Who are we when the roles we've built our lives around begin to fall away? Steve Hodgson, Founder of Beyond the Noice Collective, reflects on the experiences that challenged his sense of identity and ultimately brought him closer to himself. Through burnout, the end of a long-term relationship and a cancer diagnosis, he found unexpected teachers in nature, men's work and moments of profound stillness.

I grew up in a decade when women were told, “You can have it all.” It was the late 1970s and early 1980s, and the message was everywhere - in movies, advertising, and popular culture. One commercial in particular captured the spirit of the time. In the famous Enjoli perfume ad, a confident woman belts out: “I can bring home the bacon, fry it up in a pan, and never, never, never let you forget you’re a man. ’Cause I’m a woman!”

We sat down with Barbara (Babi) Cesario, our Sales Manager and main POC for Buyer / Retreat Leader Enquiries, to get to know the person behind info@ — the traveller, the dog lover, the entrepreneur and one of the original team who brought Synergy to life.