About This Programme

Welcome to Mind & Body Wellness (MBW), the comprehensive five-week community-led service evaluation project under NHS that empowers individuals with effective tools to improve their mental and physical health through the power of Yoga and Mindfulness. Our programme includes:

• Gentle yoga and laughter yoga, both of which help to release tension and promote relaxation.
• Various simple and yet powerful advanced Yoga breathing exercises.
• In the Breath to Health Workshop, the main breathing exercise you will learn is “Sudarshan Kriya Yoga” (SKY). This is a powerful rhythmic breathing technique derived from yoga which has numerous proven benefits in high stress environments.
• Techniques to strengthen the relationship between mind and body.
• Guided meditations and relaxation.
• Various other interactive processes.

Once you have learnt the breathing and other techniques, they are easy for you to practise at home daily and you can join for weekly follow-up sessions as well.

Mind & Body Wellness Programme – Locations & Dates

We’re super excited to announce that we have managed to tap into 4 sources of funding to be able to extend the Mind & Body Wellness Programme from Caerphilly area to Newport and Blaenau Gwent. We will continue with Cohort 7 in the Blackwood Caerphilly area mid-September; and then start brand new cohorts in Newport and in Blaenau Gwent (exact locations and dates are currently being finalised and will be advertised soon on this page and on social media. Please revisit this page around mid-August.

“Thank you all for such a great 5 weeks, and to everyone who arranged it. I feel so blessed to have attended. Will miss you all”.

“Thank you Dr Kaur, Esther and Mel. This is my second cohort and I enjoyed it and I learnt so much. Even though I didn’t speak much, I still felt welcomed and not judged. It was nice meeting so many nice, friendly people”.

“I second that, it definitely did feel a safe space to just be, with no judgment at all. It’s such a nice and refreshing feeling. And so nice to meet like-minded, kind-hearted people! With a bit of laughter and fun thrown in. Much love and respect to you all and thank you so much for putting these workshops on for us”.

“Well thank you all, it’s been a pleasure meeting you all wonderful bunch of people. Thank you to the Mind and Body team, it’s been a beautiful beginning to my journey: learning the tricks to be one with myself and I’m so excited to take my journey even further with all. Take care all and have a lovely journey – you never know we might meet again!”

“Thank you Dr Manmeet, Mel, Sandra and team for beautiful, inspirational, motivational sessions. Sorry I missed 2 sessions. So nice to meet lovely souls from this group. From every session I learnt to try my best to put in practice. Attitude of gratitude. Love, light, Divine blessings to all…Thank you Esther for all your help and guidance”.

“Thank you for sharing a safe, happy, peaceful space where there is no judgement. I was able to switch off any worries and experience being ‘present’, which I’m grateful for. Enjoyed getting my competitive side out this morning ‘run run’ and it’s good to laugh.”

“A heartfelt thank you to Dr Manmeet, Esther, Mel & anyone else who made this group possible. Was lovely to meet everyone. I have learned so much and am feeling inspired to continue to learn. I know I must begin to help, love and nurture myself because I’ve neglected myself for a very long time. Thank you.”

“This was my second time around and I loved it just as much as the first. I have enjoyed meeting everyone and it’s lovely to share and support each other. A big thanks to the ‘team’ for sharing their knowledge and energy. I will be back xx.”

“Some positive feedback after my first session. I decided to go for a walk straight after, while I felt warm and energetic. To my surprise I was not feeling breathless climbing the hill/s of Radyr which I have experienced before. It would be great to carry on with these sessions, it will do wonders.!”

“Such an amazing 3 day on Breath to Health workshop. Learned a lot about myself: that I need to take care of myself, as well as others. Breathing work I found very powerful. And relaxation was the best I’ve experienced ever. Thank you all: Manmeet, Esther and Sandra for your wisdom, kindness and support”.

“Thank you all so so so much. These 6 weeks in total have been a wonderful and beautiful experience/journey in itself. I have met some beautiful souls along the way with no judgement in what background or experiences we came from which I thought was/is a beautiful thing on its own so we could share what’s in our minds and hearts at ease. So big thank you for that. Manmeet thank you for sharing your wisdom and knowledge with us all! I thoroughly enjoyed; just wish I could put you in my pocket for whenver I need your guidance. Sandra, Esther and Mel thank you very much for helping and supporting us in whatever we needed. The workshop wouldn’t have happened without you. Brilliant team and I would recommend anyone and everyone to join this workshop. Again thank you all!”

“Thank you to everyone, this really has helped me get through the past few weeks with the worry about my mum. Still have days where it’s all too overwhelming and I get very angry about it, but I believe I can bounce back wquicker from those days with everything we have learned and soken about and I’m grateful for meeting such lovely kind people and hearing your brave stories xx”.

“Well thank you all; it’s been a pleasure meeting you all wonderful bunch of people. Thank you to the Mind and Body team, it’s been a beautiful beginning to my journey: learning the tricks to be one with myself and I’m so excited to take my journey even further with all. Take care all and have a lovely journey – you never know we might meet again!”

“Thank you Dr Manmeet. It has been an amazing experience and I feel I have gained insightful knowledge that will stay with me for life”.

“Thank you for the session yesterday, it was very successful. The feedback is very positive..!” – Education Centre Manager at Ysbyty Ystrad Fawr – October 2023.

Thanks for your session today. Thanks for the reminder that we need to look after selves to be able to look after others. The mind and emotions influence the body, as the body, in turn, influences the mind and emotions. Breathing Yoga is a good way to de-stress and get in that balance to be happy. – Cardiff and Vale UHB – Introductory Session September 2023 (Online)

“Just wanted to say, firstly; that the Thriving Communities team that we met (yourself included!) were fantastic in sharing their expertise and knowledge in a way that encouraged us to engage with conversations about holistic wellbeing whilst reflecting on how we look after ourselves and promote holistic wellbeing with our patients.

The delivery of the presentation was digestible and again, engaging in such a way that it encouraged us to connect with the content more than just cognitively. It was a truly experiential session!

It is evident that your team are the right people to deliver the Thriving Communities work and all of you were and are so passionate about the work that it is infectious. Not only that though, it felt as though we were sat with true experts who guided us to engage with breath work, laughter yoga and chair yoga in such a way we benefitted from the experience personally whilst learning how to apply the learning to our clinical work.

Personally, I really enjoyed learning about the yogic cup of coffee technique and have shared that with the wider PHP service and my loved ones!”

– Caerphilly Psychological Health Practitioner Lead with ABUHB – September 2023.