I have lived in The Netherlands until 2009 when I decided to leave my corporate job in The Netherlands, with a long experience in coaching, mentoring, personal and leadership development, to move to the UK and to start my Oxford Compassion Practice.

Nonviolent Communication (NVC) came on my path in 2006 when I met Marshall Rosenberg, developer of the NVC process. Since 2006, I have trained with many NVC trainers internationally and in 2012 I became a Certified NVC trainer with the Centre for Nonviolent Communication. I lead NVC practice groups and NVC workshops internationally, both public workshops and in organisations. Since 2015 I have been running workshops for Buddhist groups in which I bring together my experience with NVC and Zen, deepening the spiritual journey. In 2021 I was invited to become an Assessor in Training for Italy.

After having worked with Reiki for more than 20 years, I completed my Reiki training in with the Reiki Master/Teacher-level training with Cory Croyman at the Asian Healing Arts Center in Chiang Mai, Thailand. After 25 year of Ch’an (Chinese Zen) practice, I have been authorised by Ton Lathouwers, Dharma Successor of Jinarakkhita Ashin (Teh Ching), as zen teacher in the Maha Karuna Ch’an Sangha.

Other spiritual teachers on my path have been Thich Nhat Hanh, Ama Sami, Amma, Bernie Glassman and Sri Sri Ravi Shankar (Art of Living). In 2018, I was introduced into Internal Family Systems (IFS) in an 8-day retreat with its founder Richard Schwartz and since than I continue to feel deeply inspired by his work. I have completed all the formal levels of training (Level 1, 2, and 3) offered by the IFS institute and I have attended many other IFS trainings with senior IFS trainers.

IFS represents a new synthesis of two already-existing paradigms: systems thinking and the multiplicity of the mind. It is my experience in studying and working with IFS over the last year with clients in workshops, that it is very complementary to NVC and supports me also in working with NVC from a spiritual place. The beginning of a new journey!

I live in Oxford (UK) with my wife, Bridget Belgrave. My long term passions are playing Japanese music on the shakuhachi (Japanese bamboo flute), watercolour painting and broadening my perspective on life by staying curious and involving in new learning and new experiences.