My Personal Development Success

My personal development success is nothing extraordinary.

It is a story that is told by people like you, who are overcoming the bad, and learning to embrace life, with everything in it.

It's a story of an ordinary girl - who made bad decisions and developed a soul destroying lifestyle. This story tells of a women who chose to change. And she did.

I have not reached a destination. There is no end. Only the aim to learn with the ultimate goal of experiencing universal love. All the goals in between are only mile stones to help keep me walking forward. The more I learn, the more I can see how much I don't know. I am a student of life. An experimenter. Open to possibility, opportunity and above all, determined to become the highest ME I can possibly be.

This is my journey from Victim to Victor, Victor to Hero...

...My Personal Development Success Story in a Nutshell!

There was no reason for me to go down the wrong path. Perhaps I was bored, perhaps adventurous. I'm not sure. I do know that I didn't like myself very much at a young age. I was too different from the rest of the kids, and...

I believed that was because something was wrong with me.

At twelve I started to drink. By the age of fifteen, I was partying in some of the most dangerous areas in Johannesburg. I often missed school, and went to bars instead.

At seventeen, I was arrested on – though never charged with – a drugs related offense.

At nineteen I was raped.

By the time I was twenty four, there was not much I hadn't seen. I was, as the legendary journalist and author, Can Themba once said of himself, 'looking good, living fast and ready to die young.'

On the other hand, South Africa was in exciting times. Our first elections had just been held, and I had been part of the team that ensured our first free elections. It was a time of celebration.

Soon after this I began to crash. Although I was teaching life skills throughout South Africa, my own future seemed bleak. Obsessively in love with a man who was not committed to me, I opened myself up to great emotional abuse.

I sank deeper and deeper into alcohol and depression. Some days were so dark, I begged God to let me die. It is a pain I wouldn't wish on anyone.

If I had continued with my life choices, I don't believe I would be here today.

One night, I hit a friend in the face. It was a day that would change my life. She doesn't remember. But I do. As if it were yesterday.

The next day, I stopped drinking. For life. My friends didn't like it at first. The alcohol and drugs were a part of our lives. Today, like me, many of my friends, have cleaned up.

Over the next few years, I quit smoking, meat and abusive relationships. I healed myself from a severe depression and lost 18 kg.

These are just some of the challenges I faced, and the growth points I had to move through. It wasn't easy. And there certainly were no 'quick fix' routes. I had to face the hard truth that I had become a jerk. And that wasn't easy.

Some personal development success I can share today!

I am ALIVE - healthy, fulfilled and breaking through every limitation I believed I had.

This is why I am passionate about the importance of personal development and spiritual growth.

I began by reading self help books and attending personal growth workshops. I started karate, yoga, dance and meditation. Later, I got a life and business coach.

Now, I have my own business with a incredible team. A business that is a tool for my next level of learning. A business that stretches my personal growth, emotional intelligence, spiritual faith and exercises my capacity and leadership abilities.

I have a vegetarian adventure group which goes river rafting, hiking and swimming with dolphins.

I have fantastic friends and clients.

My parents, who suffered the most during my bad years, have become my best friends. I owe to them and my friends a lot of my 'personal development success' today.

The Four Steps To My Personal Development Success

What it takes!

It required four things:

1. Courage to face the things about myself that I didn't want to see.

2. I had to accept responsibility that my life was of my own doing. Every little bit.

3. Patience and persistence, especially on the dark days. It didn't happen over night.

4. Faith that everything is possible. Faith in yourself, faith in something bigger than yourself. It may be God, a higher power, the universe - whatever your language is.

This is what it took to shift from feeling like a victim, to experiencing victory over my own limitations and life experiences.

But it takes personal mastery to become the best of who you are.

And this is my current journey. To master myself. To take my personal development success - and become an ordinary leader, achieving extraordinary things in the world.

Things that make a difference to the lives of others. This site is one of the many milestones along the way. The gap between my 'current reality' is far from my 'vision.' But I am already living my purpose. I am already a success.