In 2007, I had completed my Traditional Chinese Medicine training. I was happy, qualified, ready to learn even more once settled in South Africa.

I had resigned from my job. Sold most of my belongings. Packed my bags. And asked my children to choose: elephants in Cape Town, or tea-time in England with their father.

That question tore me apart inside. I dreaded their answer. The thought of being alone without them terrified me. They chose England, they knew no one in South Africa.

I flew out alone, toward a project I had prepared for months.

The Cape of bad hope

Upon landing, the drama worthy of a soap opera: the friend who was meant to build the guesthouse project with me announced there was, after all, no work for us. "Family comes first," he said.

I had left my children, sold my belongings, and staked everything on that promise. For nothing.

I demanded immediate reimbursement of my investment. It was not returned to me until two years later.

What the collapse opened up

Rather than return to France, I looked for work locally. I found a position as a receptionist for a Traditional Chinese Medicine doctor, an opportunity to learn and practise what I had studied in Academy.

It was that doctor who introduced me to Vipassana meditation in 2008. Ten days of complete silence, no talking, not even a knowing glance exchanged. On day four, a sharp pain in my chest brought me to tears and out of the meditation hall. A teacher accompanied me with a compassion I will never forget.

By the end of the retreat, I had earnt what we jokingly called a "New Being" diploma. More calm. More clarity. A better understanding of my past behaviours.

It was also in South Africa that I reconnected with Qi Gong, through a client who became my teacher, then a close friend.

What my forties really taught me

A collapse is never the end of a project. It is often the end of the wrong project, the one that was never truly meant for you.

That friend's betrayal forced me to rebuild, alone, in a country where I knew no one. And it was exactly that rebuilding that led me toward Chinese medicine, meditation, and Qi Gong, the three pillars that still define my life today.

This is what I write about in Volume 5 of The Strawberry Wisdom.

This week's question

What professional or personal collapse redirected you toward something far more right for you?

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Elisabeth Court, known as Babette
Author of The Strawberry Wisdom