My ‘big dream’ still felt relatively fresh and exciting, fuelling my preparations in 1999 for taking the plunge as a freelance photographer. I thought I was as ready as I’d ever be, but that didn’t stop a fearful tower crane dream from rearing up as I was negotiating my departure from my employer. In recognition of this major change in my life I’d booked a six-week holiday to, appropriately, Australia – down under - and Thailand to mark my transition. The mythological parallels were real to me, I’d leave the UK, and my past as a QS, take a journey into the unknown (the Otherworld) and return to begin my new life, ‘reborn’ as a freelance photographer, albeit without any professional qualifications but plenty of experience. During my time as corporate photographer I’d been doing some ‘market research’, testing the water and talking to local photographers at the lab in Cardiff. Almost without exception I heard stories of doom and gloom, none felt they could make a living as photographer; only one ex-professional thought my idea had legs. This was about to be a real test of my trust and confidence in my new ‘navigation’ system, intuition and inner guidance. My dream was about to become reality, the final step in reinventing myself not only in this world but in the Otherworld too; my inspiration was the mythological characters who’d travelled the inner realms since ancient times. I had created a bridge to my inner world through channelling and was about to test whether it was robust enough to support me.