Back in the summer, as lockdown lifted, Forests Without Frontiers was delighted to co-host its first wellbeing event ‘Yoga in the Woods’ in a private woodland in Essex – and raised over £1,000. That’s 500 trees!
Thanks to supporter and friend Amanda Statham, and her partner Mason, we helped create a beautiful event, with camping in the woods and wildfire meadow, and a brilliant programme of yoga, breathwork and sound healing, with people generously donating their time and skills.
The woods were the perfect setting for reconnecting with nature – and looked so pretty, decorated with lights and prayer flags and tipis set up among the trees!
The site for the Yoga Festival
Schedule for the day
Among the choice of incredible sessions was breathwork by Natalie Keany of Evolve Breath & Body who ran a deeply impactful class showing how breath can help us release emotions and trauma in a powerful but gentle way. Yoga classes ranged from dynamic flows to yoga nidra, with Laura Sharpe, Diana Jones, Jo Coldwell and Nadine Cottrell, and Tamsin Lucy gave a talk on neurolinguistic programming.
Shamanic sound ceremony by Grace and Conch
A shamanic sound ceremony by Grace and Conch blew people away. The duo work with nourishing medicine songs, channelling healing – and it was particularly beautiful in the open air, under a blue sky. A shamanic drumming session by Michele Claiborne took people on a deep journey into another realm, while Tree Drum, with Manchester-based Craig Winterburn, cocooned us in an incredible gong sound-scape. It was all quite an experience! Devon-based Alex, aka Assassin of Sound, was also there recording for his show Plant Noise, experimenting with communicating with and recording trees (the results of gongs being played to an old oak are amazing, the tree really sings back!!).
And of course - we all need to party! So after dark we danced together under the stars with DJs Steve Chapman and Vicky Ramsay taking over the coolest DJ booth in the world, and sat around the fire to chat and connect.
DJ Vicky Ramsey
After lockdown and the stress of the pandemic this was an important time for people to come together and celebrate life, to have fun outdoors and be in community. And with over £1,000 raised we planted 500 trees this autumn.
The team at Forests Without Frontiers are huge yoga fans (Nicoleta and Jane are both yoga teachers – as is Amanda) and in these challenging times the importance of looking after ourselves, each other and the planet is more crucial than ever – and we believe practising outside and in community amplifies healing and escalates joy. We hope this will be the first of many wellbeing events – with the grand plan to run our own retreats in the future.
Our heartfelt thanks to Amanda and husband Mason and to all who helped, volunteered and donated. You rock! We’re planning another event in 2022 – details to be announced shortly.
Jane