Gerdi with Memnia Theodorou on lessons learned from real adventures
Memnia Theodorou is — among other things — an adventurer, motivational speaker with a TEDx talk under her belt, coach and — wait for it — dentist.
When you’re now thinking think “What an exceptional combination?”; you’re not alone. I thought the same thing when I first came across her profile on LinkedIn.
Her story is intriguing and we’ll touch on parts of it during on this episode of the podcast.
As she would say, her story starts with a diagnosis of ovarian cancer. Not in herself, but in her younger sister. Sadly her sister passed away only a few short months after learning she had cancer.
As happens so often when it rains it pours.
In that same year, Memnia had to find the courage to walk away from an emotionally abusive relationship and deal with an unsupportive manager at work. To say all of these things had an understandably negative effect on her mental state would be putting it mildly.
When on top of all this the deal on a house fell through, it was the proverbial final straw. Feeling hopeless and helpless she found herself in a really dark place.
That’s when she saw a poster for the Clipper Round The World Yacht Race. Having no sailing experience she took a leap of faith and applied.
Since that race requires sailing the most treacherous waters on the planet, sheer survival demands you find faith and trust in yourself and your crewmates, develop leadership skills and find ways to manage your fears.
After 5 months of sailing Memnia became the first Cypriot to sail from the UK to Australia.
She had applied to be part of a crew while in a dark place. She came back as she puts it “a new, shining, confident me”!
Now she is putting down in a full-length book the exciting and at times harrowing details of that sailing voyage and how she evolved into a better human my guest.
And with a coaching qualification and a master’s degree in applied positive psychology she’s on a mission to inspire and empower people around the world to awaken their confidence, find their way out of their dark spots and lead the life they’ve always wanted!
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