Rewriting resilience: Why I left corporate life

A thinker’s path from cybersecurity to natural medicine, and what I’m building next.

For nearly two decades, I worked in corporate risk strategy and disaster recovery, helping global companies identify weaknesses, build resilience, and prepare recovery plans in case of unforeseen events. I led global teams spanning multiple time zones and cultures, though despite working together every day, I had not met a single one of my employees in person. I loved my work; it felt important and preventive. But after a long series of corporate changes and nail-biting layoffs, demolishing a team and rebuilding a new one to meet new OKR’s and goals, I was starting to feel … flat. I was waking up to work and going to sleep thinking about strategy and team objectives. I was burned completely out.

It wasn’t supposed to happen this way, but somehow, I quit my job by accident. My dog had just died, and while that loss was real, it surfaced something deeper I hadn’t fully admitted; I’d also been grieving the loss of my purpose and drive. The pride I once had for my work had faded, and my soul knew long before my head that it was time to move on and make space for something more purposeful. I didn’t write a thoughtful note of gratitude to my boss explaining my desire for something different, nor was there a mature one-to-one discussion followed up by an action plan. No, no, I cried on a strategy call with him. It came out unexpectedly as tears tend to do, and I gave my notice right then and there.

So I left. And when I say I left, I really left. I went to therapy for a full month, twice a week. I did a deep values-based assessment that helped me build a foundation from which I could start making choices based on what was really important to me: adventure, community, travel, and living a curious life. I surfed every day. I dog sat. I sold my car and started riding my bike everywhere, because I could. I wasn’t in a hurry to get anywhere or do anything.

I call it The Great Undoing because it took me months to stop hyperventilating about not having a salary or something ‘important’ to do every day. My routine was trashed, and it took me a long time to figure out what I would do with my life if I didn’t have to wake up at 5 am for a conference call with India.

What emerged wasn’t a perfectly designed pivot; I had to undo 20 years of structured thinking and the constraints of a traditional career, including the loss of a salary and daily tasks. Using the new tools I had acquired from therapy and my values exercises, my monkey mind eventually settled down enough to think clearly. A soft and insistent question emerged: What if I applied everything I know about systems and resilience to the human body?

That soft and insistent question of human resilience led me to the core of my work today, and to a philosophy that is simple: true wellness begins within. I believe healing happens in the quiet places: in the gut, nature, and dirt, in the stories we carry, and in our own life’s rhythm. The modern world defers to systems that overlook our uniqueness, and we treat health like a checklist instead of a relationship. When we remember how to listen inward, to our innate knowing, we unlock the real path to wellness because our bodies already know how to communicate precisely what they need (or don’t need). It’s just that we’ve forgotten how to hear it.

I am now working to build an evidence-based practice to support those, like I once was, who experience high stress, disconnect, and a sense of emotional flatness. My work focuses on the intersection of integrative health, gut function, and cellular resilience, which are the foundations that often determine whether an individual develops chronic illness or exhibits resilience.

Whether I’m consulting, writing, or simply having an honest conversation with someone who’s quietly going through it, I carry the same ethos: We can’t manage what we don’t measure. That means looking beyond surface symptoms to uncover what’s happening at the root: how gut permeability and microbial balance influence brain signaling, how nutrient status fuels or drains cellular energy, and how chronic stress reshapes the body’s capacity to repair and adapt.

By connecting the rigor of medical science with the wisdom of integrative practices, I help people uncover the underlying patterns that shape their health story. Instead of chasing quick fixes or relying on a single modality, my approach weaves together functional insights, evidence-based nutrition, and sustainable lifestyle changes. For those living with stress or illness, the goal is not to mask symptoms but to support the body’s core systems: gut, cellular, metabolic, and nervous. And in turn, our body can regain its natural capacity to heal, adapt, and thrive.