Come home to yourself

October 28, 2025

How do you lose yourself?

Not all at once. Not in one dramatic moment.

You lose yourself one decision, one step at a time—every instance you say “yes” when you mean “no”. Every moment you take care of everyone else at your own expense. Every time you push through when your body is already exhausted.

That’s how we lose touch with who we truly are — how we drift away from our natural rhythm and inner truth.

I know because I lost myself this way. I had everything I thought I wanted—and I was completely miserable.

You see, I’m the girl who did everything the way it was expected.

The corporate job. The brand-new house. The handsome husband. The checked boxes of a life that looked perfect on paper — and felt empty inside.

I was the ‘good’ girl. And once I’d achieved everything I thought I’d ever wanted…I was the miserable girl too.

Burnt out at the age of 24.

A perfectionist who took on too much responsibility because I cared so much — about my demanding job, my family and how other people felt in general.

I wanted everything to work out for everyone. In fact I was so busy taking care of everybody else, I forgot to take care of myself. Instead of sitting down to relax I cleaned the house, visited my recently widowed mother-in-law and tried to be the perfect girlfriend.

I had to take naps in the afternoon to be able to stay awake for dinner. I finally ended up at a naturopath who told me “You have energy for four hours per day and you do the rest on willpower.”—

Part of me was proud for sticking it out on pure will, until he finished his sentence.

—“and it is damaging your organs.’’

After that I changed my life. I started a strict diet to rebalance my body, learned to relax and went to international retreats & conferences.

I started exploring what I truly wanted rather than what was expected from me.

I learned to read my inner compass and sense my intuition, often getting chills in confirmation. And I realized I had access to a far more valuable tool than my mind alone.

I discovered the value of being true to myself—even when it was hard.

I said no to 50% of my business to free up time to develop my intuitive skills, shut down my marriage and rejected a million dollar offer.

In truth it was never the easier path.

I cried a lot, said no a lot, and learned to breathe through disappointing other people, and embrace who I am.

Good girls burn out. Powerful ones let go.

By burrowing down in a world of self-care, seeking community and investing in my personal development I learned to look at challenges and grow from them. Learned to see my life as an opportunity in shifting perspective. To let go of judgment and meet others where they are.

Rather than force myself to pick one passion and be done with it, I followed an inner nudge. Allowed myself to pursue VARIETY.

I created an all-natural line of essential oil essences.

I wrote a novel. (In English — my second language.)

I tapped into my professional network to facilitate brainstorm sessions and teambuilding, and — my flagship service — I’m a life transformation mentor, helping people recover from their life of overdoing, overperforming, overgiving, and living beneath overcast skies. When what they really want is freedom to be themselves. To live in color. To love their life.

The thread that connects everything

For over twenty years, I’ve been helping people with what seemed like completely different challenges—burnout, divorce, career changes, learning to trust their intuition, embracing their sensitivity.

But after all this time, I finally see the thread connecting everything:

Every single one of them was finding their way home to themselves.

And then it hit me—the phrase that captures everything I’ve lived and everything I help others do:

Come home to yourself.

(And I can’t begin to tell you how happy that makes me!)

That’s the journey. That’s what I’ve been doing for over twenty years. Helping people find their way back to who they truly are underneath all the doing, all the expectations, all the trying to fit in. And it finally captures what I’ve been searching all this time.

This clarity—knowing I support people in coming home to themselves so they love their life again—resulted in a wave of ideas.

I am so grateful for this clarity. For finally understanding why I had clients come to me with so many different questions. Each path was a way home to their true selves. To the one they had lost along the way.

Maybe you recognize this pattern in your own life.

Maybe life’s constant demands have made you forget who you truly are. Maybe you’re overwhelmed, overworked, overgiving—tired of overdoing and overperforming while feeling disconnected from what truly matters.

Maybe you look at your life and wonder: ‘Is this all there is?’

I understand, because this was me too.

For years, I sacrificed little pieces of myself to fit in. To meet expectations, to do what I thought was needed to be successful and belong—not that I realized it at the time.

I was too busy taking care of everyone else—too busy doing—to wonder if I was actually happy.

This is how we slowly lose touch with ourselves:

Every time you say ‘yes’ when you feel like saying ‘no’.
Every moment when you take care of others at your own expense.
Every conversation where you don’t speak your truth for fear of being misunderstood, difficult or “too much”.
Every instance you push through on willpower when your body has nothing left to give.
Every time you’re playing small instead of going bigger.
Every moment you distract yourself with social media or Netflix instead of being present for your life.
Every situation where you doubt your instincts or ignore your intuition.
Every time you feel your sensitivity is holding you back—instead of seeing it as your strength.

It happened for me. It may be happening for you.

It took several life events and a lot of time, energy and tears to find myself back and live from my truth. But each time I grew and came out stronger, clearer, happier and more like myself.

If you’re unhappy about your life, if you feel you’ve lost part of yourself along the way, I recommend you don’t wait for that wake-up call to change things.

You don’t have to damage your organs before you decide to come home to yourself.

Ready to come home?

I’d love to support you. If you’re ready to stop living beneath overcast skies and start living in color, here’s how we can work together:

Life Transformation Mentoring is my private one-on-one program where we work together to help you remember your natural rhythm, restore your energy, and realign with your true self. Through eight powerful sessions we’ll get to the root of what’s keeping you from feeling fully at home in yourself. You can read more here.

And I’m creating something new: A program called ‘Come Home to Yourself’ that brings this transformational work to more people. If you want to be first to know when it opens—and get exclusive pre-sale access at a special price not available to the public—join the waitlist here.

You can choose to come home to yourself right now. There’s no need to wait any longer.

Iris van Ooyen guides people home to themselves. As a life transformation mentor with 20+ years of experience, she offers hope with a compass—helping you find your way back to who you truly are when life’s demands have made you lose touch with yourself. She’s the author of Radiant: How to Have All the Energy You Need to Live a Life You Love. Contact Iris to come home to yourself—and love your life again.