What happens when success, security, and achievement stop answering the deeper questions you’re asking about your life?

In this episode, Stephen Skwierczynski shares his journey from physiotherapy to high-performing software sales - and ultimately working alongside an indigenous community in Colombia to help build the first indigenous-owned stingless beekeeping school in the Sierra Nevada.

After years of suppressing his curiosity and intuition in favour of validation, money, and achievement, Stephen began to experience anxiety, physical illness, and a growing sense of disconnection. What followed was a series of experiences - silent retreats, darkness retreats, vision quests, and time in nature - that helped him step out of the system and reimagine what leadership, impact, and success could look like.

The conversation explores curiosity as a compass, the cost of ignoring your body’s signals, and how creating space - not answers - can radically change the direction of your life. Stephen reflects on identity, masculinity, vulnerability, and why reciprocity, not extraction, now sits at the centre of his work.

This is an honest, grounded discussion for anyone questioning the path they’re on - especially high achievers who sense there must be a way to build success without sacrificing meaning, health, or integrity.

In this episode, we explore:

• What it feels like to succeed on paper but feel disconnected inside
• Suppressing intuition - and how the body eventually pushes back
• From physiotherapy to software sales - and falling into “the system”
• Validation, achievement, and the hidden cost of high performance
• Creating space through silence, retreats, and time in nature
• Why curiosity matters more than having a ten-year plan
• Masculinity, vulnerability, and redefining strength
• Indigenous wisdom, reciprocity, and working with nature - not against it
• Building a regenerative education project with an indigenous community in Colombia
• How small, grounded choices can lead to unexpected life shifts

Who this episode is for:

• Professionals questioning whether their career still fits
• High achievers experiencing burnout, anxiety, or numbness
• People curious about alternative paths to leadership and impact
• Anyone feeling trapped by success they once wanted
• Listeners interested in purpose, nature, and regenerative models of work

About the guest:

Stephen Skwierczynski is a former physiotherapist and software sales leader turned impact-driven entrepreneur and facilitator. After nearly a decade in the corporate world, Stephen stepped away to explore leadership, psychology, and human connection through retreats, coaching, and work with indigenous communities.

He is currently working alongside the Arawak people in Colombia to help build the first indigenous-owned stingless beekeeping school in the Sierra Nevada - a project focused on education, ecological regeneration, and reciprocity between people and land. Donate to support Stephen's work here.

Connect with Stephen:

https://instagram.com/stephen_wayfinder

https://instagram.com/guardians_laangelita

https://www.linkedin.com/in/theresilienceproject

https://www.laangelita.org

https://www.zeffy.com/en-US/donation-form/guardians-of-la-a

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What happens when you follow the plan, build the career, tick the boxes - and still feel quietly misaligned?

In this episode, Julette Alon shares her journey from high-performing corporate life in Singapore and Bangkok to stepping away from everything she was “supposed” to want. Despite career success, financial stability, and global travel, something inside kept calling her toward a different way of living.

The conversation explores burnout, intuition, identity shifts, and the uncomfortable moment when success stops feeling successful. Jules reflects on redundancy, expat life, nervous system regulation, and why she ultimately chose to leave corporate life to build a sound healing and energy work practice from scratch.

This is an honest, grounded conversation for anyone who feels stuck between comfort and calling - especially high achievers who sense that the life they built no longer fits who they’re becoming.

In this episode, we explore:

• What it feels like when the plan works - but fulfilment doesn’t
• Burnout, anxiety, and the hidden cost of high performance
• Living as an expat and constantly starting over
• The role intuition plays in major life decisions
• Why many people ignore the signs for years
• Mini leaps vs big jumps when changing direction
• Sound healing, nervous system regulation, and modern wellness
• Rebuilding identity after leaving corporate success behind

Who this episode is for:

• Professionals questioning their career path
• High achievers feeling burned out or disconnected
• Anyone curious about intuition-led decisions
• People navigating identity shifts, pivots, or reinvention
• Listeners interested in wellness beyond hustle culture

About the guest:

Julette Alon is a former corporate leader turned sound healer and energy practitioner, now based in Bangkok. After more than two decades in corporate life across Asia, she chose to step away from the version of success she’d outgrown - and build something more aligned, meaningful, and sustainable.

Connect with Julette - https://linktr.ee/anahata_energy_alchemist

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I launched Rethink Travel about 4 years ago! And I love every single one of the conversations I had with the amazing guests on my first 7 episodes.

They are pioneers in sustainable travel, visionaries and people I admire so much. I am so grateful they trusted me to tell their stories.

Now, as my life evolved, and my journey into being a human exploring sustainability, kindness, unconventional lives, or self development, I feel like sharing people's stories beyond travel and beyond sustainability.

I am someone who listens to a LOT of podcasts, and in the last years, I feel like there are about 20 people who keep interviewing each other and live in a silo.

There are SO MANY interesting people out there, with amazing stories that no one's ever heard. And I want to put a spotlight on them.

Also, I think most people who listening to podcasts and trying to change the perspective on their own lives, I believe, feel incredibly intimidated by all the podcasters who are multi millionaires and just say "change your mindset".

Ok, but how? what are the steps? how does someone with a job and who's never left their small hometown actually manages to dream different? Notice I said "dream different", not necessarily big.

How can people Rethink their OWN lives? How do people figure out what steps to take? How can people relate to people who look like them? or come from a similar background? What are all the other ways of living life? What is normal? What is abnormal?

These are some of the questions I cannot wait to explore.

Stay tuned, I'm dropping 5 episodes in November 2025!

with love and gratitude, Nat

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