More about Rest and Restore Day Retreat

You are warmly invited to start 2025 from a more rested, peaceful place. The retreat day will help you become more aware of your body, breath, mind and heart, and to help you connect more wholly with the metaphysical symbolism of winter.

Hosted by experienced yoga teacher and retreat leader Mel Skinner, the day will begin with restorative yoga. Restorative yoga is a slow, soft and accessible form of yoga postures which are designed to take the body out of fight-flight-freeze and into a more restful place of being. Using props to support the body, we remove as much effort as possible so that we feel safe and held, and able to breathe once again.

This session is followed by morning tea and homemade goodies, and then we will spend the late morning in an outdoor creativity meditation. This will be weather dependent, but is likely to include spending time in the beautiful grounds and woodlands of Hawkwood, contemplating the light, colour and feel of ‘outer winter’, before returning to the warmth and comfort of the indoors to experience yoga nidra designed to help you journey deeply into the depths of your own ‘inner winter’, honouring your need to retreat and go inward.

After this follows lunch, then in the afternoon you are invited to bring a source of inspiration, or something which represents winter to you. This could be a poem, prose, piece of art, song, or an object. This session is collaborative, and a wonderful way to create a feeling of community and connection in a safe, supportive space. After this session we enter into a final yoga nidra practice, and end with afternoon tea.