Feedback from Open Meeting
17 March 2021
We would like to extend a heartfelt ‘thank you’ to everyone who expressed an interest and who participated in our first open event as Mindfulness Wales CIO. Welcome to all of you as part of the developing network across Wales working towards building a mindfulness movement to support a more compassionate, kinder, fairer and sustainable society.
We had a total of 74 registrations and 55 participants on the night. That’s amazing for our opening discussion and we hope you’ll all come back regularly to share your ideas and contribute to topics that grip your interest. We’ll try to provide a good mixture to cover all sectors in the hope that this will help support your local work and stimulate discussion and action between you and your colleagues.
Please share this document with anyone you think might be interested. All these meetings will be open to anyone interested in taking forward mindfulness in Wales. Please encourage people to sign up to our mailing list and follow us on social media to keep in touch with and contribute to our activities:
- sign up to our mailing list http://eepurl.com/gLixsb
Not enough time to discuss and write!
We’re so grateful to those who managed to provide information in the chat function – we’ve been through it all at our Board meeting and have picked out some key emerging themes to follow up. Thanks too to those who offered help – we’ll be in touch in due course!
We think there may be others of you who have comments or information that might be helpful to us building a picture of what’s going on. Please let us know by email to mindfulnesswalescio@gmail.com if there is anything you’d like to add to the discussion from 17 March 2021
‘Mapping’ mindfulness activities in Wales
One of the highlights of the meeting was sharing the exciting things already going on. We’ll include discussion time in each of our meetings to help share information and enhance the networking relationships and we’ll be seeking advice on how we might gather the information on a more organised basis and how we might be able to share this.
Health
Thanks to those of you working in Health for your input and offers of support. We’ll be in touch to continue these discussions. We know there are some exciting developments in mindfulness in health which we’d like to share more widely at a future date. We’ll also have chance to revisit health at our event on 14 July with Vidyamala Burch.
Education
There was lots of recognition of the significant contribution mindfulness can make in the context of the new curriculum. The detailed development of the Health and Wellbeing Area of Learning and Experience (AoLE) will be taking place over the next few months so this is an important time to raise awareness of the high quality mindfulness programmes available. A Mindfulness Toolkit for Wales has been developed to support education settings (not just schools) to implement a strategic mindfulness journey, ensuring that those teaching mindfulness to learners are properly trained and supported.
Mindfulness for parents was also a theme and Estyn recognises that the most effective wellbeing programmes involve families. We hope to collect some case studies as they develop – please keep us posted.
We’ve set up a Mindfulness Wales event on 12 May 2021 with Professor Katherine Weare, one of the foremost researchers in mindfulness in education. Her recent publication Implementing mindfulness in schools – an evidence based guide[1] complements the Toolkit and includes many Welsh examples. There will be time for discussion and questions for us to explore how this supports the further implementation of mindfulness in education in Wales.
Links with Welsh Government and other key Organisations
Wales is a small country and we’ve been fortunate to have good relationships with Welsh Government and with officials in relevant areas. We’re grateful for the support and look forward to widening and deepening these relationships in working towards our mutual aims. We look forward to using our wide network as Mindfulness Wales to help us make and develop more connections.
Welsh Language
We’re taking forward discussion regarding Welsh medium education and general Welsh language mindfulness provision to discuss how Mindfulness Wales might support the work already under way to develop use of the Welsh language in mindfulness activities. We’ll report back on this in due course.
Diversity and Accessibility
The Board felt that this broad and vital area deserves particular attention and is key to widening access and equality of opportunity to mindfulness across Wales. It will be the subject of an open online Mindfulness Wales meeting on 16th June 2021. Lots of you raised this issue so please come along if you can. We’ll seek to identify the issues and share some ideas about how we might address them.
Mindfulness and Nature
There was interest in supporting this area and we’ve identified a number of different applications and activities across Wales in this. Mindfulness Wales will seek to get some of the interested parties together to share ideas. Watch this space and please let us know if you are working in this area.
Research
Some of you have kindly offered your expertise in this area and we will be in touch with you. If you have any ideas though please do contact us. An evidence base is an essential foundation for all our activities so this is an area we are looking to progress. Interestingly, this formed part of the First Minister’s address at our Conference in November 2019.
Upcoming Events
Mindfulness: developing agency in urgent times
21 April 2021 7-8.30pm
Join Jamie Bristow, Director of The Mindfulness Initiative and Mindfulness Wales to discuss how mindfulness can help us build collective action to underpin the decisions and choices we make at all levels to create the Wales we want to see.
https://www.themindfulnessinitiative.org/agency-in-urgent-times
Supporting Mindfulness in Education in Wales
12 May 2021 7-8.30pm
Professor Katherine Weare
Implementing mindfulness in schools: an evidence-based approach
https://www.themindfulnessinitiative.org/implementing-mindfulness-in-schools-an-evidence-based-guide
Mindfulness in Wales: Diversity and Accessibility
16 June 2021, 7:00-8.30pm
Contributors to be confirmed
A collaborative approach to defining the best way(s) forward to widen access throughout Wales.
Mind and Body: how mindfulness can help physical healthcare
14 July 7:00-8.30pmVidyamala Burch
Breathworks founder, author of Mindfulness for Health and Mindfulness for Women
[1] https://www.themindfulnessinitiative.org/implementing-mindfulness-in-schools-an-evidence-based-guide
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