I am Leen Vanacker. A Belgian Artist and Light & Colour Doctor.
From Oncologist to Artist….
As a child, my big dream was to become a medical doctor in the mountains, living in a wooden house surrounded by pine trees and alpine meadows. When I was 18, I chose to study medicine, not in the mountains. I chose a life as a medical oncologist in the University Hospitals in Brussels, but this was not the choice of my heart. I didn't belong there, I couldn’t find my place there, I couldn't be my true self. In 2018, I decided to give up my job because of a severe physical and mental breakdown. I had given everything for my work and my patients. I felt lost, empty and broken. I was high time to take care of myself. This was the beginning of an intense healing journey and transformational process. It was stepping in the unknown, a lonely journey in the dark, desperate looking for the light, my light, myself. I never thought giving up. There has always been that sparkle of hope and confidence. There has always been the desire to live and to be of service for humanity.
I took some years to find myself back.
My path towards Freedom…
It was learning to connect with my body, my heart and soul. It was growing in awareness. It was breaking free, stepping out of the old, letting go of self-destructive, limiting patterns and beliefs. It was healing childhood trauma. It was giving expression to my deepest pain. It was the encounter with myself, with all my inner parts, also those parts that were in the darkness for a long time. It was opening my heart. It was connecting with my inner wisdom and my infinite source of creation. It was making space for myself, for my creative soul. It was learning to be gentle with myself and accepting myself just the way I am. It was becoming a gentle, loving and caring mother for myself. And it was much more than that. It was being reborn. It was saying YES to myself and to life. It was letting go of control and surrendering to life.
The Awakening of my creative soul…
It all started with dots, lines and words that I put down in my writing book during many writing meditations. It was my way to keep moving while my body was too weak. Writing meditation helped me to connect with my body, with my heart and my essence. It gave me the answers I was looking for. I found clarity about my life purpose.
A mandala colouring book made me wake up even more. I could feel life and see the light again
My life has changed totally when I discovered the magic of painting at the end of 2020. Looking for something new, something different, I enrolled in an online workshop of intuitive painting. I didn’t really liked the workshop, but it was the reason to convert the garage into a painting studio. A new world opened up to me, finally I had found a way to express myself. I spent many hours and days in my painting studio, me, myself , my paint and canvas. I gave space to every feeling, every sensation, including my suppressed anger, sadness, fear and shame. It was a time of liberation, healing and transformation. It was surrendering to the process, creating without expectations, without judgement. That felt like pure bliss for me. Vedic Art helped me to connect deeper with my creative soul and divinity.
In 2021, I discovered the healing power of drawing mandala, since then I never stopped. It started with a course of mandala drawing and numerology. A magical journey through many colours and numbers with as final destination the creation of my birth mandala. This felt like coming home. It helped me to ground and to feel more centered, it helped me to take my place here on earth. Creating birth mandala became my great passion. Every mandala is so special and so different, just like every human being. I feel grateful and honoured that I can share my passion with others during my birth mandala workshops and in this way help people to feel more centered and grounded. We need this foundation to create our life here on earth. Since this one course, mandala drawing has become my life. It is my way to center and to heal and transform heavy energies. Every mandala is intuitively created and hand drawn with coloured pencils.
Coming home in South-Tyrol.
It took some years to find my place here on earth. After Flanders, Brussels, Durbuy and Austria. I finally found that place where you feel ‘this is it, here do I belong’and that place is in the Dolomites in South-Tyrol. There I feel how my heart opens. There it feels like coming home. I realise that I couldn’t have found this place without listening to my heart, following my intuition and trusting life.
