The Change Agent
May 2007
By Rajender Menen
Answering to an inner call, Dutch national Aneke Riewald has come to India with an assortment of self-empowerment workshops
Tall, slim and radiant, Anneke Riewald is in India for a purpose. A Dutch national, she awoke one day to an inner call which told her to make India her home. She upped, came here to check out the full import of that call and felt immediately welcomed. Now she plans to stay and help people empower their lives by unlocking the infinite potential of the mind.
Even as a kid, I was always helping others, she tells me over coffee. She has come to Mumbai for a training session. Her quaint Indo-Dutch accent wafts over the fragrance of the cookies. She is headquartered in New Delhi, and travels the country conducting workshops.
How did it all start, I ask her. I was different from others. As a teenager, instead of running the usual gamut of parties and dates, I enjoyed inspiring and supporting others. I used to organize groups of children and we used to paint, play, draw and sing. I carried on with this and later worked as a nurse with the mentally challenged. I find a great satisfaction in helping others actualize their potential. As I grew older, the call just kept getting stronger and now here I am.
Of all the countries in the world, what made you come to India, I persist. You could have chosen some place more materially comfortable. These are difficult choices which are made outside of your self. Maybe it was made for me, maybe I am just an instrument in some divine plan she tells me. I have always wanted to come to India and it happened at the right time. India has its own set of challenges and its own rewards. It is completely different. She admits to being influenced by Sri Aurobindo, Nelson Mandela, Martin Luther King, and, of course, by the great teacher called life. When life knocks you around, you learn the most, she says with a soft, knowing smile.
Aneke calls her organization, Golden Inspirations. The focus is on individual transformation through inspiration and aspiration,she explains. She has had tremendous feedback for her stress management and concentration workshops. I know it is working when people get back to me and say that their professional and personal lives are looking up. She is also a certified counselor and does personal and group counseling too. She says, "Modern life is getting more complicated every day. The problems are dynamic and so the solutions have to be dynamic. Together, we look for new possibilities. But the client is in the driving seat and he has to act. Individual coaching helps. People who feel they are in a rut, suddenly see new solutions. It is just a question of giving them new eyes to see the same set of problems."
To professionally equip herself, Anneke learnt coaching and counseling in Holland and then became a certified trainer for the globally well known Silva Ultra Mind ESP system from Texas, USA. The Silva method is remarkable, she says.
Golden Inspirations conducts different types of workshops. The rates vary. From a few hours, workshops can also stretch to days encompassing the Silva method, meditation and several other empowerment techniques. The idea simply is to open the mind to its enormous potentialities.
I ask Anneke what her life purpose is. To support more people and make a difference in their lives by helping them walk on their own,she tells me, looking into my eyes. Her calendar is brimming with counseling and workshop sessions. Along with Mohammed Shiraz Qamar, who looks after the business end, Golden Inspirations looks well set for a long inning.
Contact: http://www.goldeninspiration.com/
contact@goldeninspiration.com