Episode 38 - 50 facts about me

🐚Hey everyone! I wanted to take a moment to truly introduce myself and share some personal facts about who I am beyond just being your podcast host. In this episode, I opened up about everything from my childhood dreams to my current adventures.

Topics Covered:

• My journey from anthropology student to menstrual health expert
• Life experiences across multiple countries and cultures
• My entrepreneurial path and relationship with money
• Personal quirks and daily habits
• Dreams and future aspirations

Interesting Personal Facts

• I'm 34 years old, born April 21st - a true Taurus Sun with a Pisces Moon
• I run CycleSeeds, helping people understand their menstrual cycles and fertility
• I've been dancing since age 4 and currently love Brazilian Zouk and ecstatic dance
• Getting diagnosed with ADHD at 33 was life-changing and helped me understand myself better
• I'm a coffee snob who refuses to settle for mediocre coffee
• I studied at UCLA as an exchange student and fell in love with my ethnomusicology class
• I lived in the Colombian Amazon with an Indigenous Tikuna community at the age of 21
• I believe in manifestation and aliens (yes, really!)
• I hate phone calls and keep my phone on "do not disturb" most of the time
• I dream of volunteering at an Orangutan Sanctuary in Borneo with my partner

More about Iris

💬Come say ‘Hi’ on Instagram https://www.instagram.com/cycleseeds/

🎓Check out our offerings https://www.cycleseeds.com/ 

Transcript

[00:00:00] So, since we kind of like rebranded the podcast and I realized that I never really truly, truly introduced myself and gave you a little bit of a peek into who I am and what I do and what I like in life. I thought it would be fun to do an entire episode that just exposes 50 facts about me. So that you can get to know me, who I am as a person, who I am Maybe behind closed doors, not exposing myself in my business, and just for you to basically get to know me as a person.

[00:00:40] So I am Iris. I am 34 years old and my birthday is on the 21st of April, but I was actually planned to be born in June. My entire zodiac is earth and water. That's the only two elements I have in my chart. And I am the most Taurus Sun and Pisces Moon you will ever meet. Like, if you look up the description of a Taurus Sun and a Pisces Moon, I'm like one to one that description.

[00:01:12] I run my own business. My business is called CycleSeeds, where I help people understand and support their menstrual cycles and fertility. I am also the creator of the Holistic Hormone and Cycle Coaching Certification Training where I teach people how to do the work that I do. I wasn't planning to do this training.

[00:01:33] Like when people look at the training website and they see what I do, they're like, Oh my God, like, this is so you. I always knew that you would do this. I didn't. I was never planning to do this. And this kind of grew because at a certain point I had so many people ask me like, Oh, where did you like learn to do what you do?

[00:01:55] And the thing is, I did so many trainings in my life, but the work that I do is really a blend of everything I have learned in my trainings, everything that I've learned from my own body, everything that I learned in the birth room because I used to be a doula as well. So my work is really unique in that sense that it's not just hormone health, it's like many aspects of what it means to be in human.

[00:02:19] And so when people started to ask me about where they could learn to do what I do, I realized there is no other place but with me. So then I had to create this training. I'm also the creator of the cyclical CEO, which is a productivity course specifically designed for people with menstrual cycles. And I will 0 version of this course next year.

[00:02:43] I'm so excited about that. Another thing about me is that I'm quite direct. I'm Dutch, and you know, as much as I don't like to identify as such, because, you know, colonial history, I have inherited this very Dutch directness that sometimes can come across as a little bit cold or even bitchy. People maybe don't think this about me, but I can be a little bit cold, a little bit untactful, a little bit bitchy.

[00:03:12] I've been dancing since I was four years old. I did kids dance, did ballet for a while, didn't really like that. I did street dance, Latin ballroom, belly dancing, hip hop, and I currently dance Brazilian Zouk, which is a partnered dance. I used to dance Kizomba as well, mostly urban Kizomba. And I go to ecstatic dance events very regularly.

[00:03:38] And I used to host ecstatic dance events with a DJ. Both in the Netherlands and in Malta. Another thing about me is that I love waking up before my alarm, but for that to happen, I need to go to bed early, which is a little bit of a struggle sometimes, especially when I get a little bit in a creative flow.

[00:03:57] Like right now, it's 8 PM on a Thursday evening and I'm actually supposed to start my unwinding evening ritual. Huh? But now I'm having this burst of creativity to record this podcast, so I have to do this now. What else? I love coffee. I'm an extreme coffee snob. Like, the worst. If the coffee isn't good, I will complain about it.

[00:04:23] Like, 100%. I'm that person. I don't drink a lot of coffee, so whenever I do drink coffee, which is about one to maximum two cups per day. I wanted to be like, divine. I'm not settling for mediocre coffee. That's just so not me. I was once attacked by a rooster. I wanted to pick up the eggs from the chicken coop and the rooster just straight up attacked me.

[00:04:54] And um, didn't end well for the rooster because then I attacked him back because I was so shocked. I was about 11 years old, maybe 10. Yeah, that was a bit of a traumatic experience. Like it literally started to like fly up to my face. Yeah, it was really scary. When I was very young, um, I wanted to be a vet.

[00:05:16] I was always like obsessed with animals, love animals. And yeah, when I was a child, I always wanted to be a vet. That never happened because my ability for mathematics and Physics was very low. I couldn't do it. It's not my thing. So, no, I never became a vet. My go to forever comfort food are potatoes.

[00:05:46] Nobody can tell me otherwise. Nobody can tell me that potatoes are not the best comfort food ever. I'm obsessed with potatoes. Potatoes of all kinds, but specifically french fries. I grew up on the border. Between Belgium and the Netherlands, so I had, like, access to the Dutch fries and I had access to the Belgian french fries.

[00:06:08] Oh my god, like, they're the best. I love potatoes. Specifically in the form of french fries. My favorite, or one of my favorite, childhood memories is My mom and dad have a house on, basically, the countryside. Oh my god. And there is a plot of land next to our house, the house that I grew up in, that my mom still lives at.

[00:06:33] There's a plot of land that my uncle uses to grow food. And he would grow corn. And as a child, I was obsessed. And my mom wouldn't let me because we would get lost. But I was obsessed with running through the cornfield. It was such a liberating feeling to just run, run through the cornfields. Nobody would see me.

[00:06:56] There was just a corn and, uh, I loved it. I loved it as a kid. What else? I studied Cultural Anthropology at Utrecht University and I was chosen as one of the two students who were allowed to do an exchange program at UCLA, which is the University of California of Los Angeles. And this experience was so amazing.

[00:07:21] I took the most incredible classes. I took classes in West African dance, voodoo and santeria, buddhism in India. I took a couple of Native American courses on Native American culture and history. I took a class in ethnographic film. It was so incredible, like, so good. And I felt like I was in a Hollywood movie every time I walked on this gorgeous campus.

[00:07:49] It was so beautiful. I also fell head over heels in love there with a guy I met in my ethnomusicology class and, um, it didn't last, but it was a beautiful young love. I currently have a partner. It's not that partner, but I have a partner and he's incredible. We have known each other since 2018. It was a slow burning love, but the most incredible partnership I've had in my life.

[00:08:16] Like, I have grown so much with this man in this relationship. And one thing, one thing that I keep forgetting is that we actually met on Tinder. Like, if people ask me, how did we meet? I oftentimes forget that it was such a silly way that we met. And I'm obviously grateful for dating apps, but never in the history of my life.

[00:08:41] I thought this was how I was gonna meet my partner, but here we are. I dream of visiting the Urangatan Sanctuary in Borneo as a volunteer together with my beloved. We, we have that same dream and I really hope that we can make that happen one day. Another thing about me is that I don't think in week and weekend days.

[00:09:07] Honestly, I find it absolutely ridiculous. I find it ridiculous how we build up the weeks and weekdays and weekend days. I don't understand it. I don't get it. I find it ridiculous. I live my life day by day and if I want to chill on a Wednesday, I chill on a Wednesday. I want to work on a Sunday, I work on a Sunday.

[00:09:26] Yeah, it doesn't make sense to me. So I don't live my life like that. I play the acoustic guitar and I can drum. I actually need to pick those up though because it's been a while that I did both of them, but they give me great joy. And um, there's been a time that I wrote my own songs. Yeah. On the guitar, not on drum.

[00:09:49] On the guitar. As a child, I actually always wanted to drum, but my parents wouldn't let me. And this is one thing I actually wish I took on earlier than in my twenties when I started drumming. I think. This would have been great when I was younger, drumming, but unfortunately, I didn't learn until I was in my late 20s.

[00:10:10] A book series that I absolutely love is the Maeve Chronicles by Elizabeth Cunningham. It's this story about Mary Magdalene. It's a fiction story where she is the daughter of eight witches who live on an island. And then she goes to Druid school and she meets Jesus during Druid school. Like it's such an incredible story.

[00:10:35] Like it's total fiction. But I devoured these books. Oh my God. They were so good. And I'm kind of obsessed with personal growth and entrepreneurship. I have done more courses and trainings than I can count on two hands. And I have an extreme drive to always keep growing. I think the way that we look at learning in our society and the way that we.

[00:11:06] Create schools and that, you know, you go to university until what, like age 20 something, 22, 23. And then you kind of like stop the learning and you go into like your career life. And I have never experienced life in that way. I've always been open. I've always done like trainings, yoga teacher trainings, entrepreneurial trainings.

[00:11:32] Thanks. Skill trainings, like I am always learning and I always have this immense hunger to keep growing and to keep learning. And I'm extremely curious, like I'm such a curious being that I think I will keep learning until I die. Another thing about me, and this may be triggering for some people, maybe, I don't know.

[00:11:58] I envision myself having a lot of money. And I'm very unashamed to say that. To me, more money equals more ways to give back to the world and support projects that I believe in. I love money, and I want to have a lot of it, and I'm not ashamed to say that. I always felt very restricted when making the amount of money that other people have decided for me.

[00:12:21] Like I worked for different companies and it was like, Oh, you get like X amount of euros per hour. Or, um, oh, you get like a fixed rate per month. And I'm like, what the hell? What? No. So I always felt extremely restricted. And the only way to step out of that and be completely independent of other people deciding what I would earn or when I would deserve more money, or when I wouldn't deserve like a bonus or a raise, like.

[00:12:57] What the hell? I decide my raise. I decide how much money I want to make. And I've always been like that. I've always been very, like, I get very activated when I need to talk about, like, Oh, a career. Oh, a job. Oh, working for, like, a boss. I've always felt extremely rebellious about this. And, turns out, that was not my place.

[00:13:24] I'm not the kind of person who is made to work for other people, have other people decide my tasks, have other people decide how much money I make, have other people decide when I get my money. I want to receive money all the time. I want to be paid all the time. I don't want to wait for my money. It's insane to me.

[00:13:45] And this is why I became an entrepreneur, because I want to have an endless potential in how I make money. How much money I make, the creative ways in which I can make money and the moments in which money comes in. And I can do a whole podcast about this, but yeah, fun fact about me. I envision myself having a lot of money and I'm completely unashamed of that.

[00:14:08] And with that, I will never, ever, ever be employed by someone else ever again. I'm just not made for it. I extremely hate it. I have a lot of respect for people who can be employed and be happy with that. For me, it's the most unsatisfying thing in the world. It makes me extremely unhappy. It kills my creativity.

[00:14:29] It's just not for me. And part of that could be that I was diagnosed with ADHD at age 33. And maybe my ADHD has something to do with wanting to feel unrestricted. And this has been the most rewarding and affirming journey of my life. It was the missing piece in understanding myself. And you can listen to another episode I made about this on here as well, where I go into that journey a little bit more.

[00:15:00] I used to be lactose and gluten sensitive, but I have rebuilt my gut in such a way that I can now eat both of those without any problems. I actually never thought I would work in the menstrual health field. I always thought I would become a professor in medical anthropology, and I would teach at universities, but The universe had a very different plan for me, and I'm very happy that my life turned out the way it did.

[00:15:30] I have a philosophy in life that I can better fall flat on my face and decide something is not for me than not trying it at all and then regretting it. That's actually one of my biggest fears, living my life in such a way that I will regret a lot of things at the end of my life. Something intense that happened in my life is that my father got cancer when I was 14 years old, and he passed away when I was 19.

[00:16:00] And this absolutely crushed me. It absolutely crushed my soul. And at the same time, it also gave me a lot of fuel for continuing to move forward. And I had promised him I would start studying again because I stayed at home to help take care of him. I quit school, basically. I quit university to be at home and to just be with him.

[00:16:29] And I promised him I would, you know, pick up studying. So I started university again, uh, in another city two months after he died. And a lot of people call me crazy for that, but it was my, my refuge. Studying was my refuge. And it was also a way to basically ignore my grief because I didn't deal with my grief until I was well into my twenties, but that's a story for another day.

[00:16:57] I love surprises. I'm also extremely nosy. So it's, it's really hard to keep surprises from me, but I love it. I love when someone manages to surprise me. I used to be a vegetarian and a vegan even, but now I'm fully back to eating everything. And I recorded a full episode on this podcast as well about me moving from vegetarian to vegan, back to eating everything again.

[00:17:27] I went to the Colombian Amazon on my own when I was 21. Magical, absolutely magical experience. And I ended up staying with an indigenous. Tikuna community. And I learned so much there. It's one of the most profound experiences of my life. And another fact about me is that I cannot wait to be mom. I think this journey will be absolutely life changing and I am in a place in my life where I feel ready to take on that responsibility.

[00:18:02] But then before becoming a mom to a human baby, I would love to have a puppy. Oh my god. I am obsessed with puppies. I love dogs. I love cute dogs. And I really want to have one. Like, I want to be a dog mom, like, so badly. And I think it's a good practice to be responsible for another living creature in that way, before taking on the responsibility of, like, a full blown human baby.

[00:18:30] So you'll probably know when I get a puppy. I'll probably share it on here. Another thing about me is that I hate being on the phone. Like, calling. No one really knows this about me, but I actually hate calling. I hate calling. It does not make me feel good. I have my phone on do not disturb most of the time.

[00:18:54] When I see someone call me and I didn't know that they would be calling me, I feel extremely anxious. It's just not my thing. I have no idea why. Just, you know, drop me a voice note or a text and I will only pick up the phone when I really, really, really like you. Then you know that you're in my close circle when I pick up the phone for you.

[00:19:17] I believe in aliens. I don't think that we are the only planet with life on it in this universe. So yeah, that's one I believe. And yeah, I believe that. I love going to the chiropractor and being adjusted. A dear friend of mine is a chiro here and oh my god, I just love, love. Geeking out with him and ask him like all the questions I have around what is happening in my body when you adjust me here and when you do that and he's a neurologist too so he can explain things like into extreme detail and I love that.

[00:19:55] I've lived in so many places. I was born in Belgium. I grew up in the Netherlands. I lived in India for a while, lived in the U. S. for a while. I lived in Malta and now I'm in Portugal. So. And my wish is to actually build a life where I can be close to my family in the Netherlands part of the year and part of the year be in Portugal or at least somewhere warmer for the other part of the year.

[00:20:23] I hate it when people fidget when I am working. When I'm in the co work and someone is fidgeting and unaware of that, I get so annoyed. I'm like, shut up. I cannot handle this. I don't know why, but it's just I don't like it. I Yeah. No. I love going out for long walks in national parks. It really calms my brain.

[00:20:52] And I just love how it makes me feel in my body. What else? I am obsessed with the work of Graham Hancock and his theory about a lost civilization. I just absolutely adore his work, and I went to a lecture of him in London, extremely mind blowing. Yeah, I just love his way of looking at the planet and being courageous to have a different view than most of archaeology when it comes to human life on Earth, and yeah, I just love him.

[00:21:26] Another fun fact is that I always use the lowest brightness on all of my screens. I just cannot handle the brightness and I will often wear blue light blocking glasses, but you will never see me have my laptop or my phone on full brightness ever. I love making healthy treats. I recently discovered how to make a sweet potato brownie.

[00:21:50] What? Oh my god, the best. And you can actually check the show notes for the recipe. You can just put your email and receive the recipe in your inbox. I love trying out new things that have to do with health. I've tried many supplements in my life. And when someone says to try something, I will most likely do it.

[00:22:12] I am so curious. I just love trying on new things. I am someone who teaches themselves. A lot of things. I've taught myself so many things, especially in my business. Like I can't even begin to explain like business processes, how to use different types of software, how to edit the podcast, how to edit videos, like camera, which microphones to use, how to use microphone, all the things I love teaching myself new things.

[00:22:47] You can call me woo woo, but I believe in manifestation. Not like, oh, by tomorrow I'll have a million, no, but I do believe setting your mind onto something and doing whatever it takes to get there and constantly redirecting myself to bring myself back to what I want and when I'm diverting from the thing that I want, putting myself back on track.

[00:23:12] I've done this with my entire business. I knew it would be successful even though everyone said I was crazy to start a business in menstrual health. The key to me was act like I already was where I wanted to be. My self talk would always be like that. It still is. And I still believe in the power of manifestation and I use it every single day.

[00:23:33] I worked really hard to support myself financially. I think it's extremely important for every woman to be financially independent on this planet. I do not ever want to be dependent on anyone. Not my partner, not the government, not my family, when it comes to money, specifically. Yes, my community can come and feed me and support me when I have a baby, for example, but financial independence is extremely important to me and I want to only grow with that.

[00:24:02] There's no limit. I have a strong work ethic, but I always had to work really hard because of my ADHD, I think, but I have found my ways of working in my own way. And I feel this financial independence is it's one of the most important values in my life that I want to commit to because financial freedom is also an ability to have more impact.

[00:24:28] And I don't want to leave this planet without having the feeling. That I made an impact on this planet. And yes, I can, you know, make an impact by teaching, by sharing, by creating. But I also want to like leave a legacy for my family, for my children. And so finances are important for that. I studied Latin in high school, not because I specifically wanted to learn a dead language, but because of the stories I would read in And I knew that in the fourth year.

[00:25:01] We would, uh, read Latin poetry, and at the time, I still am, I was obsessed with poetry. I love poetry, and being able to read a poem in this ancient language and then being able to translate it, I love that. Another fun fact, another fun fact about me, I hate spinning. Like, you know, this sport where you bike on a bike that doesn't move, spinning?

[00:25:37] I hate it. I think it's awful. My entire body hurts when I do it, like, no offense to people who spin, like, let that be clear. I just hate it. And I hate how stressed I feel when I've done it. I just hate it. I also think it's bad for my pelvic floor. I just, ugh, I don't like it. It's disgusting to me. I Do not enjoy it at all.

[00:26:00] I think it's awful. Another thing, I once interviewed Penn Batchley and his band. You know Penn Batchley who plays Dan in Gossip Girl? I was obsessed with him and also because his girlfriend is a doula and I admire her a lot. I once had the opportunity to interview him and his band. Totally random. And um, yeah, I did that.

[00:26:25] I do not watch a lot of TV. I do like some series on Netflix. I think Ancient Apocalypse by Graham Hancock, again, is probably one of my favorites. And that's something that I can really enjoy watching. I actually recently had like a film evening with two dear friends here, a couple, and they had like this whole installation, this big screen in there.

[00:26:51] This projector, big screen in their living room, and we watched Ancient Apocalypse together, and it was so wholesome, so nice. I think those are about 50 fun facts that I've shared with you today. I hope this gave you a little bit of an opportunity to, you know, get to know me a little bit better, who I am as a person, my quirks, and the weird things that I love and like in this lifetime.

[00:27:20] Thanks again. Uh, if you have any more things that you want me to talk about, or you have ideas for topics for episodes, or you have like cool guests you want to hear on the podcast, feel free to pop me a message or pop my team a message so that we can take that up and do something with it and use it for a podcast.