THE PATH BACK TO MYSELF
A Journey of Healing by Steve Hodgson, Founder of Beyond The Noise Collective
There have been a few moments in my life where everything I thought I knew about myself was stripped away. Not all at once. But enough times to realise it wasn’t random.
In 2018, I hit burnout.
At the time, I was deep in my real estate career. From the outside, it looked like success. I was performing, achieving, showing up. But internally, I was exhausted. Not just physically - mentally and emotionally.
There was a heaviness I couldn’t explain.
Fatigue that didn’t go away.
Anxiety sitting quietly beneath everything and with it, came the shame and guilt.
Shame that I couldn’t keep going the way I thought I should.
Guilt that I wasn’t showing up as the man I believed I was meant to be.
That period led me into depression and for the first time, I had to confront something I had spent years avoiding. I didn’t actually know how to take care of myself.
RETURNING TO SIMPLICITY
Nature was where things began to shift. Not through a plan. Simply, just by walking.
Time at the beach. Sitting with the sound of the ocean. Letting the water move around me without needing anything in return. It was one of the first places I felt even a small sense of calm.
I started hiking more. Spending time in places where there was no expectation to perform.
Twice, I walked the Overland Track in Tasmania. Days of walking. Carrying only what I needed. Waking with the light.
Out there in nature, no Wi-Fi or notifications, everything simplifies.
No roles.
No titles.
No distractions.
Just breath, body and whatever you’re carrying internally.
And when there’s no longer any distractions, you finally have to sit with it.
In nature, I could finally hear my own voice. My intuition. I was able to think with clarity, to dream, and to feel inspired by the awe and wonder of the natural world. Witnessing the sheer beauty of life reminded me that there was something much bigger than the pressures I had been carrying.
The combination of movement and solitude became medicine. Walking for hours, breathing fresh air and immersing myself in everything around me awakened new ideas, new perspectives and a deeper understanding of myself.
Some of my most meaningful moments happened alongside my two brothers. All of us husbands. All of us fathers. Sitting together after long days on the trail, we had the time and space to really connect. We spoke openly about our challenges, our reflections on life and the different perspectives we had gained along the way. It was powerful for us as brothers, but equally powerful for us as individuals.
LEARNING TO LISTEN
In 2023, I stepped more intentionally into that journey. I wanted to reconnect and find myself, not the boss, father or husband, but who I was beneath all of that.
I started attending retreats - not as a facilitator, but as a participant. Some were close to home in Australia, while others took me further afield to Vermont, Sedona and, most recently, Italy. Different locations, but the same invitation: slow down, listen and feel.
They were a mix of experiences. Men's retreats, predominantly with SoulDegree, mindfulness retreats at Esalen in California, a Wim Hof retreat focused on breathwork and cold-water immersion, and others designed to step outside the noise and into spaces of stillness, breath, meditation and yoga.
I found myself in men’s circles where conversations went deeper than anything I had experienced before. I explored meditation and breathwork as ways to regulate what I was feeling, not avoid it.
I started to understand that wellbeing wasn’t just physical. It was mental, emotional and even spiritual.
That same year, I launched a podcast. Not because I had answers, but because I was curious. I wanted to understand people, their stories, and what they were carrying.
What I found was this - everyone is dealing with something. Most just don’t talk about it.
WHEN LIFE BREAKS OPEN
In 2024, my marriage broke down. Almost two decades of life together came to an end.
There’s no clean way to navigate something like that. It shakes everything - not just the relationship, but your identity. The life you thought you had. The future you had imagined.
I had to learn how to be a different version of myself.
A different father.
A different man.
A different human being.
Navigating a new reality with my two boys. Learning how to co-parent. Learning how to sit in a home that once felt full and now felt quiet.
There was so much grief in that and again, the temptation was to push forward, quickly. To stay busy. To avoid what I was feeling. But what history had shown me, is that I couldn’t outrun it.
So once again I leaned in. Into the discomfort. Into the questions. Into myself. And in doing so, I developed a deeper awareness of my patterns, my emotions and the way I moved through life's challenges.
It was an awareness I would come to rely on when I was diagnosed with cancer last December.
A DIFFERENT KIND OF STILLNESS
Another moment where everything stopped. Another shift in identity.
After surgery and now moving through chemotherapy treatment, I’ve been forced into an even deeper level of stillness than anything before it.
And in that stillness, things become clear.
For years, I had been building awareness - through nature, through travel and through retreats. But this was different.
This wasn’t something I could think my way through. I had to feel it.
“There are things that happen in life that stop us or change our direction. But a cancer diagnosis is different. It forces you to confront your own mortality. It creates a stillness because you realise that if you don’t have your health, everything else becomes secondary.”
It also makes you question how you're living. Whether what you're doing is truly what you want to be doing. It brings clarity around what really matters and the legacy you want to leave behind.
THE TEACHERS ALONG THE WAY
Throughout all of this, nature has remained a constant.
Time at the beach.
Immersing myself in waterfalls.
Walking without distraction.
Those moments have grounded me more than anything else.
They’ve reminded me that life continues. That there is something bigger than what I’m experiencing. That I don’t have to carry everything on my own.
Travel has played a role too.
Stepping into new places has allowed me to step outside of who I thought I was. To see things differently. To gain perspective.
One of the most impactful experiences has been connecting with the SoulDegree men’s movement, Founded by Synergy Alumni, Christopher Robbins.
There was something powerful about being in a space where men showed up without masks. No performance. Just honesty. Those experiences have stayed with me.
It helped shape my own path and deeper calling, creating spaces where other men can raise their awareness and navigate their own journey of healing.
Not because I have the answers, but because I’ve lived the questions and for those that step into those spaces, they all bring their own wisdom.
THE ONGOING JOURNEY
When I look back, each challenge - burnout, relationship breakdown, cancer - has broken something open.
Each one has stripped away parts of who I thought I was and each one has brought me closer to who I actually am.
There has been an identity shift in all of this. The version of myself I held onto - strong, capable, always in control was challenged.
What’s replaced it, is something more honest.
Someone who listens.
Someone who feels.
Someone who is still learning.
If I hadn’t gone through these experiences, I wouldn’t be here.
If I hadn’t taken the time to reflect, to unpack my past, my patterns, my emotions - I would have stayed stuck, probably even stepped backwards.
Perspective changes everything. You can see challenges as things that happen to you or you can see them as something that reveals something within you.
For me, they’ve been an invitation.
To slow down.
To reconnect.
To realign.
I’m still healing. Through recovery. Through treatment. Through life.
But I’m also more connected than I’ve ever been.
More aware.
More present.
More at peace.
And that didn’t come from avoiding the hard moments. It came from facing them.
Leaning into them and allowing them to reshape me.
MY PERSONAL PRACTICE: TURNING DOWN THE NOISE
For me, healing hasn’t come from doing more. It’s come from learning how to do less - more intentionally.
The noise of life builds quietly. Through pressure, expectation, constant stimulation and the pace we try to keep up with. If I don’t actively create space, it takes over.
So my practice is simple.
It starts with two things, my breath and gratitude.
Before I reach for my phone, before I step into the day, I take a few minutes to sit. One hand on my stomach, one on my chest and just breathe. Slow, controlled breaths through the nose. Nothing complicated. Just bringing awareness back to my body.
It’s a small reset, but it changes how I show up.
I also lean into Vedic Meditation. Twenty minutes, once or twice a day when I can. It’s not about clearing the mind perfectly. It’s about allowing the mind to settle, naturally. Over time, it creates space between thoughts, reactions and emotions.
And then there’s movement.
Walking. Being in nature. Time at the beach. Getting into water when I can, whether it’s the ocean or a waterfall. No headphones. No distractions. Just presence.
There’s no perfect routine.
Some days are messy. Some days I miss it.
But coming back to these basics - breath, stillness, nature - helps me turn down the noise and reconnect to what actually matters.
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