How Hitting Rock Bottom Became the Best Investment I Ever Made in Myself

I declared January 2014 as my true rock bottom. Not the kind where you dramatically announce it on social media and then go back to your usual patterns. The kind where you are staring at your bank account, your career trajectory, and your entire life and realizing that every single system you built is broken. I had been lying to myself for years, convincing myself that each previous low was “the worst it could get.” But this time, I had unequivocally arrived.

It was the most defining point in my life. I had just gone through a devastating heartbreak that left me unable to focus on anything. My body was falling apart with new physical symptoms I had never dealt with before. And the depression I had been dragging around for years, the one I had almost gotten comfortable with, was now actively sabotaging my ability to function. The only asset I felt I still had was my job, and I clung to it like a life raft. But my days had become a painful, unproductive loop: show up to work running on empty, cry the entire drive home, collapse for hours, repeat.

Here is what nobody tells you about financial and professional rock bottom: it is rarely just about the money. The money problems are the symptom. The real bankruptcy is happening inside you, and until you address that, no raise, promotion, or side hustle is going to save you.

The Moment I Decided to Invest in Living

I will never forget the morning I woke up and heard a quiet voice inside my head say: You can choose to live or die.

I know that sounds extreme. But in my mind, those truly felt like my only two options. Instead of surrendering to the darker one, I made the most important decision of my life. I said YES, and for the first time, I actually meant it. I was going to invest whatever it took (time, money, energy, pride) to rebuild myself from the inside out.

According to the American Psychological Association, resilience is not a fixed trait. It involves behaviors, thoughts, and actions that anyone can learn and develop. That single moment of choosing to live, to really commit to it, was the first deposit I made into what would become the most valuable portfolio I have ever built: my own well-being.

And here is the thing about that decision. It was terrifying from a financial perspective too. Healing costs money. Coaches cost money. Saying yes to yourself when your bank account is already shaky feels reckless. But I had spent years spending money on things that numbed me (takeout I did not taste, online shopping I did not need, nights out that left me emptier than before). Redirecting even a fraction of that toward actually getting better was not reckless. It was the smartest financial pivot I have ever made.

The Hidden Cost of Running on Empty

Around this time, I was fortunate enough to attend a Tony Robbins event. It was genuinely powerful, and the business strategies alone were worth the price of admission. But I sat there knowing, deep in my bones, that I was not capable of implementing a single thing I was learning. I wanted to change more than anything, but I could not figure out what was blocking me.

That gap, the one between knowing what to do and actually being able to do it, is something I think a lot of women in business understand intimately. We read the books. We attend the seminars. We write the business plans. And then we go home and cannot execute because we are running on emotional fumes. We are so depleted that even the most brilliant strategy in the world cannot compensate for a human being who is falling apart.

One thing that did stick from that experience was a complete overhaul of how I nourished myself. I became an overnight vegan (well, vegetarian if you count the milk chocolate chips that were my daily companions). It sounds like a health decision, and it was. But it was also a financial one. When I stopped spending money on the junk food cycle of binge, regret, repeat, I started having more clarity, more energy, and more capacity to actually show up for my career. The ROI on feeding yourself properly is something no business book talks about, but it is real.

Hiring the Right People to Help Me Rebuild

Then David and Heather entered my life, the founders of Zen Rose Garden. They became my coaches, my healers, and (I say this without any exaggeration) the reason I am here writing this today. In business terms, they were the consultants I brought in when I finally admitted I could not restructure this operation alone.

I think women especially struggle with this. We are conditioned to handle everything ourselves, to bootstrap our emotional lives the same way we are told to bootstrap our businesses. But here is what I have learned: the most successful people in every industry have coaches, mentors, and advisors. Investing in professional support for your inner world is not a luxury. It is the foundation that everything else (your income, your career decisions, your ability to negotiate, your confidence in a boardroom) is built on.

As the saying goes: “When the student is ready, the teacher will appear.”

Research from Harvard Health has documented the powerful connection between emotional distress and physical symptoms, particularly through the gut-brain connection. When you are carrying years of unprocessed pain, it does not just affect your mood. It affects your energy, your focus, your decision-making, everything that determines how you show up professionally. I was making career decisions from a place of survival rather than strategy, and that was costing me far more than any coaching fee ever would.

The Emotional Debt Nobody Talks About

The healing work I did was the hardest thing I have ever committed to. Your body stores everything: every emotion you suppressed during a tough meeting, every time you smiled through a toxic work environment, every boundary you did not set because you were afraid of losing the paycheck. When you finally start processing all of that, it resurfaces. Physical symptoms I had carried since childhood (arthritis, gut issues, hormonal imbalances) came roaring back during the healing process.

I think of it as emotional debt. Just like financial debt, it accrues interest. The longer you ignore it, the more it costs you. And just like financial debt, the payoff process is painful. You have to face every single thing you have been avoiding. But the freedom on the other side is worth more than any number in a bank account.

I also worked with a shaman during the most intense phases of this process. I know that might sound unusual in a business article, but stay with me. Sometimes the most unconventional investments yield the highest returns. Psychology Today notes that many people report profound shifts in emotional well-being after sessions like these. Whatever you call it (energy work, somatic release, deep emotional processing), the result was the same: I shed weight I did not even know I was carrying, and I became sharper, clearer, and more capable in every area of my life, including my finances.

When You Stop Numbing, You Start Earning Differently

Here is something fascinating that happened as I healed: my relationship with money completely transformed. I used to be the world’s biggest emotional spender. I kept a running tab of comfort purchases the way some people keep a budget spreadsheet. Chocolate by my bedside every morning, impulse buys after a bad day, subscriptions I forgot about because I signed up during a low moment.

As the emotional weight lifted, so did the compulsive spending. I stopped needing to buy my way to temporary relief because I was no longer in constant pain. My money mindset shifted from scarcity and survival to clarity and intention. I started making financial decisions from a place of groundedness rather than desperation. And that changed everything, from how I negotiated my salary to how I thought about long-term wealth building.

When we are in emotional crisis, we make terrible financial decisions. We stay in underpaying jobs because we do not have the energy to interview elsewhere. We accept bad deals because we do not feel worthy of better ones. We overspend on comfort because it is the only relief we know. Healing is, in a very practical sense, one of the most financially sound decisions you can make.

Where I Am Now: Built to Last, Not Just to Survive

So is the deep work done? I would say the major restructuring is complete. I have audited every corner of my emotional life and cleaned house. But I still do regular maintenance. I am always learning, growing, and encountering new challenges that test what I have built.

The difference now is that I am equipped with the tools to handle setbacks without falling apart financially or emotionally. Recently, the universe tested me right after I returned on a high from another Tony Robbins event. What would have once sent me into a spiral of emotional spending and career paralysis only managed to sway me. I felt the impact, processed it, and kept moving forward.

That resilience is worth more than any amount of money in savings. Because savings can be rebuilt, but the ability to stay grounded during a storm is what determines whether you build lasting wealth or keep starting over from zero every time life hits hard.

Your Biggest Asset Is You

One of the most beautiful truths in business and in life is that your greatest asset is not your portfolio, your network, or your resume. It is you. Your capacity to think clearly, make grounded decisions, show up consistently, and believe that you deserve abundance. All of that starts with doing the inner work.

Whatever version of your best life you have been carrying in your mind, it is available to you. But you might have to invest in some uncomfortable growth to get there. That investment, whether it is therapy, coaching, healing work, or simply learning to feed yourself properly, will pay dividends that compound for the rest of your life.

Health and love to everyone who took the time to read this. Your next level is waiting for you whenever you are ready to fund it.