I grew up in the small rural town of Rodney in Ontario, Canada. Family has always been very important to me. I’ve been fortunate to have amazingly supportive parents and a large extended family of around ninety aunts, uncles, and cousins. I can say family gatherings were always a blast. After high-school, I headed to the big city of Toronto and gained a diploma as an Electronics Engineering Technician. Some years later, I took the leap to teach English in Italy. That didn’t work out so well. Yet changed the course of my life forever!
I then moved to Groningen, The Netherlands to acquire a Bachelor of Business Administration (BBA) degree in International Finance and Marketing. Along the way, I created amazing friendships that have lasted for twenty years since that first day of university. During these years, I spent two semesters abroad in Czechia and Hong Kong.
After university, I took a role in a software company in Munich, Germany. One could say it was the best of times. I met amazing people, had amazing times, and got to ski a lot. It wasn’t where I was to remain, though. After some years in Germany, I changed companies, and that led me to settle down in Vienna, Austria, where I worked for HP/HPE Software and Micro Focus for ten years and lived for 14 years. Life in Vienna was good. It was also a kind of “it was the best of times; but also it was the worst of times.” So many wonderful memories and friends and people, yet also some of the hardest times of my life in the last several years. In 2018, I left Micro Focus and stepped out into self-employment. I set up a company called TwelveGates, and I had planned to do some tech consulting with it. Instead, however, I found myself inspired to take all of my research and analysis over the years’ and put them into my two books and hence this website.
Sometimes even the best laid out plans end up taking you to places you never planned to go to. In January 2022, I gave up everything in Vienna planning to move to Latin America. After two months in Mexico, I ended up to my surprise back in Canada for six wonderful months. Then in October 2022, I took a one-way flight to Vilnius, Lithuania to join a friend in his blockchain Euro-Stablecoin start-up. As amazing as that was, it was in February 2024 that I felt the leading to leave the company and the country.
All these experiences have grown in me a heart of compassion. More than ever, I realize, we all go through our difficulties in life and a bit of kindness goes such a long, long way. In the end, I can say I’ve become very passionate about exploring the hearts of people and getting to know what really makes them tick. How do they see the world around them and why? I’ve also become passionate about history, kingdom law, kingdom economics, information, and data analysis, and challenging and testing cultural norms. This all includes my own beliefs and ideas about the world around me.
I believe all people have value. Yet not all ideas have equal value. My desire is one day to see all people everywhere walking in the meaning and purpose of their lives. I look forward to the day that I see this happen.
