Back by popular demand. Start the new academic year with a clear mind and new superpower with our six-week online mindfulness course. 

Learn to develop inner resources that will help you navigate through difficult, trying and stressful situations with more ease with our six-week mindfulness course.

Start Date: Monday 26 September 2022 to Monday 31 October 2022

Course Duration: 6 weeks

Course Costs: FREE

Weekly Time Slot: 4.30pm (Each session will run for 90 mins)

How to register:

To register your interest please contact Joanne Howe joanne.howe@staffs.ac.uk. If you register for the course, you will be sent a short confidential orientation form to complete prior to attendance.

Course Information:

The 6-Week ‘Finding Peace in a Frantic World’ Course is a great introduction to mindfulness. The course is based on the traditional 8-Week Mindfulness Courses (MBSR and MBCT), but the key learning points and practices have been distilled into a slightly shorter format.

The course consists of six, 1.5-hour sessions and includes 20 minutes of home practice per day between sessions. Through guided meditations, group dialogue, individually tailored instructions, and home assignments (such as home meditation practice and exercises), you will learn the essential principles of mindfulness and techniques to build your personal home practice and access the wide-ranging benefits well beyond the course.

The key learning points include:

• A variety of formal and informal mindfulness meditation practices, which involve using the breath and body as a focus for being aware of our experience in the present moment.
• Understanding the physiology of stress and how to self-regulate our moods, so that we are better able to pause in challenging situations and manage our responses more effectively.
• Recognising the patterns of worrying and self-criticism that often generate more stress; and how we can relate to ourselves with a more accepting and kinder stance.
• Learning to have more mindful communication, connections, and relationships.
• Developing practical self-care tools to help us thrive, perform at our best, and build resilience.

The structure of the course and home practice will follow the outline of the bestselling book: “Mindfulness: a guide to finding peace in a frantic world”, co-authored by Mark Williams, who is the leading mindfulness researcher in the UK and co-founder of the MBCT programme.

Please note that this book follows an 8-session format, and so sessions 5 and 6, and 7 and 8 will be combined for this course.

Notes:

• This class will be held on Microsoft Team.
• The teacher and participants will be live and visible at various times. There will be group and one-to-one interaction as you would expect in a traditional classroom setting.
• No prior mindfulness experience is required.
• There is up to 20 minutes per day of home practice during the course.
• A copy of the course book, “Mindfulness: a guide to finding peace in a frantic world”, will need to be purchased prior to the course starting. It is recommended to read the first four chapters before the first session.

What previous participants said on completing the course:

“I attended the session more out of curiosity than expectation as I was sceptical that mindfulness could make a difference especially as someone who is always busy and finds it very difficult to ‘switch off’ and relax.  How wrong I was!  I was amazed that such a short intervention could impact so greatly. “

“Do it and it will change your outlook on life and your wellbeing 100%. I am so happy I did the course as its changed my life”

“This course creates such a haven. From week one, I felt hope for a more peaceful way of being, and the skills and insight that I learnt as the weeks passed pervaded into areas of my life that I didn't even realise were causing discontent. The accompanying book is such a great resource to keep. I am at the start of a long journey but I feel equipped with some kind of superpower.”

““It has huge potential to benefit you as a person and as a professional in terms of allowing you time to focus on yourself  and by so doing, allowing you to move towards developing self-awareness and inner calm as a default position”

“Take time out for yourself and be amazed at the simplicity of the principals and the depth of the impact this can have on your health and wellbeing - self care is very down rated!”