Many professionals in the helping industry spend a substantial portion of their working lives with people in stress and distress. Working with conflict, stress, trauma and suffering, whilst dealing with the stresses of their own personal lives, puts the helping professions at great risk for experiencing distress, burnout, and vicarious traumatisation. Bringing together research and practices from Mindfulness, Mindful Self-Compassion and Positive Psychology approaches, this interactive workshop creates a safe space for participants to take an enjoyable day-out to nurture themselves and look at how they might integrate self-care into their daily practice. Many of the exercises practiced can also be applied with clients.
Participants will:
- Understand the risks involved including compassion fatigue, burnout, secondary traumatisation (Figley, 1995)
- Learn about and experience the Mindful Self-Compassion approach (Neff, 2017) both for self and for use with clients
- Learn mindful practices that can be incorporated into daily routine (self and clients)
- Investigate self-care in different areas of life – personal, professional, physical, emotional, spiritual – and identify action steps to focus on.
- Explore Meaning in their life and work and how this contributes to wellbeing. “From a Positive Psychology perspective, meaning consists in knowing what your highest strengths are, and then using them to belong to and serve something you believe is larger than the self” (Seligman, 2002)
- Build resilience
(Health Care Professionals welcome)