"I was dying inside" — My Journey Out of a Coercive Cult

And it's kind of evolved over time, but I was involved in lots of workshops and stuff.

Yeah, so really interesting work, but you came away from quite a challenge.

Yes, yes.

Well, I was actually brought up in a cult.

I actually left a cult when I was around 22.

So I was brought up in it.

I actually ended up in, it wasn't an arranged marriage, but it was an expected marriage.

And so at the age of 19, walked down the aisle to a man that I knew my parents wanted me to marry.

His parents wanted us to marry.

And I, back then, had no idea who I was.

And now I realise I was a people pleaser.

And to please my parents, I walked down the aisle and married somebody that I didn't even love.

And managed to leave the cult when I was around 22, 23, which was the hardest thing I've ever done.

Because when you leave, you do leave with nothing.

you are told that if you leave, then you'll lose everything.

So you literally have to start your life again.

I lost contact with my parents and it was...

It was a fairly traumatic experience, I think, because you just, you don't know who you are.

So you come away and you have to rebuild your life, not even knowing who you are and what you truly want.

And so that has really formed a lot of my work, initial work.

I've been a coach for over a decade and I started with self-discovery coaching.

That was my thing.

I was a self-discovery coach.

But underneath it all, women are aching for purpose.

You know, one of the quotes that I read that Glennon Doyle, who wrote the book Untamed, she says that one of the deepest regrets that we have as women or the deepest aches in our heart is dying without knowing what our true purpose is.