This is such a lovely week to celebrate our founding--4 October 2013! We are blessed to run three simultaneous 8-week Mindfulness courses and a couple of Mindfulness classes in the workplace. To top it all, coming soon is our Online 8-Week Course in a Virtual Classroom format. That will make a total of four 8-week courses delivered in the same months.
Claire at the Mindfulness-Based Cognitive Therapy 8-week course with the Southern Trust (Craigavon)
Thanks to BT General Manager Paul Murnaghan, we're back home at BT, running an 8-week Mindfulness-Based Cognitive Therapy & Stress Reduction programme for his senior management team. (BT Tower, Belfast)
Jason at TODD Architects (Titanic House)
From Plowing Concrete to Opening Up to Science
When we started four years ago, bringing Mindfulness to organisations across the island of Ireland was like plowing concrete. Perhaps the culture wasn't ready. However, due to the exponential rise of research on the efficacy of Mindfulness-Based Approaches (MBAs), more and more companies are now considering mindfulness training. It doesn't mean that there is or will be a budget for it--but at least, mindfulness is an option, a potential experiment to improve employee wellbeing. The science backing mindfulness meditation and programmes built around it make more and more people in public or the workplace talk about mindfulness--That's ultimately promising!
High-Quality Mindfulness Facilitators: It's Not All About the Science
We and our associates (Jason, Claire, Nick, Ayda, Stephanie and Lisbeth) now hold the highest qualifications in teaching mindfulness in the workplace or in public within the island of Ireland. We have repeat clients because they have seen the caliber of our mindfulness teachers and trainers. We and our associates have a wealth of mindfulness experience and competencies that we are proud of. Because of our deep collaboration and combined knowledge, when you get The Happy Warrior, you'll benefit from:
1. Decades of Personal Mindfulness Practice and Experiential Knowledge
2. Masters Degree in Mindfulness-Based Cognitive Therapy from the University of Oxford, Masters in Mindfulness-Based Approaches from Bangor University.
3. 20+ years experience in Psychology and Psychotherapy
4. 10+ years experience in Learning and Development, Organisational Development, and Human Resource Management
5. High-quality Continuing Professional Development (CPD) from masterclasses, summer schools and seminars from Oxford Mindfulness Centre, the Centre for Mindfulness Research and Practice at Bangor University and the University of Massachusetts Medical School.
Progress in Workplace Mindfulness
To date, we have facilitated mindfulness training and events for about 1,500 people! For some, it is enough to have a mindfulness class of 4 hours as part of their well-being drive. Others prefer a 1.5- to 2-hour mindfulness taster, just to try and see how management and staff receive it. Some decide to run conferences to introduce mindfulness to a wider audience from among a variety of organisations. And then we have organisations who welcome a full 8-week evidence-based mindfulness course. The blessing for us is that we have been actively part of all of this.
All of these are worthy of celebration! The Happy Warrior is all about facilitating the discovery or re-discovery of this innate human capacity to become aware. This very awareness is key to functioning optimally as a human being, an enabler to live well.
I hope we'll cross paths at some point. Be blessed as well...
Claire Robinson Gonzalez
Partner at The Happy Warrior