Our meditation retreats UK seem to becoming very popular. More and more people seem interested in attending either a meditation day retreat, a weekend meditation retreat or longer, perhaps a seven day mindfulness meditation retreat. 

 

But what is a meditation retreat? Normally our attention in life goes onto the people and things in our life. We have responsibilites; dogs need walking, dinner needs cooking, meetings take place, phone calls to do and so on. In all of thise activity is can be difficult to sense who we are and what we really want in our lives. A meditation retreat is a time and place where we take our attention away from the external responsibilites and to begin to pay attention to ourselves. 

 

There is much more understanding and greater publicity than ever before of the real human cost behind the mental health issues that so many of us deal with everyday. 

 

Our young student's powerful blog of her mindfulness classes last year, gives us another dimension to the power of friendship, the need for perseverence and her courage. 

 

When my best friend asked me if I wanted to go on a mindfulness course, I was immediately doubtful. 

 

I'm the type of person who can't ever mentally switch off. Add to that a lot of external factors - an intense relationship breakdown, debt, stresses at work, an upcoming house move and a masters dissertation and you're left with extreme insomnia and severe depression. I was at a point in my life where I did not want to live my life, my thoughts were a constant stream of self criticism and on several occasions I tried to end this.