About me

Hi, I am Marieke Nijland.

Certified Child in Mind Trainer, physical education teacher for children with special needs & founder of the Sukacita Foundation.

My Indonesian husband and I have one daughter together. We live in Bali (Indonesia). I was born and raised in the Netherlands and lived there until the age of 21. During my studies in 2007, I decide to do my graduation internship abroad. This was a five-month internship in Indonesia, Bali, to be precise. I knew that this choice would have a special impact on my life, but I never thought that the change would be so huge. I finished my internship in Bali and graduated in the Netherlands, but somewhere deep inside I felt that my task there had not finished yet. So I went back for 6 months to do volunteering work. Those 6 months slowly turned into one year, and then two years …

In 2010, I set up my own foundation together with two colleagues, named the Sukacita Foundation. From that moment on, it was clear that this was a multi-year plan. For 8 years, I worked with the Sukacita Foundation in Indonesia to raise awareness and share information about children with an intellectual disability. By giving workshops, seminars, practical guidance to parents and teachers, and by writing books, we have been able to give many people a positive change regarding the perception of children with an intellectual disability.

At the end of 2018, we completed the activities of the Sukacita Foundation. For more information about the work that we have done with the Sukacita Foundation over the years, you can still visit the website: www.sukacita.org.

After 10 years of development work, I felt I needed a new direction. What I learned in Bali is that when you let go of everything that you know and surrender to the unknown, the most beautiful things can happen. Go with the flow, don’t be too rigid and trust that things will be all right. And if it is not today, then tomorrow :). For the people in Bali it is so obvious that there are two worlds: the world that we see with our eyes (physical) and the “unseen” world, or the spirit world (energy). In the beginning that was a vague, incomprehensible concept to me as a pragmatic westerner; I just could not really understand this. However, I too have learned and experienced in recent years that there is so much more beyond what we see with our eyes. And that it doesn’t really matter what it’s called, or which rituals we attach to it. When we implement this concept in a conscious and respectful way, we can do beautiful things. Which is exactly what I wanted to do: to convert this intangible and invisible source into something tangible to help people.

And so it happened that I found the Child in Mind method. In 2019, I went back to the Netherlands to study the course for Child in Mind worker with founder Diana Hendriks-van Beaumont. And in 2021 I became a certified Child in Mind Trainer, which means I am teaching other people to learn to work with the Child in Mind method (at this moment the study is still only available in Dutch).
Child in Mind is a wonderful and gentle method that enables one to really listen to what another person has to say. It is a method that can give everyone a voice, even those who cannot speak up for themselves. By offering a listening ear to an important event in their life, completely without judgment, it will give the person the tools to take new steps and get even more out of life. A great collaboration, right?
I am grateful that I can do this beautiful work and hope to perform many special Child in Mind sessions!

With love,

Marieke Nijland - Child in Mind Trainer & worker