“If you reach for the stars, all you get are the stars, (…) but if you reach for the heavens, you get the stars thrown in.” – Marry Poppins, the musical
I believe in many things – most of all in dreams. I believe in aiming for that seemingly unachievable goal and finding yourself amazed once you reach it. I believe it creates a sense of purpose and encourages you to take control of your life, instead of your life taking control of you and you ending up feeling like a victim. Dreaming liberates you and allows you to reinvent your situation and unleash you inner potentials. This is how I started my journey…
I am born in Denmark in 1970 in a city with a population of about 60,000 – which is fairly large for my country. My parents, my older sister and I moved to Greenland when I was 2 years old and I lived my early childhood way up north in the arctic – close to nature within small Inuit communities. When I reached 2nd grade, my family decided to move back to Denmark.
In my youth I was active in a wide variety of sports until in my early teens I started to experience knee pain. Traditional medical care was unable to diagnose and resolve the problem. My parents eventually decided to take me to a chiropractor who found an underlying dysfunction in my lower back causing compensations and thereby the knee pain. Long story short, he had me fully recovered in about 10 treatments! This was the start of my admiration for chiropractic. Since then, I have dreamt about a life providing similar relief for people in pain.
As it often happens with teenage dreams, life took me in a different direction. After high school, I joined the Royal Danish Army working with explosives. I then went to university to study Engineering. This was the foundation for a career that brought me to many places: from Denmark to California, and eventually back to Greenland, where I spent 7 years working with the US military as the Chief Engineer at Thule Air Base. I was at the helm of my career, made a great income, and had a promising career path, yet something was still missing.
All throughout my early adulthood, I had been active in a long list of sports including completing several triathlons as well as getting certified as a Sports Injury Consultant. It felt like a natural progression to finally pursue my dream of becoming a Doctor of Chiropractic. I quit my successful and “convenient” job and went back to school; 4 years of very intense studying at Canadian Memorial Chiropractic College.
Looking back, I can honestly say that it was the scariest, but best decision I have ever made. I now understand firsthand how difficult and daunting it is to set goals in life, but I also know how rewarding it feels when those dreams are realized, no matter how big or small those dreams are. Today, I am living my personal dream working at Sprout Wellness Clinic as a Chiropractor alongside likeminded multidisciplinary healthcare professionals and together achieving results as a Team.
I didn’t just reach for the stars; I reached for the heavens. But beyond that, every patient I experience becoming pain free or improving how they move or function, those are the stars I got thrown in.
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