 Welcome back everybody. Next to me is standing Anna-Marie Janssen. She's a medical biologist. She's a bit afraid because her talk is not... Well, you're going to mention WordPress, but it's not really about WordPress. So she was a bit afraid that we're not going to like her talk, but I told her differently. She's running her own business as a virtual assistant. You're a local, you have anything you need to do? No, we're working locationally clients. But are you living in Nütrecht? She took some life-changing experience. You had some life-changing experience last year and you're going to talk about that. And you're maybe going to even motivate us to do the same. And this is your first WordCamp, right? It's my first WordCamp ever. Give her a WordPress community welcome, please. Okay, thank you very much for coming. I'd like to start with a small introduction... Yeah, video that's introducing my talk. So yeah, this was a small introduction into what I would like to tell you. And I would like to share with you something about shaving foam. And you might wonder why I should go to talk about shaving foam, what has it to do with WordPress. Now, this gives already a small idea, a small hint into what I mean with shaving foam. And in the end, I'm sure you all know what I mean with it. And I hope you will see some things in your life as shaving foam as well. This is quite a personal talk about things that happened in my life, especially last year. For a long time I was living the life that I was expected to live. I didn't like it that much, but yeah, I did what everyone does. I did a study, I started working, I bought a house, I booked some nice holidays. But to be honest, it didn't make me very happy. But yeah, I thought this is what everyone does, so yeah, I have to accept it. This is the normal life, so yeah, just continue. And find a solution within the way you are living now, within the system. Maybe I can buy a bigger house, buy great stuff for that house, maybe that will make me happy. Or yeah, I'm a woman, so why not buy lots of shoes, clothes, bags, tools and other stuff as much as possible every month. Or maybe I should try to get a brand new company card, maybe that will make me happy. Or maybe I should go to an exotic holiday somewhere far from Europe. Or maybe it's time for a new career step, and that will give me more fulfillment in my life. Or maybe it's time for a management training, or I should go out for a drink with my friends more often. Maybe that will make me more happy. And if this all doesn't help, maybe it's time for a coach. I think almost everyone has a coach now and then, so why isn't it something for me to help me? Or I should follow a workshop about happiness, or maybe it's just the shoes, buy more shoes. I read a book about flow, I thought maybe I can find flow when I read this book, and that will help me in my work to find real flow. Or I should just start dreaming about traveling more, because I really love traveling. That makes me happy, but yeah, I had a job, so not that many days off. But if I start dreaming about traveling, maybe that will help me. And if this all isn't enough, maybe you can follow a simple online course about running a business while traveling. I learned about digital nomads that are traveling and working all the time. They work location-independence, so they can travel as much as they like. But to me it seemed a big step, so I decided to follow a small online training, just to think a bit about it, not to really take that step, because I didn't dare to do so. But yeah, if I follow a small online course, I can maybe dream a bit more about it. So I did. But wow, that made such an impact on me, that small course. And why? All of a sudden I realized I don't want to continue this way of life, even if it's the life that I'm expected to live. I knew I don't want it. It was a feeling that was hidden inside me. And because of that small online course, I realized more and more I want to change my life and start traveling and step out of the standard system. I couldn't ignore that any longer. I decided just to take the big step to live and to regard everything I was going to do as an experiment. Because if you see everything you do as an experiment, nothing can go wrong. Whatever will happen, it's just the outcome of your experiment. So what was I going to do? I stepped out of the system and I did many things that I never thought I could do. I love my house. I have a very nice house here in Utrecht. I really loved it. But I rented it out for a year. I'm over 40 but I decided to sleep in hostel dorms. Most of the people were around 20-22 and there was me. But I did it and I loved it. I decided to start my own business building WordPress sites. There's the WordPress. Although I didn't have that much experience with WordPress with running a business. As I told you before I was a shopaholic and a fashion addict. But I decided to take only one backpack with some clothes, some shoes. That was all I had during my six month journey to South America last winter. I'm really a control freak but I didn't plan that much. I bought a single ticket to Lima. That was all I planned. And I loved it. I traveled by bus very much. I often get motion sickness. But I thought let's go by bus because I want to travel by public transport. I hate routine and at the same time I know how good it is in your life. But I change places every five days for six months. I used to live on my own but I had hardly any privacy. When you're sleeping in hostel dorms then you should forget about privacy. And it was so amazing because I did so many things that I never expected I could do. And now that I'm back many people are asking me what did this step teach you. And it teaches me a lot and that's what I would like to share with you. One of the things that I learned is that home is everywhere. I thought I'm so much in love with Utrecht, with my house. I can never live somewhere else. But I learned that home is not just a building. Home is something of feeling happy, feeling comfortable. And I learned that I needed about 24 hours to feel at home in a new place. At the other side of the world, on a place I'd never been before. But it's just for me a matter of time. I need a bed, of course, a shower, my backpack with some stuff and something to eat. And I'm a coffee addict so a cup of coffee means the world to me. And as long as all those things are in place I can feel at home wherever I am somewhere in this world. And now I love the idea of minimalism. Yeah, maybe in the western world we're focused a lot on having lots of stuff that looks nice. And that's according to the trends. And that everyone who is visiting our house, loves some merch says, oh you have a nice house, nice stuff. But in the end it has nothing to do with a good life. It's not important at all. Life is about experiences. And that's what I really learned during my journey in South America. I had a great time, but I had nothing with me apart from my small backpack. But I didn't miss anything of the stuff that I collected before because I thought before I started travelling that it was important to give me a good life. The third thing that I learned is, as I mentioned before, trying is living. As long as you see many steps that you take as an experiment, nothing can go wrong. As I told you, I loved control, security, organizing. But I experienced that I can live without it quite well. And maybe after one month I would have gone back home because I missed my house, I missed my standard life. But yeah, okay, then it would have been the outcome of my experiment. The thing that I would have learned was, okay, this sort of life is not for me. Taking these steps, yeah, it was, I didn't dare to do that. But if you see things as an experiment, then you can do many things and nothing can go wrong. So if you're thinking about taking big steps in your life and you don't know if it's something for you, just tell yourself it's an experiment and then you can do everything. The biggest things I learned, and that's the shaving foam, is that, yeah, the system, how we used to live here in the Western world, what is regarded as a normal life, a standard career. If you're happy with it, it's okay. But if you feel unhappy, you have the idea, I want to do something else, I want to change my life, just step out of it. It's only shaving foam that referees use in the soccer. It's just shaving foam that keeps you where you are. There's no reason why you cannot step out of the standard life. There is no real border. There is nothing that's really limiting you or that would help you from doing what you want to do. It's just shaving foam. You can't step over it. It's nothing. You think it's something big. You shouldn't do it. But in the end, you can do whatever you like to do because it's just a shaving foam border. The other thing is what I learned, is that you're not defined by your character and preferences. Of course, you know yourself, you know what's important to you, what you like very much, like I thought, I like my house, I like being an organized person, I'm a control freak, a shop addict, but it doesn't define me. Even if you're over 40, you can change your life, you can change your way of living. You can leave things behind that you've always seen as very important to you. And therefore, I'm sure you can do what you never expected you could do. So never believe you can't change your life and live a different life. It's only shaving foam that keeps you doing what you do. So just step over it and if there's something that you think, okay, I'm doubting, can I do it in my life? Realize, maybe it's just shaving foam and see if you can step over it. Okay, thank you very much. Thank you very much, Salome. If there are questions, can they find you later? Of course. Okay, I'm here for the rest of the day. So find her if you have a question. I think we need like two or three minutes to change the technical stuff for the speaker and then we'll go on to the next talk.