About Janey

My outer journey

I was born in Tanzania where I spent my very early childhood. On returning to England, my family lived in Dorset which is where I grew into adulthood. I studied Modern Language at Oxford University, and then went on to train as a teacher at the University of London. Disillusioned by the state education system, I went into Teaching English as a Foreign Language until I trained as a counsellor at the Psychosynthesis and Education Trust in London in 1987. Since that time I have worked both as a counsellor and psychotherapist in private practice and as a teacher in language schools and universities. I have also volunteered with environmental and social justice projects in the UK and Africa.

My inner journey

My early childhood experience of trauma brought about a sense of isolation and being exiled from the love that I knew existed, and led to a long and deep search as to how to bring myself home into my own heart and body.

This involved exploring a great number of spiritual paths and practices, participating in countless workshops and retreats, and receiving personal therapy and healing, over the course of about twenty-five years. Each teacher, each workshop, each retreat brought me closer into myself, but I still had a strong tendency to disassociate from my direct experience and disconnect from my body because of the unhealed trauma that I was carrying.

Finally, I found teachers and guides of embodied awakening who could support me in becoming fully present with all of my humanity from a place of loving awareness. I worked with a trauma therapist and learnt to stay connected more deeply to my own direct experience of intense emotion or physical release. I have also intensively practised self-parenting, which allows me to take care of the little child inside me, and integrate her into my life. I am still learning, still growing, still discovering, and I imagine it will be that way till the day I die. My heart is devoted to Love and Truth, and this is the Pole Star that guides my life.

My spiritual practice has been guided by the timeless teachings of Christ and Mary Magdalene, and the Buddha. I offer my deepest, heartfelt gratitude to these extraordinary human beings who have also taught and guided me: Adyashanti and his wife, Mukti, , Chameli Ardagh, Jeannie Zandi, Colin Harrison, Fanny Behrens, Simon Daly, and Tara Brach.

And to my dearest family and friends who have loved and supported me over the years, I say “I am only here because of you.”

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