When safety and trust met in me.

Last Sunday, together with my tribe of the Heartdancing training, I closed a period (for now) of a very intense and also beautiful journey to my inner world. This period started in October 2020 when I made the choice to go on this journey within. I knew for years that I had to make this choice, but it took me a while before I dared to do this. In addition, it also took a while before there was enough space in me to start this. I already knew instinctively that I would have less space for other things and people in my life when I went on this journey. That is part of making a choice like this. Be prepared to give yourself this space and then take it. This was an intense thing in itself in my case. Considering myself important enough. This journey started with the Soul Coach Annual Training, after which I continued with the Breath Coach Training The Wounded Healer and then ended this entire period with the Heartdancing training. I hadn't planned this like that. My choice to do the Year Training for myself was already huge. The other two were a result of this, which I could not have suspected beforehand. It was the most intense and at the same time the most beautiful and magical journey I have ever made so far. Words are not enough to describe what I have experienced, but I would still like to write a piece about it. On the "About Me" page here on the website I do give some hints about my life. This one was far from easy, dark too. I've pretty much lost myself for very large parts of my life. Then I tell this gently. Although my life slowly became a little lighter from the age of 40, it was still difficult. In the past two years I have managed to find my own light and everything is a lot lighter, in myself, around me. Who knows, writing my experiences may also touch someone else's heart and then dare to move and be able to move, no matter how difficult this seems at that moment and how great the resistance is. It really is true, not a word of a lie "All the answers lie within yourself and there is a way to feel the energy of life and to live the path of your soul".

When I made the choice I could not have imagined what it would bring me and what would happen. I found it very exciting, almost nauseating. The resistance and tension felt so great in the week before this training that I called Tanja to say that I really didn't want to. This ceremony made me go anyway. I can't tell you exactly what she said, because I really can't remember. It's also irrelevant and I thank myself for doing so. That I handed out when everything was too big, too intense and too exciting. Instead of retreating to my self-created prison. That's what it was.

I remember well how I set off for the first weekend. Tension coursed through my body. I was brought by my sweet caring partner which he then continued to do for me every weekend after that and I am deeply grateful to him for that. When I arrived there I was pleasantly surprised by my dear dear friend Michelle who welcomed me there. She was one of the supervisors that weekend and had not told me this to surprise me. It was so nice to see her there. I still remember walking further inside this truly beautiful and colorful location. Little did I know at the time that this location would be my second home for the next two years and where I would meet many disowned and hidden parts of myself (along with a ton of new people). Some people were already inside and more were coming. I met Tanja for the first time and then also all the others with whom I would experience this year training and with whom I would also form a beautiful Tribe (see the first group photo). At that moment I didn't know that and I felt like I was all alone and I felt naked and vulnerable. Tanja took us in a Heartdancing. This was my first experience with Heartdancing. It is a form of moving, dancing and experiencing to music to connect with yourself and to meet others from that connection with yourself. My little girl who loved nothing more than to dance was frozen in dance when she was 14, so this was really exciting. Whatever is at that moment, whatever lives in you and happens. It can all be there. Goddamn how intense I found it. A lot went past me that weekend too. Later with Lars I learned that this was one of my ways of dealing with difficult and vulnerable situations. I literally checked out then. Then I was physically there, but I closed and locked my inner world. Not consciously, that was still fully automatic at the time. In this year's training I learned how, step by step and at my own pace, I could very carefully connect with this sweet, scared, little girl in me, who found almost everything threatening. Her pace was a lot slower than what I lived as an "adult". As an adult I lived in the Fast Lane. Fast, in dissociation, crossing my boundaries and almost always depressed or in a burnout. Mainly not wanting to feel. In addition, I learned to feel safe here again. Safe with myself. During the first weekend, the theme was Soul Retrieval*, where we retrieve part of our soul. A part we lost along the way or didn't even know before. For me, this part turned out to be "safety". Every weekend there was a little more insight into this theme. It remained intense, every weekend, but I also felt somewhere in the depths of me that something was slowly waking up and changing. I learned to feel safe with myself. In addition to Heartdancing, teachings  and other forms of bodywork, we also did breathwork very regularly. There I experienced for the first time that this was a way that worked for me to get into my inner world and could really release stuck energy without my head getting in the way too much. At least a lot less. During this annual training, Lars Faber from the Ademcoach training came to facilitate two weekends. Already during the first weekend that I heard Lars talk, I immediately knew that I wanted to do this training with him. I didn't dare say it out loud at the time, but I felt like I had found my calling (among other things). I still didn't feel nearly equal enough to sign up for this. After his second weekend at the annual training, I still signed up for his training. In the first instance to be able to continue working on my own processes in this way. I had relieved myself of the idea that I had to do something with it afterwards and so again gave me permission to use this for my own healing. With this I gave myself the space I needed to safely discover, heal and grow. I had removed the pressure to perform. It has been so healing for me to be here and through this breathwork and everything I learned here to get in touch with these parts of me. That's why I went straight from the annual training to the Ademcoach training and that wasn't all. In the last weekend of the annual training, Tanja told me that she was developing a training in Heartdancing. At that moment I already knew I was going to do this one too. It would later appear that she would start with this two months after the breath coach training would have been completed. Coincidence does not exist.

We also did the Soul Retrieval* here again. This time I retrieved my soul part "self-confidence". Retrieving these two soul parts turned out to be the basis for the rest of my existence. Words cannot really explain what this has done for me. These two soul parts work together and ensure that I walk my path in this life step by step from the safe base and confidence in myself, knowing that no matter what happens I am always safe with myself. I can't lose myself when I'm connected to myself. It also became very clear to me why life was so difficult for me. I missed the connection with two very important parts of myself. Through the techniques, the many breathwork we did ourselves and also the guidance, I learned to have confidence in my body, my feeling, my intuition. My body knew exactly what it needed. Breathwork has something magical for me and I still find it fascinating every time I guide someone or groups with breathwork. Towards the end of this training I also noticed that I could really experience space within myself, more stable, more powerful, more loving, calmer and much more. I still have work to do, in that respect the inner work does not stop either. It's less exciting in a way, because I now know what it brings me when I look at shadow pieces of myself. In addition, I now know that it is precisely when I experience and feel tension and resistance that an answer can be found there. When I look at this feeling it brings me relief or at least change. During this training I also met wonderful people and if you enter into these processes together and you can be completely yourself with everything that lives in you, this is a tribe for life. Safety (Safe Space) is one of the most important parts of the training here, just like in the annual training and also in the Heartdancing training. Without this security, the chances are very small that our inner wounded children will show themselves at all. At the end of this course, I also chose to take the exam. This is part of who I am and I do this with so much love. From all my experiences. Then I was also ready to make the next part of my journey. My frozen girl's in the dance.

After my exam, I also signed up to supervise Lars' next Breath Coach Training. Experience the entire training again, but then as a supervisor instead of a participant. This year started at about the same time as the Heartdancing, so a full weekend in Zaandam twice a month. This training is still ongoing. Last weekend was the penultimate weekend of this wonderful group of people and it was great again. Beautifully beautiful to be part of this wonderful team and to be able to support as a supervisor in the amazingly beautiful, intense, all-encompassing processes. I feel very grateful to be able to do this and gain even more experience.

I also met a few acquaintances here. Beautiful, beautiful sweet souls together again. This training was slightly shorter, but at least as intense. Although with some parts of myself I can connect with myself much more easily, experience pleasure, feel love and warmth to name just a few, there are still parts in me that still find it very exciting and difficult. Due to the growth of the time before, I now have more awareness of this. I don't check out anymore, but stay with it. I listen and respond to what my body tells me it needs. Little by little, my little girl is coming back to play "outside" more and more. This is what I now make more and more time for and practice. Play and have fun. In and out of connection with myself.

I knew that the Heartdancing would be the last for a while and just before the summer holidays I could already feel that something else was coming and a time for integration. Something else is definitely coming, because we are moving to Portugal in January. The supervision of the training is also almost over. A time of cleaning up, relaxing and integrating is coming and has actually already started. Beautiful ideas are slowly unfolding in Portugal. My life is completely different now and I eagerly look forward to the future and with it all the lessons to be learned from the safety and confidence in myself.

First of all, I am so grateful to myself for taking these courageous and vulnerable steps and giving myself permission to take up space in the world. I am grateful to Tanja and Lars for allowing me to meet these parts in me in their safe and loving setting and to let them be completely there with everything there is. All my dear Tribe members for being allowed to learn, practice and be unconditional with and for each other. My dearest friend Michelle for her deep, unconditional and eternal trust in me. Last but not least I thank my dear Marco, who faithfully brought and picked me up every weekend and experienced many intense and mournful pieces with me. Certainly not easy, not for either of us and that also brought a lot for which I and we are both very grateful. I am now specifically naming some people, but I am truly grateful to everyone during this period. Everything is so intertwined. That is becoming increasingly clear now. Life is for me and not against me. Thank you for this loving reminder dear Ariette. Day by day and little by little it becomes a little brighter and lighter and I live a little more and more the life in which I am truly happy.

If you've gotten this far reading, I'm grateful for the time you've taken to do this. Maybe I touched your heart or maybe you know someone for whom this could be a nice message. Then share it further. That's what it's for. Let's touch each other's hearts or at least the parts in us that find recognition together, so that we can take new brave steps to find our own light and thus also relief from the heaviness in our existence.

With love,

Natasja