This is a long read. It is not necessary to read it, however if you would like to know about my journey and what has lead me to this space here is a “short” origin story.

I had a childhood with many moments of discomfort and challenge. I was a heavy, big kid – in 7th grade I was 280 lbs and 6 feet tall. I played sports and did movement, and I would eat massive portions with no second thoughts. The summer between 8th and 9th grade I herniated two discs in my lower back in a weight lifting accident which left my left leg in a constant state of pins and needles, and having to be surgically repaired. In 10th grade I was over 300 lbs, and struggling with maintaining momentum, living a life with much stagnation. I would go to school, then come home and eat a couple bowls of cereal and play video games. I developed my first addiction around this time to the computer game Diablo II, and can still remember falling asleep and dreaming that I was still playing the game.

Around this same time my father had his first stroke. I rembmer it was Black Friday very early in the morning and they were outside of Best Buy, while I was working at KB Toys. I was lucky enough to be growing up in an age where the internet was budding and through a browser based game, its forums, and mIRC, I was able to forge a great supportive community of people from all around the world. My first exposure to Energy Work and expansive Consciousness theories happened around this time. My father was rehabbing, and my internet friends recommended I bring him music and just sit and listen with him. “Sound Healing” they told me, educating me on how healing the musical frequencies are for the brain and the nervous system.

A few years later while I was in college, my father had another incident, and had a heart attack. On my way to the rehab one day I had a mystical experience, while stopping to pick up dinner. I was in a contemplative space just waiting when a stranger approached me, and asked me some questions. He then proceeded to give me a Vedic Astrology reading, which provoked a deep sense of connection to the universe and a felt experience unlike anything I had gone through up to that point. He assured me that my life would get better and helped me reflect on so many positive moments, reminding me that Tuesdays were a great day. He gave me a lucky Ganesh Bead that I held onto and wore on a necklace like a talisman for many years, until one day when that necklace broke and fell apart without my knowing. 

In 2009 I was diagnosed with an Auto-Immune Kidney Disease, I was 20 years old and told that my chances of needing a kidney transplant by the time I was 35 were very high and that normal people don’t have to worrry about the possibility of needing new organs. That was a tough reality to accept and took a while to set in. So at 20 years old, I began contemplating my mortality. It was around this time that I saw Be Here Now for the first time, without knowing what it was I bought it at Borders Books for $3.33. That summer I went to my first music festival, Wakarusa, in Arkansas. While there I met some incredible humans and had some profound and deep experiences that would change me for the rest of my life. My neighbors were 20 something’s and very stewed in the psychadelic world, and attempting their version of shadow work. They had a copy of Be Here Now, and it was there where I connected with the book and found a new mentor in Richard Alpert, AKA Ram Dass. Little did I know how much I was craving connection to my spirit and practiced around spirituality at that point.

Around the same time while out in the salt marshes of Long Island for a Marine Biology class I threw my back out while trying to move a large rock. That evening I was referred to Sports Medicine Doctors who helped me profoundly. After years of “monthly maintenance chiropractic sessions” this office helped “fix” my back in 3 sessions! They educated me around how things in my back worked, and how the rest of my body worked in conjunction. I still remember them saying “Dude, you have literally no ass, its no wonder your back hurts!” They then referred me to work with a personal trainer, and the physical portion of my Journey to Better Health Began.

I started with my personal trainer then weighing in at 330 lbs. At that point my social life was doing alright, I had a lot of friends and we would meet up all time. We were kids though so of course we were not acting in our best interests, I was smoking cigarettes and lots of weed and going through drive throughs at all hours of the day and night. My personal trainer helped me realize that I had no awareness in my consumption.

Over the next 9 years I would lose 140 lbs, getting to my lowest weight to date of 190 lbs, which is the weight that I was when I married my lovely wife in 2019.

In those 9 years I had a lot of momentum in self exploration, experimenting with the food and drinks I would consume, as well as the tv I would watch and, the music I would listen to. Analyzing my environments and the company that I kept, the friends I hung out with and the experiences I would choose to partake in. Eventually the crowd I was hanging out with would invite me to consider massage school in 2016, and once again my life would change profoundly – for the better.

While in Massage School at the Finger Lakes School of Massage I met my wife Victoria. We created our massage business Attuned Life Massage & Wellness located in Ithaca NY. 

Over the past almost 9 years, I have embraced my passion for helping others. I have learned that having been through these many life altering experiences that I can be a beacon along the path of better health. I have poured many hours into cultivating my awareness, amassing knowledge of philosophies from around the world and from the depths of time, while also experiencing and understanding many aspects of how the body works. In coaching sessions I apply my synthesis of many techniques of past and present masters, to observe and connect with the ever unwinding co-creation of life with the universe. Through cultivating greater awareness we craft a greater appreciation of life and confidence to accomplish goals.

Now I invite you, since you’ve made it here to consider working with 

The Alchemists Fire.