Lifestyle
LIFESTYLE
On this page I would like to share what inspires me in life, my passions and rituals.
As you may have read in the other themes all countries where I lived as a child contributed to the way I live my life now; being open, flexible, independent and aligned to follow my passions, my dharma or purpose in life.
One of my passions was dance. After a year in India and living with my aunt and uncle in The Netherlands at the age of 15 I was fortunate to follow beat ballet classes with the popular Penney de Jager. She asked me if I was interested to teach beat ballet to children and in no time I followed a training for that and entered her Show ballet group. For three years I was part of that group and danced in video clips for the Dutch television programme called ‘Toppop’ and twice in a German show called ‘Hallo Peter’ which was a fantastic experience. The following three years was in another dance group; teaching jazz ballet to teenagers and adults during the week, receiving training in other dance forms like tap and Spanish dance and performing in the weekends. What a life!
Due to management issues in the dance group I decided to leave and go for another passion: travel. At the age of 23 I applied for a job as an air hostess for the summer season with one of the Dutch airlines: Martinair which was followed by 6 years with KLM. A super way to see alot of the world and learn working in a different team on every flight.
Wine, such an interesting product, became my passion as well and was introduced to me by my father and uncle. During the time with KLM I enrolled for a wine course which was followed by the wine academy to become a Vinologue. I was so passionate about this nature product that I started my own wine tasting company and stopped working as an air hostess. After receiving a big order of wine from a big Dutch firm, the next step was importing and selling wines. My specialization became South African wines because my heart also lies there, which I mostly sold to other wholesalers and restaurants.
A few years later I also started importing rooibos tea from the Cape under my own brand ‘Sonnigdal’, which was sold in supermarkts in the Netherlands. Due to many years of draught it’s mainly sold online now.
More than ten years ago I stopped with the wine business; after 20 years it was enough. I could n’t combine it with the Raja yoga school which I had set up with friends and the tea business.
Influence of the planets
The law of Attraction
About the creative process
Since long I am fascinated by Astrology, so I follow it regularly and read about the influence of Uranus who was retrograde from August 7th 2018 till January 6th 2019.
“During this period it may have seemed like things were stalled and any progress we made felt like running in the sand. That is because Uranus retrogade is a time to reorganize our inner life and learn what we need within ourselves so that we can be prepared for the things we really want to come to us in our outer life. Expect the changes you tried to implement around July/ August to manifest around this month, which is January 2019. The good news is, when Uranus moves direct, we can expect things to finally start happening. You’re now ready for the changes to manifest because you had to order some ideas and get real with some aspects of yourself so you would be able to handle succes in new areas without losing your head. “ (Astrology Answers – Shannon Yrizarry)
This is exactly what Manouk, my godchild, who made this website, most pictures and video’s and I experienced during this period. The whole creative process took much longer than we thought and many times we thought we were not making any progress and it frustrated us both. After Manouk and Hidde moved to Barcalona at the end of January we easily could make preparations for another meeting in the first week of February to work on this project. When she arrived on the camping in Sevilla things suddenly started to become clear to us. And finally after a many more adventures we met again in Barcelona in April, and are now in the process of rounding up.
Do you also experience the influence of the planets?
about losing and finding.
In November I lost my Indian silver bracelets which I had for a long time and which meant a lot to me. One day near Barcelona when walking in the street of my friend Nicky (see Travel) I found a bracelet with different gemstones; a stone for every chakra. The next day I found another one with moon stones.
In the same period I was looking for a very small plug for the sink in the camper and in the same street I suddenly see a small plug on the ground which fitted exactly.
And here in Denia the frisbee we found the day after we lost one.
We would call it a miracle but it is a law of nature:
The law of Attraction. What you send out you attract.
Camper stories
My porridge recipe; A good way to start the day
After four months when tidying up the camper for the arrival of Astrid (see Travel) guess what? I found my Indian silver bracelets in the smallest closet in the back of the camper. Can you believe it!
'Herbes de Provence'
THE STORY OF THE SEAGULL
When Zyra and I were in El puerto de Santa Maria near Cadiz and Jerez we found the wings of a dead seagull on the beach. I have always been fascinated about birds, collected feathers and bones as a child. Guess I have inherited that from my dad who was a nature and bird lover. During my life birds alive or dead have brought me messages.
You may have read the post about the wings of the seagull on Facebook but if not read about it here. When Zyra and I were in El Puerto de Santa Maria near Cadiz and Jerez de la Frontera we found the wings of a dead seagull. I took them back to the camper to let them dry. When we drove on to the camping Dos Hermanas near Sevilla I cleaned them and hung the wings in a tree in front of our camper. When doing that a heart appeared. See picture.
Yesterday, 1st of March I found another dead seagull on the beach of Vila Chà on the Portugese coast. I felt I had to pick it up and put it on a rock near the sea for the waves to take the gull back to the sea. As I did that a whole flock of seagulls arrived above my head. Did they disagree or did they come to say goodbye?
Today during our morning walk my eyes caught another seagull. Not dead but also not really alive; not flying but hopping around. After a good look I saw one of his wings hang out and understood he was not able to fly. I felt so sad for him and wondered If he would ever be able to fly again.
I thought why do I keep on seeing seagulls? Then suddenly Jonathanpopped into my mind. 😇Jonathan Livingstone Seagull,a book of Richard Bach and one of my favorites. 🤗It’s about a seagull ( read you, me, every – one) who wants to find out about life and flight, about self perfection; how it is to fly beyond his limits. He wants to know what it’s like to leave his comfort zone (group, home), who wants to find his potential, who wants to find his Self; to Be.
Not easy. Jonathans family, friends don’t accept it, find him strange and don’t want him to be different. But Jonathan cannot adapt to what is standard, to what they expect of him. He stays sincere and keeps on practising flying beyond his limits for hours, days, weeks. Eventually they throw him out out of the flock. So he is all by him self and has to find his own way. Don’t we all have to do that in Life. But most of the time we rather stick to what is conventional, whats is expected of us instead of following our own path, potential.
It’s not easy and it requires faith, perseverance and to be able to surrender. But if we do, show our Light, our Strength we get so much in return and find peace of mind and real Bliss!
2 March 2019
