January 23, 2026 | by Allana Pratt

S14 | Intimate Conversations: Finding Soul-Led Leadership After Life Burns Down with Lopa from RASA

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Walk with me into a story of loss, rebirth, and fierce integrity in this unforgettable episode of Intimate Conversations. In Dark Night to Divine Light, I sit down with Lopa van der Mersch, Founder and returning CEO of RASA, mother, and devoted student of Tibetan wisdom traditions, for her first public conversation after years of deep initiation.

Lopa opens up about the season that dismantled everything she thought she was. Divorce. Single motherhood. Stepping away from leadership. And the sudden loss of her home in a devastating fire that erased nearly every external marker of identity. What followed was not collapse, but a profound rebirth.

Together, we explore how this identity death reshaped her leadership, her spirituality, and her relationship with compassion. Lopa shares how people-pleasing and subtle compromise once shaped her path, and why returning as CEO required an uncompromising devotion to integrity, even when it did not make financial sense.

We dive into Tibetan wisdom, nervous system healing, and the difference between compassion that depletes versus compassion that nourishes. Lopa reveals the daily rituals that now anchor her life, from unplugging at night and beginning her mornings in practice, to allowing devotion to pulse between motherhood and leadership.

We also talk about embodiment, sensual grounding, beauty, and pleasure as necessities rather than luxuries, and how RASA was born not as a product, but as a devotion to creating businesses that heal rather than harm and nourish both people and the planet.

In this episode, we explore:

Identity death and rebuilding a life after everything falls away
Leading with integrity when compromise no longer feels possible
Tibetan wisdom as refuge through grief, betrayal, and loss
Compassion that includes the self, not just others
Nervous system rituals that support sustainable leadership
Embodiment, pleasure, and beauty as medicine
Conscious business as a path of healing and service

This episode is a living transmission of what it means to lead from truth, trust yourself again, and build a life that is sane, humane, and soul-led.

About Lopa

Lopa van der Mersch is the founder and returning CEO of RASA, a beloved adaptogenic beverage company that has served over 20 million cups worldwide. She is a mother, truth-seeker, and woman who has walked through profound initiations including burnout, loss, betrayal, rebuilding, and ultimately a return to leadership with greater wisdom, compassion, and clarity. Guided by years of deep spiritual study and rare Tibetan masters, Lopa brings a powerful blend of grounded business strategy and embodied intuition to everything she does. Her mission is both simple and radical: to build companies that nourish rather than deplete, consciously cultivate human virtues, and demonstrate that business can be a force for real good without sacrificing health or humanity.

Explore RASA and receive a special savings:

www.AllanaPratt.com/RASA

Use code ALLANA15

Connect with Lopa and RASA:

Website: www.wearerasa.com
Instagram: lopalovesyou