The Trainers

Be Mindful Online is led by Ed Halliwell and Tessa Watt who are leading mindfulness trainers, having completed the Teacher Development Retreat run by the Centre for Mindfulness Research and Practice, Bangor University'. Ed Halliwell is co-author of The Mindful Manifesto and learnt mindfulness after suffering from chronic depression and anxiety. His co-practitioner is Tessa Watt who has been practising mindfulness for 18 years and gave up her career at the BBC to teach mindfulness to the general public. She comments:

"I first took up mindfulness practice when I was feeling overwhelmed by a high-pressure job at the BBC, I needed something that would help me cope with the stress of working life. As I continued to practise, I discovered there was much more depth to it, and that these simple practices could transform me as a person into someone who appreciated the richness of life instead of rushing through it. Through daily mindfulness practice I was learning how to step outside the thought processes that were trapping me, to discover a much bigger and more vivid world."

"I teach mindfulness now, and it's exciting each time to see the impact of mindfulness practice on people from all kinds of backgrounds. Participants often come when they are feeling stressed or depressed, and the course helps them to deal with the specific difficulties of their lives with greater gentleness and awareness. They become more accepting of themselves, and less caught up in painful emotions and habitual ways of reacting, And like me, many people report that as they practise mindfulness regularly, they begin to enjoy and appreciate their day-to-day life much more fully."