As a kid, I was a stream without aim. I moved around more times than I can count. Réunion’s island was the first place I really called home. But I was an outsider.
To belong, I had to adapt and observe. I learned to listen deeply; understanding people through and through. Their motivations, behaviors, fears, and passions. What came back to me is that people felt cared for in return. It often sparked a sense of safety, love, and reassurance in them.
Education was my own spark. If you’d ask my friends who I was during my school years, they’d say: “Kévin “A+” Fornier”. Learning was a breeze. I felt a love for knowledge and it loved me back. From top of my class, to valedictorian in my Master’s, being the very best has always been my second nature.
That climb continued at age 24, when I became one of the youngest HR Managers in the country working at the top of a multinational. Talk about being thrown in the rapids. I soaked up lessons people twice my age didn’t even get a chance to learn. And there, I developed my edge.
Slicing through bureaucracy, politics, hustle, and ego battles, I found the beating heart of any organization: its people. I honed my skill of baring hearts. This time with C-level, in a corporate setting. Even them would tell you: “Kévin asks the questions no one dares; the ones that no one even thinks of.”
Unfortunately, cutthroat boardrooms are more often about processes than people. So, as with all stories of ivory towers, there came the fall. Disenchantment kicked in with having money and status without meaning. An ache was piercing. A wholeness was missing.
I resigned from that life to steer my river elsewhere. I retreated and traveled far and wide. Witnessed the superlatives of the sublime.
Yes, I climbed the foothills of Mt. Everest and reached high peaks.
Yes, I lived with indigenous tribes who are one with nature.
Yes, I experienced sacred psychedelic ceremonies.
Yes, I stood on the most pristine beaches.
Yes, I had time and money freedom.
Yes, I felt like “I had it all’’.
Only to be lost.
“That’s nice, Kévin. A fun little sabbatical?” Not quite.
“I think everybody should get rich and famous and do everything they ever dreamed of, so they can see that it's not the answer.”
Jim Carrey
This is what seeking truth looks like. You get lost and you lose yourself. At times it felt like I got it all backwards. But it’s always been the right way—inevitably— to go within. All it took was courage. Not to push, but to let go. To once again listen, this time to a daring call to unlearn and relearn everything.
Like clear lakes, I sat in silence. For days and weeks. It sounds crazy. And it was. I can only describe it to you as placing my hand on the earth to feel the pulse of the planet. My heart’s true beat came alive.
I went back to learning. Surrounded myself with the best teachers in the world, from successful coaches like Rich Litvin and Jogn Patrick Morgan, to reverent mountain monks able to tap into a higher frequency of living.
In the midst of all this my ego was picked apart, again and again. I see this with my clients too. You crack through the pain that your current truth is not the whole truth, the resistance of thinking you need to forfeit your life, and the wonderful chaos bringing it all together. The key is to remember that you’re ok.
Which led a wellspring of wisdom to emerge: “It is inconceivable to the waterdrop that one day, it will fly. Yet, it happens.”
This is where your flow meets mine. The rapids and cascades of your old story left their marks and made you, you. You’ve done brilliant for yourself. But that’s only half the story. You are destined to carve another path. One where you can achieve all you truly want and equally find your depth of being.
To become a tide-turning force, the river must merge with the ocean. What happens next feels like a mystery, I know. I invite you to listen to that horizon line, pulling you to your greatest power. What gifts do you need to open in order to fly? It is up to you to answer.