“Mindfulness is about maintaining a moment-by-moment awareness of our thoughts, feelings, bodily sensations, and surrounding environment, through a gentle, nurturing lens. … when we practice mindfulness, our thoughts tune into what we’re sensing in the present moment rather than rehashing the past or imagining the future.”
greatergood.berkley.edu
“We live so connected to the past and so focused on the future that we don’t allow ourselves to EXPLORE what we feel, want and need NOW”.
Angeles martinez Bodi
Mindfulness for stress and life difficulties
When we live with low stress and are more relaxed the serotonin and endorphins hormones, we produce are very different and make us feel good. But to reach a state of calm and happiness we must first realise we are getting upset, so we must develop our attention. There are many studies that show that it is difficult for us to pay attention, as we live in a world of hurry, stress, and a lot of distractions, we are so busy that we don’t have time to pay attention to what we really need, which is our self, our being, and our inner self.
Mindfulness practices like body scan, breathing meditation, walking meditation make you aware of how to live the present. You will learn to recognize your most difficult emotions, unpleasant emotions and live them as something temporary, react in a balanced and slow way, you must be aware of your emotional states and apply the tools of mindfulness that help you to manage your emotions
Unique and beautiful rural mindfulness retreat
Our unique and exclusive rural retreat overlooks the river Ebro and mountains of Southern Catalunya providing the perfect location for our 3-day weekend mindfulness retreat that’s designed to provide a warm and unforgettable experience that includes good food, local wine, and relaxing activities so that our clients remember the positivity of the retreats experience to help de-stress and focus in their post retreat experiences.
Retreat Objective
- De-Stress
- Re Focus
- Feel Good
and
- Observe and understand what is happening around you and yourself.
- To direct attention to a point, regulating what we are doing.
- To develop the capacity for tenderness, kindness, compassion, and effort.
- Being resilient and knowing how to adapt to adverse situations, valuing painful situations in a positive way.
Elements involved:
- Attention to the present moment
- Positive intentions to change
- Acceptance without prejudice, full experience of what is happening.
“What matters is not what you look at, it’s what you see.”
Henry David Thoreau
Weekend Structure
3-day weekend mindfulness course
- Mindfulness introduction workshop
- Mindfulness workshops
- Certified and experienced instructor
- Unique, comfortable and exclusive rural retreat
- Retreat activities: walking, cycling, wine tasting, kayaking
- Healthy biological vegetarian meals
- Coffee, tea and fruits are included
- 2 nights’ accommodation at El-Figueral
Experience
- Beginner
- Intermediate
- Advanced
Retreats with Instruction in English and Spanish
Mindfulness activities, food and wine
The wellbeing of our clients is the very essence of the weekend, so apart from the core mindfulness sessions we like to ensure that the experience is unforgettable.
All our food is provided by our Rivermeinds chief, breakfast, lunch and dinner is designed to be healthy and exiting.
We just happen to be located in an area of excellent wines, DOE Priorate, DO Montsant, Do Terra Alta and Do Tarragona so for those interested there is always superior wines available and we also offer as an activity wine tasting at one of our pre-vetted vinyards.
El-Figueral is a 8.8 hectare Olive farm and we have plenty of trails on the farm but walk out of the gates and it’s a walkers paradise. We offer cycling on the green path, kilometres of relaxing cycling through magnificent country side and kayaking down the river Ebro from Miravet an amazing and beautiful stretch of the Ebro.
Scientific rational for Mindfullness
Mindfulness arose from the desire of psychologists and psychiatrists to find tools to relieve stress and alleviate the suffering of patients with chronic pain and suffering.
These professionals researched the practices of meditation and yoga from Eastern disciplines, trying to understand the relationship between mind and body, ‘Integrative medicine’ with the intention of changing the behaviour of patients by understanding the causes of their problems in an integrative way.
Psychologists and professionals in this field developed mindfulness to be used by patients teaching them to direct attention to a point, to control and regulate what they were feeling.
30 years of professional experience
Angeles Martinez-Bodi MSc, BSc has been teaching “A” level students Psychology and Sociology for 30 years and has first-hand experience in dealing with stress, anxieties, depression, and the emotional demands of her students.
This peaked Angeles’s interest, she discovered by helping her students with their wellbeing, that in many cases she helped improved their academic performances as well.
It was no surprise then that when Angeles moved to Spain in 2016 she evolved and developed her interest in mindfulness. Using her background in teaching Psychology she gained a further degree in Mindfulness from the Universidad de Juan Carlos, Madrid. Today she provides mindfulness courses online, one to one consultations and from El-Figueral a mindfulness retreat.
The benefits of a Mindfulness weekend at Riverminds
The benefits of mindfulness are many, you will improve your attention, memory, intuition, live in the present, with more energy, creativity and happier, at a physiological level you will improve your immune system and improve depressive states, improve your self-esteem, your self-worth and better relationship with others. You take away the positivity of the Riverminds retreat experience to help de-stress and focus in post retreat experiences.