Meet Susan

Susan JohnstoneEver since I was little, I've had 2 strong feelings about myself.

The first feeling was that I knew there was WAY more to me than I was expressing and way more inside me than anyone could see on the outside.
I longed to find out what it was and learn how to be "All of me".

Yet at the same time, for reasons I couldn't explain, I also had the feeling that there was something very wrong with me and I doubted that I would ever do anything good in the world like I wanted to.

My whole life has been a study of these two opposing feelings and a quest to express all of myself and my gifts in the face of everything that seemed to be telling me not to, both from inside and outside me.

I got a lot of mixed messages when I was small, like we all did.

The adults around me figured out pretty early on that I was "bright". And once school started I was expected to perform to my "potential". But coming from a thoroughly British background, humility and invisibility were the order of the day.

So I was supposed to be brilliant...and no one was to know about it. There's a conundrum!

Of course, as expressed by James Hillman in The Soul's Code, our challenges are perfectly placed to thwart us early in life in exactly the areas where we're called to explore deeply. So I was left with a deep curiosity and desire to discover my full potential, allow it to be seen in the world and find out what it was for.

I had my first crisis of meaning 2 months after I graduated university. I found myself standing alone in the medical research lab where I worked thinking:

"This can't be IT! There's got to be more to life,  and more to me,
  than THIS!"

So at 22, I started educating myself and embarked on my quest in earnest.

I studied for 20 years, (in fact I'm STILL studying!) reading, practicing, taking courses and seminars, and hanging out with others who were studying the same things I was. I learned about psychology, quantum physics, spirituality in many different forms, voice work, shadow work, dream work, the Law of Attraction, human interaction dynamics, conflict resolution, healing in many forms and modalities, life purpose and calling, creativity, art, compassion, empathy, and on and on and on.

Most of all, I learned to dig...deep into my own inner world, to discover the roots of whatever was running my life in that moment.

By the time I was 36 I had learned a LOT.

And I had put my learning to work and accomplished quite a lot too.
-  I spent 3 years working with an international seminar company
-  I had opened a million dollar wellness centre, along with a team of 6
   others. It was one of the largest in North America and allowed me to
   experience over 25 different healing modalities
-  I designed and presented several of my own seminars and led  
   teleclasses on a number of topics
-  I had spent several years leading and co-leading corporate team-
   building programs
-  And I had my own coaching company with a small roster of clients.

And I had recently met my future husband, David, but didn't know it yet.

A major turning point came in a late night phone conversation...

One night on the phone, in the summer of 2001, he pointed out that, for all I had learned and all I had done, I was still living pretty small and I was expressing nowhere NEAR my full potential!

Well...I blew. I lost it. I raged at him, I swore, I defended my life. I finally told him to F*** OFF, and hung up on him.

I sat in the dark in my living room for the next 15 minutes listening to a voice ranting on and on in my head with everything I wanted to say to him to prove him wrong. I had already learned how to witness myself and not identify with my thoughts and feelings, so I was watching them at the same time as a part of me was thinking them.

And then a part of me started to daydream about being hit by a car and how badly he would feel if I was dead the next day, and how sorry he'd be for all he said...

...and I stopped cold!

I looked around at my tiny basement apartment, where I lived alone, barely able to pay the rent on it, and I knew he was right. And I said to the part of me that was daydreaming, "Are you SERIOUS?! You would rather DIE than have to step out and learn to live bigger than THIS?!!" There was no response. Everything inside my head was now completely quiet.

That's when I understood what I was really up against, the defense system inside me, and I got a good solid look at the resistance that was determined that I would NEVER be ALL of who I wanted to be.

And for the second time, I got serious and I embarked upon the next level of my education...

...to find out everything I possibly could about what gets in our way and
how to deal with it so that we can each fulfill our greatest potential for ourselves and for our world.

And in the last 8 years I've learned an enormous amount about resistance and about transforming it and about the journey of becoming all that we're here to be.

And I think that's exactly what my early challenges were for and I truly believe that sharing all I've discovered in the service of freeing YOUR gifts and potential is what I was meant to do with what I was given.

And in this role, I'm honoured to be able to offer a hand to others who are pursuing their path, seeking to find out who they really are and the gift that they can be to the world around them.

If you'd like to connect, I'd love to hear from you! Feel free to Contact Me .

OR if you're ready to break out of whatever's been holding you back, I invite you to download my Free E-Book.

My 20-page guide called "6 Keys to Ending Your Battle with Resistance and Allowing Yourself to Succeed" will show you many of the fascinating sources of your resistance along with the 6 Meta-skills that are needed to transform it. You'll come to see self-sabotage in a whole new way so you can soften your struggle and learn how to make real progress again. Find out more.

In Gratitude

The Sufi's say that we will each be known by our fruit - by what we offer and by the legacy that our lives leave in the world. The fact that I have any fruit to offer you at all is due to the Grace of the Beloved (my word for the Divine) in guiding me to my teachers at The Way of the Heart.

My fruit tree flourishes because it has grown on a steady diet of THEIR fruit, their teachings and offerings. And their fruit has been nourished by their teachers, and so on through the ages. Without this living fountain, my fruit tree would still be a short stick coming out of the ground with a few scrawny leaves on it.

I'm grateful to be able to offer back all that I've received.