Hi, I am Maria Nazdravan.

My story

I would like to begin this story by telling you how I’ve always dreamed about being a therapist; how, even from my earliest years, I showed an outstanding level of empathy for human suffering; or how I was always in touch with something greater than myself.

The truth, however, is that I really struggled with life. For the largest part I felt disconnected from myself and the world, overwhelmed by anxiety and dread. But I loved music and I loved art and I loved, above all, books. I read voraciously and fantasised about one day being a writer–and so, naturally, I went into advertising.

My years as a creative copywriter were fun and a great distraction from the discomfort I felt within. I loved solving problems in ways no one had thought about before. As someone who spent most of their life feeling like an outsider, I enjoyed finding out what matters to people and creating stories that help them feel understood. But ultimately I couldn’t deny the fact that, no matter how much I liked to pretend my work had meaning, I was merely selling people more stuff they didn’t need.

After ten years of advertising, a humbling, yet necessary breakdown of everything I thought I knew about my life, my mission, and existence brought me to a reckoning. My last few years in therapy, along with my experiences with psychedelic-assisted therapy and a spiritual emergency piqued my interest for this work enough for me to quit advertising and dedicate myself to a long process of retraining. Looking back, that’s when my life truly started–I began again.

Over the last few years I've been consistently rebuilding through dedicated study, therapy, inner work, and devotion to spiritual practice. I learned the value of suffering consciously and alchemising pain through our greatest vessel, the body, and the organic way it metabolises trauma and difficult experiences. I realised that becoming a good therapist is first and foremost about becoming, not transcending oneself. I found that amor fati, the love for one’s fate, is the only enlightenment that’s worth pursuing.

And I came to understand that my work is to use my experience and love for knowledge to accompany and guide others on their own path towards themselves.

And let me tell you, it feels like the greatest honour in the world.