I’m a mindfulness teacher and supervisor, a psychotherapist working in private practice and also deliver training for voluntary organisations. I began teaching mindfulness in 2009 and have offered eight-week courses in lots of different settings, including for medical students, carers, trainee counsellors, mental health peer mentors, people living with cancer and women who have been through domestic violence and abuse. I began co-teaching on residential retreats in 2014.
Qualifications
- Masters in Teaching Mindfulness-based Courses – Bangor University
- Mindfulness Supervision Training – Bangor University
- Mindful Self-Compassion Teacher Training with Kristen Neff & Chris Germer – Bangor University
- Certificate of Competence in Teaching Mindfulness-based Approaches – Bangor University
- Tai Chi Movement for Wellbeing – qualified trainer
- Postgraduate Diploma in Person-Centred Counselling – Swansea University
Teaching Training Specialisms
- MBCT for relational trauma
- MBCT for carers
- MBCT in higher education and for medical students in particular
- Mindfulness for staff, volunteers and service users in third-sector organisations
- Mindful Self-Compassion
Retreat Lead Experience
I’ve been co-teaching on residential retreats for three years, beginning in 2014 with Richard Farmer, co-founder of Tai Chi Movement for Wellbeing, at Poulstone Court Retreat Centre, in Hereford. I completed two years of training to teach in this context in 2012.
I’ll be co-teaching my first retreat for the Mindfulness Network in October 2017 with Annee Griffiths, who has developed “Staying Mindful,” a course for eight-week course graduates. Supporting people to continue journeying with mindfulness beyond the eight-week course is something that I’m especially interested in. Co-teaching and collaborating with Annee has offered me a wonderful opportunity to reflect on what helps with sustaining and deepening practice, after the final bells of week eight have sounded!
Retreat Specialisms
- Mindful movement
- Interpersonal mindfulness
- Retreats for people who are caring for others
Personal Practice
My relationship with meditation began in my late teens and my practice evolved through many changes and transitions before I bumped into mindfulness in my mid-thirties, during a time of personal difficulty. Mindfulness practice offered me a way of being with myself when life felt unbearable, supporting me with turning towards parts of myself and my experience from which I’d habitually turned away. Slowly and gradually, I found my way to sitting down with myself each day, and fifteen years on, my practice is at the heart of my life and my work. Though old patterns of harsh self-judging recur sometimes, I’m finding they pass more swiftly and as my practice is deepening, I’m beginning to grow a kinder and more open-hearted relationship with myself. Working one-to-one with Insight Meditation teacher Catherine McGee has been a gift and through her skillful inquiry, I’m coming to know more fully the deeply personal and universally-shared nature of our human vulnerability.
Research Activities and Interests
I have a special interest in mindfulness for relational trauma and wrote my Master’s Thesis on adapting MBCT for women survivors of domestic violence and abuse (DVA). I’m currently collaborating with colleagues within the School of Social and Community Medicine, Bristol University, on a trial of the adapted MBCT-DVA curriculum.
Further info
Sarah’s website – www.sarahmillband.com
