Nothing can be achieved unless we see it first. ALBERT EINSTEIN

Marie Ward, a nurse with over 20 years of experience, established the Inverell Counselling Practice in 2000 after gaining a Bachelor of Counselling at the age of 52. Her service offers personal, relationship and family counselling and relationship coaching. Marie’s husband Mike is a real estate and property agent and is also a trained counsellor, mediator and educator. They have been married for 40 years and jointly run premarriage courses. Marie has also won numerous awards through her involvement in Toastmasters International, a communication and leadership organisation specialising in public speaking. She runs Toastmasters’ Speechcraft courses for the community as a volunteer because she knows from experience that such courses can help to boost confidence and self-esteem.

What gave you the motivation/inspiration to follow your dream?

I had a life-changing experience during a 28 day round-Australia camping trip in May 1999 with my husband, four other adults and 27 Rotary Exchange students from 17 different countries. I had always dreamed of seeing Australia although not quite so fast and not with such a crowd! My husband Mike has a problem with hearing and background noise. The bus was one big background noise so I was unable to chat freely with him while we travelled. It gave me lots of quiet time to ponder. As we travelled those thousands of kilometres, I slowly awakened to the dream within of establishing my own counselling practice and making a positive difference in people’s lives.

At what point did you realise that your dream was actually possible and what was it that made you think you could really do it?

The feelings were still surging within me as we returned home from the trip. I then talked to my husband about resigning from the counselling agency I was working with and setting up my own business. He was beginning a new phase of his career and it was like he didn’t hear. The conversation ended and I painted the interior of his new offices instead.

As I painted I thought, ‘I can do this’, and began to formulate a plan of the steps I would take to resign from my employment. As our last child was completing university in December, that seemed like a good time. It was too scary to think about beginning my own practice so I pretended it wasn’t an issue and ignored it. I badly needed a mentor but wasn’t game to talk to anyone about my dream because they might say something that would destroy my plans.

I did nothing for about a month after I concluded my employment. It was only when some of the clients I had been supervising asked if they could continue with me that I decided the time was ripe. I officially opened my own counselling practice three months after finishing work with the agency.

When you were a child, what did you want to ‘be’ when you grew up?

Whilst I could not have found the words to express it back then, what I really wanted to do was to make a difference in the world. I expressed it in those days as wanting to help those in pain. Thoughts of becoming a nurse, a nun and being a missionary were part of my romantic dream.

How did your childhood influence you in later life?

Looking back I can see how childhood experiences have influenced me. I spent the first three years of my life on my parents’ cane farm at Pimlico near Ballina, and then grew up on their dairy farms in the Kyogle–Casino area. Thus it seemed a natural progression for my husband Mike (also from a farming background) and me to buy a dairy farm at Roseberry Creek north of Kyogle, which we owned for 10 years. We ran it as a dairy farm and later went into beef production. Perhaps if the beef crash of the ’70s hadn’t happened we’d still be there. Our farming experience taught us that life isn’t always fair and that the only way forward through the hard knocks of life is to pull together.

When I was 10 my parents separated, and the deep emotional pain and loneliness I suffered at that time was so incredible that I didn’t ever want to experience that pain again. It was difficult being a ‘divorced kid’ in the social and religious milieu of the 1950s, where nobody talked about their feelings.

I experienced a similar pain when our infant son died in the mid-1970s. Once again, no one seemed to want to know about my feelings (or Mike’s), yet in spite of the seeming lack of support, Mike and I were able to talk, weep and pull together through the tough years that followed.

To fulfil my childhood dream of making a difference I became a nursing sister, and 20 years later I began my first counselling course, moving into counselling and relationship education in the early 1990s.

Who are your role models?

Grandma Moses was an artist who began painting in her 70s. She spent most of her life being an unknown farmer’s wife and rearing her children. Yet at the time of her life where she could be expected to slow down and succumb to the arthritis that prevented her from doing her embroidery, she created a new career and life for herself as an artist, using house paints to create her first painting! She lived to the ripe old age of 101 and painted 25 pictures in her last year. She danced a jig on her 100th birthday and the US President declared a Grandma Moses Day in her honour! She looked at what she could do rather than what she couldn’t. ‘I look back on my life as a good day’s work, it was done and I feel satisfied with it. I made the best out of what life offered’, she said. Her story has remained with me since childhood and has inspired me to believe that age is unimportant when you have a dream.

My main role model is Jesus! I’ve been fascinated with Jesus and the way he lived his life for as long as I can remember. He sure had the courage of his convictions. I fall far short of his example most days yet I pick myself up and start all over again simply because I believe God loves me. I am a Christian, although I prefer to call myself a ‘Jesus woman’ because I’ve seen some horrible, un-Godly things done in the name of Christianity. (Mind you I’ve probably been guilty of quite a few!) Whilst I don’t believe in ramming my beliefs down others’ throats I do believe that Jesus is the pure example of how I am to live. I also believe he had a great sense of humour and a loving, forgiving heart.

What does success mean to you?

Being part of a long-term marriage partnership where we are each other’s ‘best friend’. Being involved with our five wonderful children as we worked through the ups and downs of childhood, adolescence and life in general and seeing them all married with loving partners and beautiful children. They now are continuing the pattern of working through whatever comes up. Being part of a loving family who accept me ‘warts and all’ — mostly! Having friends who are there for the long haul. Having a sense of the ridiculous and laughing loudly at least 10 times each day, especially at myself! Making a difference, even in a small way, wherever I am.

What has been one of the biggest barriers you have had to face, what happened, and how did you overcome it?

My biggest barrier has been my lack of self-worth. In my early 30s I participated with my husband in a Marriage Encounter weekend where I learned that ‘God doesn’t make junk!’ This affected me deeply and was a turning point as I realised the truth in that statement. However, there remain days when I struggle to believe that.

Toastmasters has helped me develop a sense of self-worth as it is a ‘learn by doing’ organisation. In my work for Toastmasters I run six-session Speechcraft courses for people in our community, as I am living proof of what Toastmasters involvement can do for anyone. In these courses participants enter into a mini Toastmasters experience. I get a real buzz out of seeing people who, at the beginning of the course, think they can’t do it, yet because they are prepared to ‘face their fear and do it anyway’, complete the course. They recognise they have improved in confidence and knowledge with a great sense of achievement. We conclude the course with a celebration because I believe we need to acknowledge a job well done.

Where do you see yourself in 10 years time? What is your vision for the future?

In 10 years time I’ll be 71, my family will have expanded and I will be a great-grandmother! I will most certainly be enjoying life and discovering new things daily. I believe I will still be making a difference yet there will be time to lie back on the soft green grass at night and look up at the stars and marvel. I will think about the wonderful life I’ve been able to live and the remarkable people I’ve been privileged to call friends.

What would you like to say to other women who may be just starting out on a ‘Daring to Dream’ journey?

Believe in your uniqueness. Believe in your dream. Don’t expect someone else to do it for you! Talk about it. Write down the steps that you need to take to get there. Create a five year plan. Ask yourself ‘where will I be in one, two, three, four or five years?’ By writing the steps down you can cross them off when you have achieved them. Celebrate each achievement and every step along the way. Close your eyes and see your dream coming to fruition, constantly. Einstein said ‘nothing can be achieved unless we see it first’.

If you don’t know something, admit it. Find some supportive people. Sometimes you will talk to people who are negative. This may be because they are scared for themselves should you be successful in making your dream a reality. Sometimes they are angels in disguise sent to challenge you. Accept the challenge, thank them, bless them and keep moving on, following your plan, achieving your goals and celebrating your successes.

Find a mentor whom you admire. Ask for help—sometimes this is the most difficult thing to do, as often we don’t know what it is that we need. These are the times when you need someone who will allow you to talk and who is prepared to hear what you are not saying as well as what you are saying! Often when we are given the opportunity to talk freely we hear ourselves say something that is just what we need to hear! Write ‘I can do it!’ on slips of paper and put them everywhere! And follow the Nike ads’ advice and JUST DO IT!