New Health Yoga Therapy is the place I envisioned 15 years ago, but at that time, I only dared to dream about it.

 

How that dream came about?

I was 25 when, forced by a severe burnout, I took the time to ask myself for the first time in my life: What do I really want? Until then, I had mostly done what (I thought) the outside world expected of me. Unfortunately, I was quite good at that, which led me to become a lawyer at a prestigious international firm at the age of 21 and a trainee judge at the largest court in the Netherlands at the age of 24. I was successful in my work, but I had never questioned whether I actually enjoyed it. Everyone thought what I was doing was amazing, and I almost started to believe that I felt the same way. Until my body eventually said, "Enough is enough." I was standing at the Central Station, throwing up all over the platform, when I called my mother, who (in all her eternal wisdom) said, "Well, looks like it is time for something else, isn't it?" Surprisingly, I immediately knew that she was right.

I come from a family of very strong women. My mother and grandmother are two of the strongest women I know. As far as I know, they have always remained true to themselves, regardless of the challenges they faced (and there were quite a few).

My mother, a life coach and master NLP trainer, and my grandmother, a Catholic nun (yes, you couldn't make that up), both have, to put it mildly, an interesting history. Neither of them has ever cared about what others thought of them, and both have always charted their own course. They excel in doing exactly what they believe is best for themselves and for the people and the world around them. Whether they realize it or not (I think they do), I have learned from both of them that true strength comes from within and that it is not necessary (pointless even) to seek it outside of oneself. Deep down, I already knew this, even when I was standing on that platform feeling sick. In the following weeks and months, I realized that it was high time to listen to that strength, to that inner voice that had been trying to tell me all along who I was and which direction I should go.

I started practicing yoga and went to therapy, learned to listen to myself more and more, regained confidence in myself, and gradually saw what I truly wanted to do with my life, what resonated with me. What I envisioned was a place where people would feel welcome and safe. A place where people could regain balance when they had lost it in one or more aspects of their lives.

I opened my yoga studio in 2010 because I had personally benefited so much from yoga (combined with NLP therapy) during my burnout and in my search for what I wanted in my life. In many ways, the yoga studio came close to what I had envisioned, and it was a beautiful, safe place for many people for years.

In the back of my mind, while continuing to learn about different forms of yoga and NLP over the years, I knew that I wanted to learn more, to gain more knowledge from a biomedical perspective, so that I could better support people in their search for (more) balance. My training as a Yoga Therapist was exactly what I needed to connect and expand my knowledge up to that point.

At the end of 2020, I closed my yoga studio during the pandemic. For me, this was not the end, but ultimately a beautiful new beginning. The closure of my yoga studio gave me the freedom to take stock with an open mind and ask myself (again), "What do I really want?" The answer was no different than 15 years ago, but the image I had in my mind was much sharper. My lens has been polished and honed over the years ;-). New Health Yoga Therapy is the place I envisioned 15 years ago, but back then, I only dared to dream about it. I look forward to seeing you there!