Hi, my name is Andrea.

Almost three decades ago I started my professional career in banking. I loved it and I was absolutely sure that finance would be my forever line of work. I could not have been more wrong.

Life threw me a punch which forced me to stop and think. I found myself standing at the coffin of our one-year-old. This, and the uncertain months leading up to it were the hardest things I ever experienced. I asked myself the questions “What is important to me?” and “What do I need to change so that I can achieve it?” I quickly found myself on a deep and painful self-discovery journey. What I did not realise back then is that these journeys are life-long ones.

A few years later I moved to New Zealand with my young family, the place farthest from my country of birth and (then) life. Four checked-in bags, four cabin bags, a car seat, a pram, and a piece missing from our heart – that’s all we brought here, besides ourselves.

Moving countries accelerated my self-discovery journey. It meant physical separation from my past and a brand-new place to discover myself. It was a fresh start, albeit with limited support. I was living far away from everything and everyone I had ever known. It was tough – on all of us.

Years later, I started studying professional coaching. It was another dive into getting understand myself further. I discovered how much I had changed because of my experiences and how much control I had over those changes. I realized that circumstances in life change, things happen, but my responses to these are under my control.

My experiences have led me to believe that change is possible. That is, only if we want it.

Hi, my name is Andrea.