It has been one long ceremony of self discovery and understanding.

Following an abusive relationship, and the initial revelation of my childhood sexual trauma (A fun time, let me tell you) - I entered a wild and wonderful world with a giant group of eclectic artists. To a man/woman, we were all artists, which I think is quite rare, and isn't something I have any longer.

Several lines from a prophetic piece I wrote at the end of that intiatory year of 2015, called Classroom, rings true here:

Just then she was distracted by a new racket
Coming from beneath two desks that had been pushed together
It smelled nice
The music was alright
And the lot seemed open to life
But something was missing...
A Light
It was dark and she couldn't see clearly
Things got confused so she left for a clearing
A few from the desk commune had made it
Seated in lotus position, a beautiful calm on their faces
Their person's evaporated leaving no traces
She enjoyed the meditation, but knew this was not her stop at the station

You can listen to the full poem here: Bandcamp

As though deeply aware of something that my conscious mind didn't know what to do with, this beautiful murder of artists were, to a man/woman, dealing with addiction. Dealing is a strong word. And not to jump directly into the pathologising, there were countless beautiful and incredible moments, that I wish I could remember.

What we were all facing was our own inner-battles, drowned out by the sipping, smoking, and snorting, and the culture of acceptance whose mantra was, 'You do you'.

Victim is the typical role that the toll of strange relation makes us say, when seeking a safe way to be without the pain they cause the sheer force of locating the shell game your rough frame calloused into, there's beauty in there if you let that in too.

But the truth of Gabor Mate's words from In The Realm Of Hungry Ghosts (which I first read at that time), ‘At the core of every addiction is an emptiness based in abject fear.’ were confirmed over and over during these formative years. From sexual abuse, to domestic abuse, to emotional neglect, to bullying, and everything in between, not one of us was untouched by the cruel deliverance of the wounding social.

Sometimes people object to this kind of characterisation of pain and suffering, 'It's character building! Was worse in my day! No one gets to live a completely safe life!' - which misses the point, actually. What we're missing today is not safety, it is a village. Never perfect, ofcourse, but the shape of the absent human soul is the exact dimensions of the village we don't have. Meaning, the spiritual void we experience as mental illness is directly proportional to the lack of community that embraces us.

It is not the experience of these events which scars us, it is the lack of a balming salve.

Every song written, every poem spoken, every spontaneous rhyme, conversation, philosophical disagreement, every betrayal - rang with the bell of live! Live! LIVE! Even if many of us were trying to kill ourselves with our addictions.

Most of us aren't in contact like we were, though each of us retains a memento crutch from that time, this is simply how we cope.

This is the heart of the city, the heart of me which starves in the steaming sea of choked out pleas, stuffed down pain and thrown out needs, hard won memento and the list of stolen things, a list of sordid ways to dissuade deep connection, too much attention from anyone who might go digging or who may find the backdoor traps for the mapper of sore hearts, how to deflect those who saw us - so they see themselves

And through it all, I wrote poetry. Still, though much more rarely, I sit down to chart my thoughts and sensations with the invoked metaphors delivered from that other place.

From 2016 until 2020 I ran a poetry open mic, and was privy to hundreds of heartfelt and beautiful performances of people either sharing a well practiced ode to their suffering or giving their first ever performance in front of a group of attentive strangers.

At the end of 2020, my poem 'Tracks' was shortlisted for the Venie Holmgren Environmental Poetry Award.

I use to put everything into my poems. Every desire I couldn't commit to satisfying, every look that inspired me, every way the world ought to be, every relational difficulty - I channelled into prose, poetry or lyric.

And I did this until something happened. Something immense, and minute. Something that changed me forever, and is now why I am here, writing about how to heal, and offering the same through my somatic counselling.

(Me performing with my band in early 2022, one of my last performances with the group Freud and The Family Solution)

On June 23, 2022, after a month of intensive attempts to resolve my sexual trauma and its hold over me, I finished a poem. What happened next was so unexpected, so candid, so wildly inappropriate, that I wrestle with how to describe it, for fear of diminishing or aggrandising it.

You still blame him, as though he came in weapons a blazing and your damsel ways got taken, got raped in the thicket, chained in your victimhood you can't dismiss it, but it’s not quite so simple is it?

The Transformation

I'll ask that again after we hit the pavement and walk a ways into the next phase where this pain did more than deliver defeat as it goes hurt people hurt people you see?

As I wrote the last word on a long poem, a poem which was an underworld journey in and through my troubles, accompanied by Hermanubis, I broke my own curse. I spilled out all over that beautiful house I was caretaking while the owners were gone, 20 plus years of repressed laughter and tears. It is a blessing that I had previously had multiple psychedelic experiences, for the kinds of expression I was releasing is not for the polite of mind to deliver without a very justified self admitting to professional care.

Defensively, this place is more sophisticated than the city walls or propaganda could ever be, let loose Theseus he won't be finding a Minotaur as a centre piece, he'll die here and become rat feed

I laughed and cried, or rather howled and wept, for hours, without a pause. It got to the point that I could the dishes, and feed the animals (frightened as I'm sure they were), with complete bodily autonomy - I was just cackling and keening like an absolute fucking madman while I did so.

Now the final stroke of strange, which isn't super relevant to this discussion, takes this spontaneous somatic release from being complete catharsis to utter insanity. I received a visitation, a very visceral felt experience, hand on my shoulder though no visions, acceptance into the bosom of our lord and saviour Jesus Christ. HOLD ON! Don't go anywhere. In my article, Christianity without Proselytising, I lay bare my desire to never once attempt to deliver anyone into the arms of Christ. If it is right for you, as it apparently was right for me (though to say it was out of left field, is to speak of left field being lunar), He will find you.

And that poem is what you have been reading throughout. You can see from some of the raw and confronting words that came out of that time, that I wasn't holding back - I wasn't gently entering my trauma. I went into the underworld and came out the other side all the better for it.

That night I took the poem to my former open mic, now run by a friend, and read it to three people, two I knew well, and the other was a stranger. This is I believe is the crux of the name I have chosen for this newsletter and my counselling business, Common Witness. I cried through the entire reading, and was met with the appropriate level of acceptance and discomfort.
(If you would like to listen to this poem, head over to this piece on my substack, and scroll to the bottom, you will find a recording there - Church Of A Common Witness)

I must mention that, looking back, there is a kind of ceremony to the whole event - I committed to healing, no matter the cost. I started opening myself up to the pain and suffering. I ended a long and difficult relationship. I summoned a companion, a psychic guide into and out of my underworld (No matter what form the companion takes, don’t do this alone). And I trusted the process, once the release began.
A further anecdote here. Around this time, a friend of mine died in a car crash. A loving and beautiful soul. She had previously had an awakening of sorts, during an LSD trip (completely unrelated to her death). In the debris of that experience, rebuilding her spaceship mind, she was forceably committed to a psych ward by her parents. This is the exact wrong decision to make following such things.
Now, there is every chance that if someone had walked in on me during this experience, I would have had the same treatment. I would have understood the impetus, but wholeheartedly disagreed with the decision.
This is the importance of trusting the process. Trust also, that from the outside it does not resemble appropriate behaviour. We take healing on at our own risk, and must do so wisely.

Following this event, I gathered my belongings into my van-home, and headed out on a great big east coast journey. The second solo journey I had embarked on, to discover this beautiful country, and myself along with it. I headed to where my old man had recently bought a house and stayed with him on and off, while I did some odd jobs, spent time with my sister and niece, and mostly, actually, didn't discover much about myself. Seemed that despite the enormous undertaking of trauma relief that I had gone through, while it meant that I no longer had a knot in my stomach, and I knew myself better, I had now to begin the difficult work of integration, which, much like the ceremony of release, I was going to have to spontaneously figure out. After three weeks in the balmy sub-tropics, I headed back south. 

This was me several days before a whole other ceremony that would change my life immensely. I had planned to be a part of a grandfather ceremony (San Pedro cactus) with a young shaman, and several strangers. In order for the plant medicine to work its magic, a dieta was necessary. This would become a lfe altering decision, in and of itself, by giving up alcohol (which I am still off, nearly three years later). We engaged in a sweat lodge, which flushed me of toxins, and reaffirmed my connection to God. Then during the actual plant medicine ceremony, within a half hour I received a download regarding my history of disconnection from my fellow people. Then additional confirmations about the where and how of this disconnection, as I struggled intensely to join the group in shared singing. 

After completing the three day ceremony, I ventured out to Daylesford, to meet Patrick Jones and Meg Ulman. Patrick was running a fire choir men's circle, on the crown land near his property. I had intended to go before I began my journey north, but had been unable to alleviate the social anxiety which flared up in response. As though fate had other plans, joining in on this ceremony after the plant medicine, was the perfect combination. 

What I witnessed and experienced in this men's circle was nothing short of revolutionary. During a component of the circle where we make spontaneous vocalisations, singing, or humming, or just making random sounds, one of us enters the circle, the brothers around him lock arms, and sing or hum or make random sounds toward them. There was so much love, and intimacy in the act, between some familiar people and others who were relative strangers. It was affectionate. And it was completely devoid of sexuality. I mention that only to say there was this sweet, intimate affection between men, standing together in the dark, holding one another and singing in honour of the suffering of the man in the centre, and it was a moment of remembering. Like we use to do this all the time, an old limb of connection, or intimacy, long since atrophied but once someone brought it into focus again, I remembered just how important this missing thing had once been.

It was not long after this that I was baptised by my friend Jacob. jacob is without a doubt the most joyous individual I have met.

From here, 2023 to today, I will abbreviate the journey:

• I moved out of my van into a friend's place, and began work as a support carer.
• I also began Jiu Jitsu, and was starting to get very fit, very quickly
• I met my partner, and very soon after, we moved in together. This relationship has been my greatest interpersonal teacher
• I started my Embodied Processing certificate, in October 2023 and finished in April of 2025
• Across various different iterations, I developed a daily fitness routine which has greatly increased my energy and confidence
• My partner and I adopted a dog, Bob. Another great interpersonal teacher.
• In May 2025, I started Body First Somatics, as a teaching house and place of remediation for those suffering as I once did

Through the joint ventures of Poetry and a commitment to both healing, and overcoming insecurities (which may or may not be the same thing), I am now in a position to assist with some of the ways that life creates blocks in us, and prevents us from living in presence and desire. 

Certifications: