• What is your best personality trait?
  “I’m very determined and dedicated. Whenever I start something, I completely pour myself into it and do whatever it takes. That’s good because you achieve more. But on the other side, it does take a toll. Right now I’m exhausted because I have this new job, try to manage my successful blog and make an effort to have a social life. I’ve slept no more than four hours a night for the past three months. But then I say to myself, This is your moment, Lynn, you’re young, you have to do this now, this is your chance. I just keep going, because I expect perfection from myself. Even to the point that I self-destruct. I already burned out once. For me as a workaholic, it’s very hard to find the right balance. The reason I last this long is because I love what I do. Writing an instagram post or going to an event where I know people doesn’t feel like work most of the time, so I feel energised by it. But sometimes I get really tired.”

• What is your biggest struggle in life?
  “On a work level, that I’m an introvert, yet I have to deal with this world where you need to be super extraverted if you want your career to grow. As a nine year old I was actually so intensely shy, that I had a psychologist monitor me because I refused to talk. But as a model and blogger I have to force myself to be a social, extrovert person because that’s part of the job. When you get noticed as a blogger, your traffic grows. Sometimes it feels natural, but at other times I don’t want to be the centre of attention, and I can get shy and feel like people are staring. So I’m quite conflicted about how to handle that. I drink, haha!
  On a personal level, I had been struggling with the fact that I’ve been with my boyfriend for seven years and felt like I needed to settle when I turned 25. That thought was actually quite scary for me. My boyfriend is amazing and I love him, but what if I miss out on something? I never had dates or crazy one nights stands, and in thirty years I don’t want to think, I wish I had a crazy time when I was young. How will I know for sure that I won’t regret it later that I didn’t have more flings? I guess it was a quarter-life crisis thing, because now that I’m actually living with my boyfriend, I’m super happy.”

• What is your biggest life lesson?
  “In the Netherlands we often use the expression, ‘a shot not taken is a shot missed.’ You should always give things a try, at least. As soon as you move out of your comfort zone, life becomes more exciting, more interesting, and your horizon broadens. And that’s what I want in my life, to have as much experiences as possible. But my grandfather gave me my biggest life lesson. We used to play checkers and he refused to let me win, as young as I was. He said, ‘If you want to win, you better defeat me.’ He taught me that if you want to achieve something in life, you have to work for it and deserve it. I kept playing checkers with him every single day, and I never won. But that’s where my determination comes from, I guess. If you want to get somewhere, you just work your ass off until you get there. It doesn’t matter if you fail 100 times along the way. My grandfather really was an inspiration to me. I still miss him a lot. I feel sad that I never got the chance to know him as an adult, but everyone in the family says we are very much the same.”
• What is your biggest fear?
  “I’m scared that when I am old I will think, I wish I had done more with my life. That’s the reason why I’m super active and constantly on the go. And the reason why I cannot choose, because of all the options I have.”

• What makes you different than other people?
  “I think due to my study – social sciences and anthropology – I became highly self-reflective. It’s a blessing and a curse – it does give you insights that help you grow, but at the same time you start doubting every single thing you do all the time. A lot of people aren’t that self-reflective, they just act and don’t know why they do things, how their past affected them, et cetera. Another thing that makes me different is my obsessive need to push out of my comfort zone. I always want to try something new, even if it makes me uncomfortable. It’s an inner urge I can’t help. I think I got used to being pushed to my limits and reacting quickly during my days as a model, and it became my standard for life. I don’t know how to do it differently anymore. Lastly, my openness and honesty make me different. I don’t want to hide anything. Although a lot of people have no clue that I am actually really shy and quite traditional about love. Or that I’m a lingerie model, and yet a bit of a prude.”
• Do you have a dream or goal in life?
  “I don’t really believe in holding on to just one for life. When I was fifteen, my dream was becoming a model. But now I think my biggest goal is to do everything I love and not having to make either/or decisions. Just follow all my passions. It’s a problem, I just like too many things. Why choose just one thing if there’s so much more that makes you happy?”
• What does Amsterdam mean to you?
  “I just moved here. For me Amsterdam meant a fresh start to discover new things. And every day it feels a little bit more like home. It’s a really active, dynamic city with a lot of people from all around the world and the country itself. You get this feeling that it never sleeps. What I like – except for the obvious fact that there’s a very open-minded attitude about topics like drugs and sex – is that we are not that religious and we are very accepting and welcoming. We don’t judge people that much. People feel free here. For me, Amsterdam is really inspiring because you can be whoever you want to be. We should not take that for granted, nor the fact of how relatively equal women are here, compared to other countries. I think Dutch women are some of the most powerful people I’ve met in my life. And apart from that, it may be a capital, but it feels more like a village where everyone knows each other. I think that’s a very unique combination.”

Photos by Mabel van den Top