That same day, he lost his father to suicide.
Within just three short years following this devastating loss, Pace’s best friend and cousin also took their own lives.
Rocked to the core by these events, Pace fell apart: his own mental and emotional health plummeted and he became increasingly shut off and isolated in the years following.
“[The loss] changed the way I saw the world, other people and, most importantly, myself,” he says.
“There was a lot of self-doubt, anger, pain and bad choices.
“I pushed away the people I cared about and loved ... the best way to describe it is like someone just shut the light off.”
While it would’ve been easier to succumb to the sadness, Pace reached a turning point in his life where he decided to drag himself out of the darkness.
Using a mix of medical and self-help methods including diet, exercise, and practising gratitude, he began rebuilding his life.
Along with these techniques, Pace says his Italian heritage and close-knit family helped heal the pain.
With a paternal grandfather hailing from Sicily, Pace was raised on strong family values.
“Family means the world to me,” he says.
“When my dad was struggling, I remember being so hurt and heartbroken by his behaviour.
“A few years after losing my father, I could see I was doing the same things he was doing to me, my mum and my siblings.
“I realised that my behaviour was turning me into the same thing that I had despised my dad for before he died and it was a real awakening for me ... I’d become everything that I’d promised myself I never wanted to be.”
The ultimate eye-opener was an emotional conversation with his mother.
“I saw that I’d made so many bad choices and hurt so many good people along the way, and the only thing that would make it better was for me to take responsibility,” he says.
“I started to build a relationship with myself again ... it took about two years but it was one of the best decisions I’ve ever made.”
Now living with happiness and purpose, 32-year-old Pace is helping more than 50,000 people from over 10 countries to do the same, with his social enterprise Happiness Co.
Founded in 2017, Happiness Co aims to reduce the impact of unhappiness, depression and anxiety in the community through workshops, webinars, online and face-to-face programs for individuals and groups.
The organisation now has seven employees, 15 coaches and 250 volunteers across Australia.
Pace’s brainchild also includes the Man Enough program, which aims to help reduce the startling rate of male suicide in Australia by supporting men to develop the tools they need to overcome life’s challenges and encouraging them to open up and seek support.
Happiness Co pays homage to Pace’s Italian roots in a subtle yet sentimental way.
“My last name means ‘peace’ in Italian,” he explains.
“Happiness Co’s logo is blue, which is the colour of peace.
“The organisation is about finding peace of mind and finding peace in yourself.”
Pace’s purpose has taken him all over the world, from the US and Hawaii to New Zealand, Indonesia and Thailand.
In two short years, he has received many accolades, including being named in the 2019 40under40 awards which recognises Western Australia’s top 40 leading business entrepreneurs and professionals under the age of 40.
Happiness Co was also one of 25 leading businesses from around the state that were recognised as finalists in the 2019 Telstra Western Australian Business Awards, which attracted a record 21,000 nominations.
Perhaps his highest recognition to date, Pace was recently named a WA Local Hero 2020 Finalist for the Australian of the Year Awards.
When he got the call to say he was a finalist, Pace’s initial response was: “Are you sure you’ve got the right person?”
“I was really blown away and it was such a touching moment,” he says.
Pace was also recently appointed an Australia Day Ambassador by the Australia Day Council of Western Australia, and will be presenting a speech at the Town of Bassendean’s Australia Day Celebrations and Fireworks on January 26.
“I’m excited to celebrate what it means to be Australian with a group of people from a range of different backgrounds and cultures,” he says.
“I’m going to go with the theme of stories, because every single person in Australia has a different story which has led them to this chapter of their life.
“Our stories are what make us unique.
“At times, they are filled with pain, suffering and challenges ... but there is also joy, passion and fulfilment.”
Pace knows better than anyone that life is a balancing act between the good and the bad.
He fervently argues that we can’t let the bad times dictate how we approach each day.
“As humans, we love a reason to commit to our misery,” he says.
“But if something bad happens to us, we still get to make a fundamental choice about how we want to show up in the world.”
Instead of making excuses or waiting for things to get better, Pace encourages people to ask themselves: “Am I working towards the person I want to be, or am I working away from it?”
“We make around 30,000 conscious decisions a day and most of those are on autopilot,” he explains.
“But if we make five choices today to change our lives in a positive way – maybe it’s how we treat our partners and our kids, or how we look at our career – we become consciously aware and things change in incredible ways.”
Pace has overcome unimaginable sorrow and grief to write his own inspiring success story, based not on what happened to him but how he chose to respond to it.
Taking his pain and turning it into purpose, he is paving the path to a happier world, one person at a time.
