Through a combination of activating, deeply relaxing and contemplative practices we offer Addiction Recovery Yoga to help individuals to re-balance neurologically and prepare them to be in a receptive place to work with other recovery professionals in lifestyle therapy.
Steps to Hope | Steps to Hope SCIO is a non-profit charity dedicated to caring for the homeless and those suffering with addiction. In March 2020 we partnered with local yoga studio Calm on Canning Street to offer an in person class taught by John Arthur, a recovery coach and ECY yoga teacher, supported by Rachel Kelly. These classes successfully moved online through out the pandemic. They returned face to face in September 2021 and due to the large number of attendees we moved the venue to Beetroot Sauvage. The classes are continuing to support the people who attend in their recovery journey with Steps to Hope.
WomanZone by Foursqaure | Our yoga project supporting women affected by trauma and in recovery from addiction with Womenzone reached the end of its second year in August 2021. This project is funded for three years by the Volant Charitable Trust. We successfully moved our weekly yoga classes online during the pandemic thanks to dedication from the Womenzone team and the teacher at the time, Bethany Halcrow. We are continuing to consider ways to support group members further through our mentorship program, though progress on this has been limited due to lockdown restrictions. We are looking forward to running our postponed retreat in early 2022, COVID restrictions depending. With income saved from room hire we were able to offer a wellbeing care package to each woman in the Womanzone programme. These were put together by volunteer Anne Close (Lorraine’s mum) and were really appreciated by the women in the run up to Christmas, after a particularly difficult year. We returned this class face to face early in June this year.
Lothian Edinburgh Abstinence Programme (LEAP) | We offer regular yoga and meditation workshops for people engaged in this residential abstinence programme in Edinburgh, offering people the chance to experience the healing offered from mind/body practices and to learn skills that may help in their long term sobriety.
Previous Projects Include:
Serenity Café | Funded by Mars GoodnessKnows grant. We worked with the most established recovery café in Edinburgh, running the 8 week Minded Addiction Recovery Kit (MARK) programme. Each person on the 8 week programme received a free one to one recovery/life coaching session. As part of this project we also offered a Friday night drop in class with community social for graduates of the 8 week programme.
Alcohol Related Brain Damage Unit-Penumbra Milestone | We offered the 8-week MARK programme to residents of the in ARBDU run by Penumbra Milestone. This class offered accessible movement and breath work to people with a range of physical and cognitive impairment and encourages balancing of the nervous system and awareness of sensations in the body.
This year we have ran one off projects with CGL and weekly Chair Relaxation classes for the Salvation Army.