Train to Teach the Mindful Warrior Programme November 2024

The Sanctuary is now offering a training course for those who work with young people to enable them to deliver our Mindful Warrior Programme in their own school or community centre.

What is the Mindful Warrior?

The Warrior Programme is a teacher trainer programme created by Brother Richard Hendrick and Niamh Bruce that draws on the various traditions of culture and the arts, helping young people to end up as reflective, resilient warriors. It is built around an initiation framework linked to adolescent psychological development that includes:

1. Mindfulness and movement practices
2. Insights from psychology of adolescent development
3. Ways to experience moments of reflective stillness
4. Traditional wisdom embodied in the ‘gentle warrior’ figure
5. Use of creative imagination

What are the benefits?

This transformative programme aims to equip teachers and youth workers with the tools to inspire reflection and mindfulness in the the young people they work with, fostering a community of young people who are better resourced to navigate the challenges and disappointments in life with resilience and wisdom.

Who is the Mindful Warrior Programme for?

It best serves the needs of a cohort of young people who require an alternative, experiential-led approach to their development and is particularly suited to young people from 6th class to 2nd year, who are finding the journey to maturity and social integration challenging.

Will I get resources I can use in the classroom and youth centre?

Yes, you will be supplied with handouts and lesson plans, we also offer follow up reconnection days so that we can help you continue your practice.

Are there prerequisites to join this course?

Applicants to the facilitator training course should have undertaken some prior mindfulness training and have established a regular mindfulness practice.

Prerequisites to the course include:

Ideally, applicants should have completed an 8-week mindfulness course such as MBSR / MBCT / MBLC / MBCL / Breathworks / .b Foundations or the Art of Stillness in the Classroom, with at least 6 months of a minimum of 20 minutes of mindfulness practice per day (such as sitting or body scan practices).Exceptions to the qualification prerequisites outlined above may be made for applicants who have a long-standing mindfulness practice in other contexts (eg. Vipassana / Shamatha / Insight Meditation or WCCM / Centering Prayer).

Reflections on the Programme

I’ve had the privilege to have participated in the Mindful Warrior Programme and it is the most life changing piece of education I have ever undergone – for both personal growth and for the young people who I work with on a daily basis.

– Lisa Bonnell, Youth Worker, Ballymun Regional Youth Resource

This Programme will be spread over three weekends:

Friday 8th of November (evening) Saturday the 9th of November (full-day) and Sunday the 10th of November (half-day)

Friday 29th November (evening) Saturday 30th (full-day) and Sunday 1st of December (half-day)

Friday 6th of December (evening) Saturday 7th of December (full-day) and Sunday 8th of December (half-day)

Cost: €400

Mindful Warrior Videos