19/08/2024
Today is a meaningful day for me, as it has been a year since my motorcycle accident that I was fortunate to walk away from.
I have been reflecting a lot about what I have experienced over the last year and chose 3 moments that have completely changed my life to share with you.
As I am often the one leading the class, session or workshop so my intention for doing this is to provide you an oppourtunity to get to know me.
I recorded a video message that you can watch here: https://youtu.be/Il6vYp_Ltko
Or if you prefer to read, an edited transcription of the video can be found below.
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One year ago today on August 18, 2023 I was involved in a motorcycle accident.
They say a lot can happen in a year, but I never believed it until I experienced it, and I can use the date of my accident as a starting point. I'd like to share with you what I experienced over the course of the following year.
Going back to the accident, I was coming around a corner doing about 40kph when I felt the back tire slide and then my motorcycle started pitching sideways. I decided at that point I can't recover from this, so my best option is to let go of the motorcycle, curl up in a ball and roll on the ground to a stop.
So I did just that. I let go of my motorcycle, curled up into a ball and waited to feel the impact on the ground and roll.
But I didn't feel the ground. A short period of time passed and then I feel an impact as I landed on my backpack and I started tumbling, having no bearing as to where I am.
When I stopped I looked up and I saw a tree three feet in front of me. I looked off to my left and there was another tree, looked off to the right and in the distance there were more trees and rocks everywhere and all I can wonder was "How did I get here?"
My friends that I was riding with found me. Emergency Services came and extracted me. I find out later that I was launched off an edge of an embankment and tumbled about 100 meters down.
I walked away from that accident with four broken ribs.
When I shared this story with my spiritual mentor, she said to me "You can either believe you were just really, really lucky and somehow missed everything on your way down or maybe you had a little bit of help."
And I really had to think about that.
One question that kept popping up is "There's got to be a reason why I'm still alive?"
I started my process of healing from the accident and on September 22, I took to the stage at VoiceStory Live to share my story about the Power of Forgiveness. And very similarly, I didn't understand the Power of Forgiveness until I felt it myself, and the story I shared was how I finally forgave myself.
What happened after that? I felt free. My inner critic was silenced, the pain of my father who passed away faded and just turned into sadness.
A month later on October 22, I was at a plant medicine ceremony that my friend Andra insisted that I go and participate in.
In the first 2 days, Ayahuasca went through my body, went through my heart, and found all the grief that was hiding and trapped in there, stripped it all out and asked me to process it. Which I did.
It was on day 3 when I was administered 5MeO-DMT, which allowed me to access my subconscious, and what was presented to me was the suppressed trauma from the passing of my Grandfather. I was 19 at the time and I remember not feeling a single thing when I heard of the news of his death.
Well... that morning I got to process all of it. It was by far the most painful experience that I've ever had, and I've processed plenty of trauma over the 15 years of work that I've done to get to that point.
When it was all done I felt different.
In the days and weeks that followed... the result of processing all that trauma, and I would never have believed it, but all of the coping that I had... all my coping mechanisms were gone!
All of the thoughts, the desires... I never believed that the monkey of addiction I would be gone!
I always believed that I would have to deal with it for the rest of my life. It's gone. The wanting, the desire for alcohol and substances to numb out don't exist anymore.
A friend of mine who deals in trauma explained it to me like this: "You had chronic pain. Imagine if you had chronic back pain for years and years, and you needed medication to just make the pain bearable so you can exist. Then you supplemented that with alcohol and substances to numb out so you can just go on every day.
Now imagine waking up one day and it's gone!
Now your body is not stressed out. It's not creating all those chemicals inside of you in order to cope with the pain. It can down-regulate and you are going back to normal as there is no pain to cope for."
And that made a lot of sense.
In the months that passed, I realized it really did happen. The pain is gone, the thoughts are gone and replaced with just wonderful experiences.
You might be thinking "That's great! I want to experience that too!"
Please understand that it took 15 years of hard work for me to prepare for that 10 minutes of transformation, and I truly believe that if I wasn't ready, that I would have had a much different experience.
I share that story to you purely to say, if you're on your journey of healing, whatever you want as the end result... it's possible! It really is!
I kept holding on the belief that if I keep going, the Universe one day is going to give me a new experience, as I continually clear out the pain, the trauma, suffering that I kept holding on to that was stored deep within this body.
I finally experienced something that I truly believed was impossible! To be free of the coping. So keep going on your journey. Keep doing the work, because I'm standing here as proof that healing is possible.
The third thing that happened was I got to experience what "letting go" means at a deep, deep level.
I was doing a very deep dive in a sensory deprivation tank and I became aware of all the resentment and regret that I was holding on to. Started with my own regret and resentment, and as I started letting them go I realized there's so much more that was stored within me that's not even mine! I inherited it! So I just made the decision that I'm done with it. I'm done carrying this because it serves no purpose. I just started working on just letting it all go.
The result of doing all that? It became very clear why I do what I do.
I discovered the really deep why, behind my why.
What I just deeply resonate with is teaching people how to connect with themselves, how to have meaningful conversations, to teach them empathy, compassion... to heal.
In that moment I understood why I'm still alive.
If you've attended one of the community sessions that I run, a weekend workshop, if I happen to be your coach or mentor... I have a lot of gratitude that you chose me! Trust me to teach, not preach, and to guide you on your journey.
Because I know firsthand what it's like to get out. To get out of your own personal hell, get out the other side and to be able to finally feel everything and live.
I want you to experience this too! I really do.
So I look forward to connecting with all of you at the next session or event, and if we have yet to connect and meet, I look forward to meeting you and having a conversation.
Keep going on your journey, feeling it's possible and never, ever give up!
- Winston
