Most people climb the ladder for 40 years — only to find it was leaning against the wrong building.
Best years gone. Pension waiting. NO DEAL, if you ask me.
The old deal drains you, isolates you, owns you. I stepped off it in 2022. Built something else instead — on land, with people, in businesses that fund a life worth running.
Not someday. Not after retirement. Right now.
I'm Dennis.
Dutch. Based full-time at Zomerlicht, a 7.5-acre park in Overijssel, the Netherlands. Father of two daughters, 6.5 and 9.5. Partner to Asha, who planted the seed for all of this.
1997 - dropped out of high school
1999 - working in retail and menswear
2001 - started my first design agency
2004 - got kicked out of that design agency with pennies
2005 - working in retail and menswear again
2007 - started a menswear company
2008 - met the love of my life but we were not ready
2010 - lost my company
2011 - my family made an intervention on my life choices
2011 - working in retail and menswear again
2014 - moved to China to work as a concept developer for a tech investor
2014 - had a long distance relationship for the first 18 months
2016 - came back to Amsterdam and had our first daughter
2017 - started a branding agency for tech brands
2019 - we lived and worked in Canggu, Bali
2020 - our second daughter was born
2021 - did a real estate course and bought our first property
2022 - we bought a recreational park and a farm to transform into a community village and a retreat center
2026 - sold the agency in January 2026
I realised that on paper, until 2022, it looked like a life. Underneath it, I was on autopilot in a never ending struggle. Fed, housed, always working hard but quietly starving for the things that actually matter.
Love. Purpose. Freedom. Trust.
I didn't know myself at all.
WHAT I BUILT
In May 2022, we bought a 7.5-acre recreational park and adjacent farm with four families.
The goal: a conscious community village and retreat centre.
Instantly we were running four businesses at once — a campsite, a restaurant, a development project, and a retreat centre — on the busiest weekend of the year. We received six death threats when we terminated the 91 lease contracts on tennants. We converted a farm into a fifteen-bed retreat centre with two kitchens and a yoga hall in 3.5 months. The first partner-family left and that made the bank to call our financing into question. A second family left. Winter arrived with almost no revenue.
Asha and I asked each other, more than once: is this still our dream?
The answer was always yes.
I consider this a test from the universe. The plan was revised but the goals remained. Today the bank is paid off. We developed the short-stay lodges and cabins, and we already sold half of the plots of our co-living.
This isn't theory. It's a working prototype.
THE PROJECTS
Zomerlicht
The recreational park in Overijssel - The Netherlands. Home base. The proof that a different life is possible, standing on real ground.
Innerlicht
The retreat centre, built from the converted farm. Two halls. Weekly retreats and events. The most established part of everything we run.
Slowville
Short-stay cabins and lodges on the park. Completely developed.
Co-living
Not-so-tiny houses for people who want land, community, and shared ownership - not a weekend visit.
Truflo
Inner journey guidance for entrepreneurs who've built the outer life and are asking why it still feels empty.
Noai
Building and development. Early stage.
The secret of change is focus all of your energy not on fighting the old, but on building the new.
Zomerlicht.com · Innerlicht.org · Truflo.nl · Noai.nl