about Kosta Stoyanoff

As a child, I was always very sensitive. I could intuitively sense how others were feeling. My mom told me how I always seemed to know who was feeling low, because I would immediately go and hug them. Looking back, I now realize I was clairsentient; a trait many empathic beings share.

As many of us know from experience; being a sensitive kid isn’t always paired with a smooth childhood. While I was loved and cared for by my family, school was rough—and being overweight with a severe stuttering problem didn’t help. I was subject to bullying and ridicule. My schoolmates baptized me “Porky Pig” and I’m sure you can guess what that did to my self-esteem. I felt trapped in a body that wouldn’t let me express myself. I remember the panic, anxiety and nausea I felt before going somewhere new, knowing I would have to introduce myself. Because J’s were somehow easier for me to pronounce than K’s, I started introducing myself as “Jimmy”. As you can imagine, I felt a long way off from being able to be myself.

I continued gaining weight and by the age of 13, I was close to 180 pounds and stuttered worse than a scratched disc. I weighed myself constantly and cried just as often. I hit a personal “rock bottom” the day I asked my mom to lend me her corset to wear underneath my pants for a high school dance so that I could hide my love handles. I was crushed. I deeply hated and resented myself…

Around the age of 14, things started to change. I was introduced to what would soon become a passion, a second home and a catalyst for my personal transformation. I was introduced to the gym! I remember how nervous and anxious I was when I first started working out. Initially, I was very self-conscious and would show up at the gym wearing baggy clothes and heavy sweatshirts. However, with the encouragement of a good friend, I persevered through my insecurities and started to feel empowered.

Then, magic happened. As my body changed, I started changing other unhealthy habits. A flame lit inside of me. I suddenly didn’t feel so broken and hopeless. I felt inspired and knew that I deserved better than the life I was allowing myself to experience. I remember telling myself that I no longer wanted to experience such heaviness and self-hate, and that I was willing to finally appreciate and love myself. I made the decision to step up to the plate and take responsibility for my life!

My next step was to get over the stuttering. Determined to release the anxiety that was at the root of my stutter, I would sit in front of the mirror for hours, look into my eyes, breathe deeply and repeat my name. This helped me to heal and no longer feel fragmented by the overwhelming noise going on inside my head. It was a long journey, but I kept at it. My time in front of the mirror became “my time”. Looking back, I now realize that it was my introduction to meditation. It was literally transforming me from the inside out.

My body became healthier, my stuttering slowly diminished and I began to feel whole and alive. This was the beginning of my journey inwards; the “entry point” to embarking on my soul’s mission!

My love for health and fitness blossomed and turned into a successful career as a fitness coach. My personal experience with weight and body image allowed me to effectively relate with my clients. Having gone through the emotional and psychological turmoil myself, I knew that helping them achieve health and vibrancy had more to do with finding an inner lightness rather than focusing on physical weight itself. This insight allowed me to take a non-conventional approach to working with my clients. Because of this, my practice bloomed and I was able to mentor my clients on a deeper, more personal level.

Most of my clients seemed to live the “good life”. By society’s standards, they had everything someone could want to be happy. They were successful, financially wealthy and had all the fancy bells and whistles. But during our sessions, they expressed feeling quite the opposite. I quickly understood that “worldly success” had very little to do with true happiness. I saw that our internal state of being and the way we interpret, define and respond to our lives directly influence the quality of our experience. By observing my clients’ inner-dialogue, I realized that the stories we tell ourselves do create our personal “reality”. This was a HUGE a-ha moment… one that I gradually allowed myself to forget.

Being around achievement-oriented clients had many perks. I learned so much about business, wealth creation and life in general. I met extraordinary human beings that helped me get my feet off the ground financially. I slowly started getting myself into investing in the stock market. Next thing I knew, I was hooked.

Money was coming in faster via my investments than my fitness business. Despite my previous realizations about true happiness; my own insecurities got the best of me and I started becoming obsessed with making more and more money. I became blinded by the thirst for material wealth, and I lost myself. Fancy cars and expensive watches suddenly became important to me. My success made me feel like “somebody”. But most importantly, I was motivated by the fear of not having enough; a fear that had me sacrifice what was most valuable in my life.

Years were flying by and I was missing the first precious years of my daughter’s life. My wife was telling me that she felt like a single mom. I was working seven days a week, and the time that I did spend at home; I spent on my laptop trading stocks. I was constantly stuck living inside of my head. I would tell my wife that I was doing it for them, for our future, for our “security”. Ironically, the more I “succeeded”, the more I experienced feelings of lack and insecurity. Still, I managed to hide them behind my high “achiever” persona.

Completely possessed by the “not enough” mindset and in need of a quick hit, I decided to invest nearly all of our savings on one stock that was meant to be the “big score” of the summer. NOT!

I remember sitting at the computer trying to liquidate my shares as they were plummeting. In just a few days, I had lost a substantial percentage of our savings. All the money I saved from all those years of working seven days a week—GONE! I was devastated.

It rocked me to my core.

I was cracked open and it forced my ego to its knees.

I had let my family down.

I was a complete loser.

I wanted to simply disappear…

But that event FORCED me back to the basics of life; the things that truly mattered. I was stripped bare and my ego was demolished, but something else began to shine through me.

Claudia, my wife, was unreal. Never once did she flinch. Somehow, she kept her eye on all that we had rather than focus on what we had just lost. She kept reminding me of the greatest secret of LIFE: our reality takes the shape of what we focus on and the stories that we tell ourselves. We are living a reality that mirrors back to us who we are! We all have the power to choose where we put our attention and how we give meaning to what shows up in our lives.

I will never forget her words. “Kosta, if you believe you lost everything, then you just did. But if you believe you just found a doorway towards something potentially much better, go through it and see where it leads you”.

I did. And very soon, a very powerful and visceral knowing anchored itself within me. I saw that my own happiness was the product of a conscious DECISION to no longer believe the story of lack playing like a broken record inside of my head. I experienced pure joy and love as soon as I acknowledged and rejoiced in the beauty and blessings already present in my life.

I had just received my real life PHD. It felt as if I had just crossed a portal to another dimension… to another level of “seeing”! I stopped opposing life. I stopped “swimming upstream”. I got out of my own way. I surrendered. Some may say that I underwent a spontaneous awakening that day. But to me, it felt like the finishing stroke after a long journey of chipping away at untruths. That day, I was completely broken open so that something much more intelligent could begin to “work” through me…

Just as my life was undergoing a massive inner and outer “shift”, a good friend had given me the number of clairvoyant she swore was the real deal. I had to laugh. I may have just experienced a massive shift in consciousness, but by no means have I related it to anything “spiritual”. I had always been a skeptic. Yet out of politeness, I still held onto the clairvoyant’s number and left it in my wallet. Over a year went by before I decided to go. I told my wife that I was mainly going to please my friend but deep down, I had this inner-voice telling me that now was the time to go.

She completely blew me away by accurately picking things up about me that no one could possibly know. She spoke about my clairsentient abilities as a child. She began telling me about my weight issues, my stuttering problem and my recent financial disaster. She now had my fullest attention.

She explained that I was being “groomed” for my “mission” and that all of my previous experiences were what she called “soul lessons” that would enable me to step into my purpose effectively, authentically and with compassion.

She spoke about how in the next few years, my intuitive abilities would skyrocket and I would be guided and assisted on my path as a “bringer of clarity”. She told me that my soul’s mission was to help those who were ready to remember simple truths, reconnect with their true essence and align with their highest purpose.

Needless to say, I was totally confused and quite frankly a bit spooked. She calmed me down and gave me reassuring details of what it all meant and what I had to look forward to. My appointment was meant to last only an hour, but I stayed there for almost four. She refused to charge me for my session and told me that she was put in my path to “activate” me so that I could remember my “soul contract” and begin sharing my journey with the world. Little did I know, my life was about to radically change!

Throughout the following years, I continued experiencing synchronistic meetings and events that allowed me to gradually build a clientele for one-on-one sessions. It happened effortlessly, through word of mouth. Helping people access a greater level of clarity and reconnect with their true self and potential became natural to me, and I have been busy at it ever since. Some started calling me a “modern day spiritual teacher”, but not being a fan of such labels, I simply chose to go with “Uplifter”!

I slowly started getting the nudge to bring this message forward on a larger scale, and this is when the idea for an online platform through which I would help lighten up other’s lives was born. I woke up one night with the words “Uplifted Life” echoing in my mind, and the rest is history. I started meeting wonderful people who are now helping bring this platform to life and spread it with the world—individuals whom the clairvoyant predicted years ago I would meet.

The rest of the “story” is what you will be discovering along with us as you follow the journey and teachings of Uplifted Life. I am blessed to be able to share my personal discoveries with others all across the globe, in hopes of bringing lightness of heart, mind, body and soul in the lives of many.

I know all of this might sound perfectly normal to some of you reading this and absolutely nuts to others. I was one of those skeptics who would be saying “coo-coo” right about now, but I am now at a place in my life where I no longer need to “intellectually” understand in order to deeply know and feel life’s bigger picture. I no longer need to convince others of anything. So many unexplainable events have happened to me that I can no longer deny the existence of a “higher” intelligence at play… even if I wanted to! Everyday that goes by leaves me in a complete state of awe. What was once considered impossible is now my everyday normal. I am grateful to have awakened to the magnificence of “what” I truly am and feel blessed to be aligned, connected and alive!

I share my experiences, my passion, my truth and my life’s work in a simple, authentic, and practical way so that you can in turn reawaken to the magnificence and lightness of your true being. My work is all about reminding people that we are “more” than what we have been conditioned to believe and experience.

I wish to bring to our awareness that individually and collectively, we are indeed the architects of our reality!

I want to leave this world having shared my “song” with it.

I want my daughter to one day say that her dad walked his talk and had a blast doing so!

I want to live my life authentically, and in alignment with my soul!

I now know beyond doubt that we are all powerful creators. We are all extensions of the same Source; the higher intelligence at the basis of all life. It is through us that this intelligence grows and evolves. Each of us are key players in the universe’s expansion. It is time that we awaken to this fundamental truth and begin living the Uplifted Life we came here to create and experience!

Since 1998, I have been blessed with the opportunity of helping people bring truth and lightness into their lives, and I hope that together, we can help light up this world!