My Story of Metamorphosis
When I ask people what they've always wanted to do, most people haven't done it. That breaks my heart. People usually give up on their dreams and I always wished I had the power to inspire them to continue fighting for what they believe is important. It took me 3 decades, a 6-year relationship, re-inventing my life in 4 different countries, plant medicine and lots of sweat and tears to figure out what I wanted to do with my life.
But it was all worth it. And I want to tell you why.
My story is about how discovering your own story can change your life. How freedom is achieved by continuously looking for that centre of gravity around which everything else can revolve. How finding that deeper purpose doesn’t happen overnight, and that comfort is a privilege, not a right.
BEGINNINGS
◊ I’m a creature of my environment ◊
They say that life begins outside of your comfort zone. Mine certainly did.
My humble beginnings took place at the foot of the Alatau mountains in the former capital of Kazakhstan, Almaty. I entered this world feet first, after a period of 4 hours through the night, almost killing my mom in the process. Before I even saw my first light, it was clear that nothing in my life would come easy and in a conventional way.
When I was 8, my mom and I left our 5th floor, concrete post-soviet apartment building and moved our lives to the heart of Europe, Belgium. A new start. New language. New culture. New family. New everything.
At 22, I left the comforts of my home for the first time to study in Denmark for 6 months. Only I didn’t really study that much. Instead, I changed girlfriends as fast as I changed my underwear, got my heart broken for the first time, binge-watched TV shows during the daylight hours and partied from dusk till dawn. And don’t even get me started on the occasional escapades to Berlin, London, Amsterdam and Stockholm.
After graduating with a masters in architecture I started working 9 to 5, earning good money and driving a company car, but decided to leave my secure job after 2 years to experience the lifestyle of the Pacific Northwest in Vancouver. The wild nature of British Columbia awoke a new kind of energy in me. Amongst the giant mountains and oceans I felt at home, maybe because it reminded me so much of the landscapes of my birth town Almaty. Even though I only stayed for 4 months, I promised myself to one day return and build a life in Vancouver.
I returned to Belgium to save my relationship with a woman I had met a year before. It worked out and we had a great time together trying to live out the traditional Belgian ideal—building our dream-home in the forest with a garden, a dog, 2 cars, regular vacations to France and a stable 9 to 5. It all felt cozy and exciting in our twenties, but as we both grew older we also began to grow apart. Our world views started to collide and I realized I was living someone else’s dream. She wanted security, comfort and a stable income, I wanted risk, adventure and new experiences.
MIDDLES
◊ Learning To See ◊
I was lost. I grew up in one culture and I was living in another and I didn’t quite understand my relationships with either. I really needed to work out who I was and where I belonged. I wasn’t living from a deep purpose but rather trying to measure up to what everyone else was doing. I was dissatisfied with my self, my work and my relationships. People around me seemed content on the surface, but I could sense their fears hiding behind a facade of nice clothes, expensive toys and shallow conversations. They were smiling but I didn’t see joy in their eyes. They were living but I didn’t feel their aliveness. And sadly, I was becoming one of them. Regular health issues, anxiety, and poor sleep started to take over my life.
I found myself asking: is that the kind of person I really wanted to become? Did I want to continue living a life of conformity and just settle with contentment?
The answer was a clear no.
Looking back to the culture shock I experienced as a young kid, or to my wild days in Copenhagen as a student, or even reflecting on the few months I spent in Vancouver reconnecting with nature as an adult—I always returned home feeling re-vitalized and renewed. It’s as if each experience created a spaciousness within me that allowed me to evaluate the person I had become, to keep what worked, and to get rid of everything I didn’t like about myself. With each new friendship, long beach walk, or hike through a forest, I felt transformed, more alive and joyful — not through a growing bank account or a convertible.
This realization led me to a huge turning point in my life.
I remember that moment very clearly—one of our last times in each others embrace—when I declared that I needed to become a better person. After six years, I didn’t only leave a relationship, a house that we together converted into a loft, and a generous pay check—I also left my old self. I felt heart-broken, empty of desire and spiralling into one of the darkest periods of my life. But the only way for me to heal was to leave everything behind and start from scratch.
In my carry-on luggage, all I packed were summer clothes, a camera, and a one-way ticket to Bangkok. As I gazed into the endless skies through the plane window, I felt myself healing from the prospects of a new adventure, new opportunities, new friendships, and a new me. I was on a mission to become a better man.
During my three months traveling through South East Asia, I uncovered new layers of my spiritual self. For the first time in my life, I began meditating regularly. The ancient Asian cities and villages, brimming with history, tradition, and culture, provided rich soil for my spiritual growth. I slept on floors, sofas, dorm rooms, and in the warm embrace of strangers' homes. I was challenged by loneliness and tortured by self-doubt. Yet the new experiences always outweighed the struggle. Here, smiles seemed more genuine, even in the face of adversity. People lived with less stuff but loved with more grace. Every day, fresh impressions made me reevaluate who I once was, recognize who I’d become, and inspired me to envision a new self.
My next stop was Melbourne, Australia, where my healing continued while living in a co-living community of travellers. People from Chile, Estonia, England, Italy, Ireland, Colombia, Belgium and Australia all lived harmoniously together in an 8-bedroom household run by the wonderful Eva Migdal. Eva was our host, mentor, leader, healer and so much more. She managed to provide a welcoming and inclusive environment where meals were shared, laughter was expected and collaboration on impactful projects was endorsed. I stayed for 6 months.
But the past 30 years felt like mere prologue to the grand story that was about to unfold.
It was on the 7th day of the 7th month of the year 2017 when I sat in a circle among a dozen strangers, with an Aboriginal shaman at the centre. The medicine man brewed a cocktail from indigenous plants that could send us on the ultimate journey of a lifetime. Regrettably, my vocabulary falls short in expressing the blissful state of the two hours that followed after drinking the Ayahuasca medicine. Perhaps such a profound experience isn’t meant to be captured in something as ordinary as human language. Just as it’s hard to articulate to a child the sensation of true love, this experience is beyond words. What I can say is that it revealed my place in the universe. My ego shattered into a billion tiny pieces as I joyously travelled through space and time, exulting in absolute freedom, detached from my body and mind.
If discovering my spirituality was the unspoken mission of my journey, then all the past experiences served as the key to unlock the gates to my deeper purpose. The dots slowly started to connect, my story suddenly started to make sense, even though the mechanics of every part of it still remained a mystery. I began living life with a greater sense of freedom, more relaxed and light-hearted. Opportunities started to appear, money came in the moments I needed it most and my relationships began to feel more loving and warm. I was becoming a better man.
On August 23rd, I received news from the Canadian Government: an invitation for residency. Having applied over a year prior, I'd almost given up hope. Yet, the letter arrived and I had no choice but returning to Belgium to figure out how to make $10,000 in three months—the amount needed for my residency in Canada.
On January 18th, 2018, precisely a year after leaving my old life behind, I landed in Vancouver, Canada, realizing my dream of living there once more.
ENDS
◊ Waking up ◊
I’m writing my story in May 2021, more than 3 years after moving to Vancouver in January of 2018. In those 3 years, I have met a beautiful woman whom I love dearly, I have started and failed at a business venture, started and quit 2 office jobs in architecture, worked as a food-runner in a Spanish restaurant, lived in 5 different apartments and, after being laid off during the pandemic, decided to take the opportunity to become a self-employed photographer and storyteller.
Despite my continued struggle with mental health, I have been waking up every day with a deeper sense of purpose than I have ever felt before. Some might say my life isn’t stable and secure and looks like a sequence of starting things and failing. But that’s exactly what they are: just ‘things’. Jobs, businesses, and countries are all experiences that help us learn how to live a more fulfilling life and it’s by failing at many of them that I started to learn what matters to me. I’d rather consume experiences and create memories than consume entertainment and luxuries and create debt. In the western world, we are lucky to have a choice. We can either face our fears and experiment with the opportunities that life offers, or stick to what’s comfortable, living the rest of our lives feeling miserable and alienated from ourselves and our relationships.
Every country I've moved to, every new face I've met, and every relationship I've started fortified my courage to chase my dreams. Each person I met revealed something new about myself, like puzzle pieces fitting together, guiding me closer to my deeper purpose. A good life doesn't come with a roadmap, just a passionate urge to live it fully.
We have the power to reshape our narratives.
Take a leap, dream big, and constantly reinvent your story. I roam the globe to amplify tales of transformation—stories that ignite our zeal to pursue our dreams. To push forward, regardless of the curveballs life sends our way.
