions and truths, I turned to alternative options early in my life, as I refused to be content with the limited possibilities I found in the conventional world.

My endless need to learn and research more about new ways and new information, lead me on amazing journeys! I embraced the biblical text of testing everything and I kept what worked.

I have found that there are no limits in this world when you open your mind. We can sometimes be so blind and it can be a long and hard road without the right support, but as the saying goes; the teacher will appear when the student is ready.

I have also learned that not everybody is ready to take responsibility and make the choice to get informed, because that also means to take action and start working on it. This was probably one of the hardest things I had to accept; in general, people will rather stick with the suffering they know than face their fears of the unknown towards freedom. I had to learn to respect everyone’s free will and choices. I have learned that I can only share what worked for me, how I made sense of my own wounded past, and how I came to understand how this can run one’s life and how change is the only way to break out of these patterns.

I now share with an open heart, how seeking guidance from God, from Jesus and from the Angels, lead to the right people crossing my path, which showed me the way to test new realities and gave me the courage to reflect on spiritual truths, by continuously going back to basics and finding confirmation from the bible.

I have learned to be content with asking questions without needing immediate answers, and rather wait expectantly for Divine guidance to get to more truths.

I have learned to see challenges as a series of opportunities to release negativity and conflict, and to embrace possibilities and hope, which ultimately leads to experiencing a journey to true freedom and healing.

Most importantly, the more I learn, the more I realise we actually know nothing – and this is a freedom in itself. It is ok not to know… because only then are we open to new possibilities and miracles, that our human minds can barely grasp.

This is my story

Approximately the first twenty years of my life

I was born in 1977.

Both my parents came from wealthy families and I grew up within what one would call a privileged, loving home. With a mom, well-known as a very strong, independent woman, a go getter who never sits still and the one who make things happen and a dad, well-respected, successful farmer, ranking high up in the military, a pillar of the community and our family’s rock, I felt secure and loved.

In 1984 my journey started with Brain Cancer.

I was 6 and my brother 4 when it was discovered that my sister of 18 months had brain cancer, with a 5% chance of survival. Cancer was a rare disease at that time.

The chaos of hospitals, surgeries, chemo-therapy and radiation started at around the same time as I started my school career. For the next 2 decades, I would learn to live with cancer in more forms than statistically possible for one family of 5.

My sister’s brain cancer demanded desperate measures, and with the results of brain surgery, severe chemotherapy and radiation, she needed growth hormone therapy, which posted the risk of blood cancer. This snowball effect developed into skin cancer and other bone deformities. She kept on surviving near death experiences, and with the brain damage caused, the next struggle was to see how her school career (and subsequent future) would be influenced. After countless therapists and private teachers, the time came to accept the fact that my sister would be like an eight-year-old child for the rest of her life. Despite the miracle that she was alive, it was devastating.

Everything stabilised until 1992. My brother was excelling in school through multiple sports and being selected as head-boy of his school, when it was discovered that he had a very aggressive bone-cancer. (At this stage, according to doctors, statistically impossible for one family to have 2 members with such rare and aggressive cancers.)

The chaos started again and he lost his leg in the process, with the long-term risk of lung cancer hanging over his head, if the cancer should spread. With a solid support system and being the person that he was, he excelled even more, competing in all school sports except rugby, with a maturity and leadership skillset beyond his years, being selected as head boy in high school again.

Again, everything stabilised until 1996. Through regular tests and check-ups, it was discovered that my brother had in fact developed lung cancer.

The familiar chaos started again and he lost a part of his lung. Two years later, with both of us studying at the University of the Free State, my brother had a lung cancer threat again, but it was discovered during surgery that the specialist must have ‘mistaken’ the previous scar tissue for cancer! We were overjoyed with yet another miracle out of Gods’ hands! We could breathe again.

Through all of this, my sister continually struggled with all forms of cancer and bone deformities caused by all the radiation she had received, while I developed the secret fear that any pain I experienced, could potentially be cancer and fought my own fight against unexplained chronic fatigue. Numerous tests, from blood cancer, yuppie flu and thyroid functions were done, with no answer as to why I struggled with constant tiredness and could sleep at any given time for as long as I was left to do so. Adrenal fatigue was still an unknown illness, which would have made sense due to the continued crises and near death experiences in our family.

After another stabilising period, it was discovered that my mom had a melanoma on her back, which was the one deadly form of skin cancer, without a cure.  The melanoma had to be removed with the hope that it hadn’t spread to other parts of her body. This proved to be true, as she fully regained her health.

My next encounter with cancer was when my dad was diagnosed with prostate cancer in 2004. He got through it with so much grace and survived, and we could breathe yet again.

By this time anxiety and negative belief-systems were part of my life! I developed, early in my life, a quote as an answer to the question of how we were doing: “The better it’s going, the more scared I become!” I honestly felt safer during the periods of crises and turmoil.  At least when facing a crisis I knew what we were up against.

Through all the tragedy though, I experienced countless miracles and learned priceless lessons of desperation and acceptance, of disbelief and gratefulness, and above all, how priceless health is!

With parents as example of never giving up when faced with hardship and always doing the right things in tough situations, I assumed life must be straight-forward, providing everybody stays healthy! I knew tragedy in the form of life-threatening disease, but about life outside my family structure, I knew nothing. I grew up over-protected and super naïve, and with my family history, I never really felt bored enough to rebel like normal teenagers so often do. Near death experiences and the aftermath thereof took up enough time, and I developed a certain form of “survivor’s guilt”, caused by the fact that I never had to fight for my life like the rest of my family.

Approximately the next twenty years of my life

I went to university and started my studies of science. With a love of physics I was happy and content with the rock-solid support of my parents. I started this phase of my life with the assumption that I could achieve anything, as long I was healthy.

My studies went well, but I struggled to fit in with the light-hearted and careless ways of a typical student. I was too serious about life and after a few relationship experiences I developed depression. In the process of finding something meaningful, I involved myself with a university community project of horse riding for the disabled.  My dad had an Arabian horse stud, and with a background of horse sports, involving all members of my family in either endurance riding, gymkhana or dressage, I was asked to take over this project. I started doing courses focussed on therapeutic riding for the disabled and managed to still cope with my studies.

I achieved my B.Sc. Agric Degree as an agro-meteorologist specialist in 2000 and started my master’s degree in Climate Change. It was during this transition phase after graduation that I met my husband. We “clicked”, and the natural next phase of my life was to get married, especially with my parents’ beautiful example.

The University of the Free State moved their Community Service Therapeutic Horse-riding Project to my premises and I established the Equistria Therapeutic Development Centre.

I got married to my best friend in 2001, and couldn’t understand that people can get so worked up and nervous when they approach marriage. I was fearless in my theories of life and things working out, as long as you stay focused and did things the right way. I believed it was just a matter of having the right mind-set and never giving up. After all, how hard could it be if you don’t have to constantly fight death? On my wedding day, I got the feeling that something was off, as I left the wedding venue, but I couldn’t pinpoint it, and with everything going on I shrugged it off.

I loved the new direction in my life and decided to stop my master’s degree and focus on riding for the disabled and dressage for people with special needs.

I participated in courses of the South African Riding for Disabled Association and became a qualified instructor with the South African National Equestrian Federation. My sister started riding and competing in dressage shows, and it opened a new door for other disabled riders, which was very exciting.

Something was off in my marriage and I started asking questions, which my husband made off as nothing, and reassured me that I was just overanalysing everything. Our relationship was based on friendship, which was great, but I wanted things to be “right”. I went to see therapists and church leaders for guidance and I was content with the possibility of stress or depression causing temporary strain on our relationship.

During 2002 I got pregnant. We struggled more and more, and he would come home at unpredictable times after work or early mornings. If/when confronted, he became dismissive or had some answer about a crisis. I felt very unsafe and lonely, and cried myself to sleep most evenings. The pregnancy was easy up to 34 weeks, after which I had to be hospitalised 4 times to prevent a premature birth of the baby. At the end, her heart stopped and my baby girl’s life was saved by an emergency caesarean. I was off my depression medication during this time, and after the birth I developed severe post-natal depression. I didn’t realise this as I only wanted to be with my baby and was too tired to even speak over the telephone, which could be explained as normal adjustment. During this period, my riding school was managed by a trusted instructor, and I was asked to help out at a local school to teach biology for high school kids. We needed the money and I decided to do it.

After six months I was so thin that my clothes barely fit me, and my main need was to sleep or be with my baby. I went back on anti-depressants, and the symptoms improved. My husband changed his job, and became even more unpredictable. I accepted the fact that a new job was very stressful, all while still fighting my own depression.

I felt responsible for everyone and everything and wanted to save the world. I wanted to provide therapeutic opportunities free of charge to all the disabled institutions and schools.   I started normal riding lessons and I eventually entered my sister in the Para-Olympics, at the Nedbank National Championships for the Physically Disabled, where she won gold and silver medals.

I was still searching for the missing link in my marriage, and during 2003 I learned that I was pregnant again. It was unbelievable. With this pregnancy I started to struggle from 24 weeks. After numerous hospitalisations, my son was born prematurely at 34 weeks, through an emergency caesarean and could not breathe on his own. His life hanged in the balance for 3 weeks. I could only touch his head, and was devastated and alone, with my husband busy with yet another new business in another city. The next 3 months I had to cope with a two-year-old and a premature baby screaming almost 24 hours of the day. After numerous visits to doctors and clinics to help me find out what caused the severe “colic”, I found a chyro-practitioner specialising in babies, and we found that his shoulder had been dislocated during the birth or something, causing the pain.  After a few sessions this was sorted out.

My husband’s new job was a financial disaster, and after six months we were financially almost broke, and our relationship had deteriorated even further.  We started with counselling sessions, and during these sessions it became evident that our problems were bigger than I could have ever imagined. Financial problems and our lack of intimacy led to other women. I was crushed and my depression increased, but I was in crisis-control mode, which was in a way familiar territory.

We separated and continued with counselling and therapy. My parents and family were devastated by the situation. It was during this time that my husband confessed that he never loved me and was still in love with his ex-fiancé, and that our marriage was the biggest mistake of his life. A part of me was relieved, because for the first time I could stop searching for faults in myself, and understood what was going on. He made a mistake and got married during a rebound phase and I was too naïve to know better, causing him to feel stuck. We continued couples therapy, as I believed we had to make the best of what we had chosen. He approached me with the news that his psychiatrist explained that he was suicidal and not able to make proper choices and needed someone to look after him. I agreed that he moved back and accepted that he still didn’t know if he loved me. I focussed on keeping everything together to protect my children and my family, and refocussed on my business.

During 2007 I was invited to attend a ground-breaking international course in equine assisted therapy and found one of my true callings in life! I went on to become a recognized associate member of the Equine Assisted Growth and Learning Association of Europe, and a member of the Equine Assisted Psychotherapy Institution of South Africa. I also qualified as Horse Behaviour Specialist at the Academy of Ethology. Equistria became the Free State Branch of EAPISA, and I served as the EAPISA Horse Behaviour Specialist representative of the Free State.

My business life was going from strength to strength, but my personal life had to be carefully managed to be the best it could possibly be. I made peace with the fact that I would probably never experience true love and that my marriage would be functional to protect my kids and my family. My husband kept on changing from entrepreneurial jobs to establish financial security, but it kept on eluding him and he started gambling to cover his expenses. As a perfectionist, I worked hard on myself with the guidance of my life coach and Equine assisted Psychotherapy partner, and worked longer hours in my struggled to micro-manage everything.

My business grew so big that I had to appoint more instructors in order to keep up. I eventually burned-out and had barely time to recover between managing kids, schools, business and my husband. This led to a pattern of broken trust, anger, frustration, acceptance, forgiveness and hope, by trying again and working harder.

My husband’s dad became ill and we discovered that he had liver-sclerosis and severe diabetes. He couldn’t work anymore and had to be taken care of, and so he moved in with us. It was a heart-breaking process to see a once impressive, proud man going through the phases of being one moment clear minded, and the next not knowing what he is doing. My husband had a hard time coping with this and escaped in work away from home.

Through all of this I had one child thriving in every area of life, while I started to realise that my other child showed symptoms of severe ADD and ADHD. My journey with doctors and therapists and alternative methods started (again), while my son struggled to cope in school. Medication made no positive differences, even with 3 difference types of medication at the same time! He was clever enough according to well-known professors and therapists who tested him at the university and his teachers could not understand how he would get either 100% or 0% for tests. I was desperate to find a solution for his absent minded behaviour.

It was during 2011, when I believed my marriage was stabilising at last, that I was again totally blindsided. After all my previous experiences and efforts, this was unreal. I had to face the truth, and everything finally came tumbling down in one moment!

I had to finally realise how futile it is to try and control, manage or change the heart or mind of another human being. I had to learn the hard way, about the universal law of free will, and that not even God would ever violate this law. It was time to face reality and focus on what was best for me and my children, while finding my way through all the memories, blocks and patterns I have accumulated to a place of healing and peace.

I had to make tough decisions, but it was time to admit that I made a choice that led to a situation that could not be fixed. I had to face the guilt and knowledge that I have to make a decision that will impact and devastate countless people around me. I had to live with the fact that my children were too young to understand why divorce would be the better option.

I had a choice: I could crumble under the weight of it all and see 12 years as a waist of my life, or I could learn from it and use all my experiences as stepping stones to something meaningful.

My journey to peace

With the healing support of my family, friends and colleagues, I found my feet and started a true spiritual journey.

Through equine assisted therapy I experienced amazing breakthroughs, and with the guidance of special and gifted people around me, I found new insights and freedoms.

I became more and more intrigued and inquisitive about the energetic transference between horse and human, as well as the strong influence of synchronicity, experienced during the processes of the equine assisted work I did. Although I believed in evidence based outcomes, and experienced the evidence of my work on a daily basis, I still struggled to explain this to clients.

The need to properly explain my work and the roll synchronicity plays in it, let my scientific background and love of physics kick in and I decided to pursue and study the principles of the law of attraction, in a quest to better understand the science behind synchronicity. Under the Global Sciences Foundation, I became a certified Law of Attraction Practitioner. This new level of understanding was powerful, and I decided to qualify as a Master Life Coach under the American Union of NLP to ensure better results with my equine assisted programs.

l was guided to a very powerful Energy Healer and Reiki Master, who trained under the direct lineage of Dr Mikao Usui. I started to learn more about self-healing and energy transference, and later received the Master Healer Degree of the Usui and Tibetan system of natural healing. I also completed the Advanced Healing course and received the Master Teacher Degree and became a Reiki Master, specialising in distant healing.

All the new studies demanded continuous intensive inner healing work and I healed on levels that I did not know was possible. I realised that we can’t find our happiness in someone else, which will only develop the need to manipulate other people to be who you need them to be. I found self-knowledge and a better understanding of different temperaments and personalities helped me to understand who I am, and why I operate in the ways I do, and also why I never felt I could fit into the normal pictures and boxes around me.

When you truly start to understand yourself and all the different personalities and temperaments out there, with all the possible background influences, experiences and perceptions, and the impact of a lifetime of wounds on each of us, there comes an overwhelming sense of compassion for yourself and others, and judgment naturally falls away, which makes forgiveness so much easier.

I have come to realise that wounded people hurt other people, and these behaviour patterns are just the symptoms of unmet needs of a wounded inner child, which, unless that person becomes aware of this vicious circle of destruction, and chooses consciously to face it and let it go, there is nothing anyone else can do.  It is solely our own responsibility to find happiness in ourselves, which will consequently let us enjoy other people, simply for who they are.

When you see mistakes for what they are, and you truly accept and embrace it as a natural part of life, you can understand that every individual on this earth has his own journey and lessons to learn. We all do the best with what we know, and if we don’t, it is still our own choice with our own consequences.

I now respect the law of free will and accept the fact that everyone is busy with their own process and journey in their own unique way. As an empath, I had to learn to protect and take better care of myself, as this is the best way to be able to keep on giving to others, which is the ultimate goal. I invited my children to join me on my journey and teach them about the value of life lessons and choices and the way we can look at things.

I knew I was on the right path when I was diagnosed with tumours in my womb at 39 and didn’t go into the old familiar pattern of crisis and chaos, as I now had powerful tools and the right support system. It was just something that came up and had to be taken care of.

At the age of 40, everyone in my family is still alive, healthy and happy. My daughter still excels in everything and my son found his place in a home-schooling system with alternative support to overcome his ADD and ADHD symptoms, and he is in the process of integrating back into mainstream schooling, after I prayed for guidance and found the Journey for Kids Method. I was lead to this process in the most amazing way, and thank God every day for the way He keeps introducing miracles in my life. Even my ex-husband and I have a peaceful relationship, and everyone is doing well on their own paths. We all do regular Journey process work and we celebrate every trial and triumph!

With every single experience I went through, I discovered something new, and learned something more about an Almighty, Omnipresent God and his amazing Angels. By realising that our minds can never even begin to understand or imagine the true greatness of God and losing the humanising picture I had, He became as real as the air I breathe.

I can see the pieces of the puzzle of my life fall beautifully into place, as I use the gifts I received out of every experience I have had.

I have redirected and fine-tuned my skills and passions into a holistic approach to assist people who realise how important health and emotional well-being is, by using quantum mechanics and the principles of quantum physics, combined with all the other powerful tools I have tried and tested.

Although the scientific explanations of energy medicine is still difficult to explain to the public, it is now my mission to try and demystify the field of quantum physics and energy medicine in the form of illustrative books, as I am currently pursuing a PhD in Mind-Based Integrative Medicine.

I have found that freedom and peace that The Bible refers to so often, and I now move in a space where I respond to things by asking open ended questions as things come up, and then just let God guide me to the truth.

I invite you to join me on this journey of life, embracing the trials and lessons and celebrating the ultimate gifts it brings, and I leave you with a precious poem that I memorised as a child:

“I walked a mile with Pleasure, she chattered all the way,

but left me none the wiser for all she had to say.

I walked a mile with Sorrow, and never a word said she,

but oh, the things I learned from her, when Sorrow walked with me.” – Unknown

To your best life!

Marie