My journey with cacao started the 3rd of May 2024. That was the day i attended my first cacao ceremony, facilitated by Marloes Kramer. I still remember that when we went to stay at Vår Inspirationsgård my mother had told me that Marloes did these ceremonies where you drink raw cacao and I was like “you have fun with that, I don’t think that would be something for me”, funny to look back on that now. But then, when her son would also join, I figured I’d just give it a try and had a great experience!
Then, after a second ceremony with them in october, I knew I wanted to learn how to facilitate cacao ceremonies like hers and to be able to hold space for myself too.
In november I got myself Dan Knowlson’s Cacao Ceremony Facilitator Training Course, which really helped me get started.
In december I attended one of Dan’s Cacao O’clock’s, a lovely ceremony with a meditation led by Steph Edwards. Here Dan briefly spoke about his 40 day training that is Cacao Mastery Online, which I’ve since done twice.
In early 2025, I found out about Mahara, I heard about it trough Purekakaw and thought the locaction in Amsterdam was the only one. But at some point Purekakaw posted about the location in Zutphen, which was the city I went to school in at the time, on their story. I was really excited about that, it was so close and I had never heard of it before!
When I finally dared to go in, Michelle received me with open arms. Mahara has been much like a second home to me since, I’d come there whenever it was open after school, to just be. And still whenever I come to The Netherlands today.
10th of April 2025 I held my first ceremony for others, I got the opportunity to hold it in Beatrijs van der Wiel’s yoga space BeeCAP, very grateful for that! It was just me, my sister and a friend, which was really good for my first time.
Since, I’ve attended many more ceremonies, mainly from Marloes and The chocolate haven & Kim Ruwa, which I attend on a regular basis.