Irene's parents were refugees who fled Vienna in 1939 to settle in Derry, Northern Ireland. She was
born into that small, quirky community in 1943. Although she understood English, she did not speak
it until she started school.
She spent much time alone in the woods at the end of the street, in her own world. She loves Ireland,
Fairy Tales, trees, and the ocean.
Although Irene lived in a Catholic neighbourhood, she was brought up Protestant and bussed to
school. When she was fourteen, she began to search for a new 'religion' at the local library. This quest
eventually led her to Jung and Sufism.
She became a Radiographer, moved to England, married, and emigrated to South Africa. When she
arrived in Johannesburg on Christmas Eve 1965, she had twin sons seven weeks premature.
Irene was chosen from 200 applicants to train as a computer programmer and became an expert at
coding and decoding symbolic language.
She divorced her first husband in 1972 and emigrated to Australia in 1977 with her two sons. There, she
discovered Jung and undertook adult education, eventually becoming a psychologist and hypnotherapist
while working in IT. She undertook an almost seven-year Jungian analysis, which changed her life.
Then, she found Universal Sufism and the magic of stories as teaching tales. Her Sufi name is Nuria.