Rise and Wild

17/07/2025

I love these photos, they capture a glimmer of the joy, connection & peacefulness we return to at my Mindfully Wild workshops at Hassall Green Nature Reserve with the Green Angels - The Land Trust.

I guide one of these each season, as an opportunity for folks to slow down, learn some calming mindfulness techniques, connect with one another & nature and nourish our wellbeing.

🍃🐛

13/07/2025

Keeping cool & calm through these summer days?

𝐉𝐨𝐢𝐧 𝐦𝐞 𝐟𝐨𝐫 𝐚 𝐠𝐞𝐧𝐭𝐥𝐞, 𝐫𝐞𝐣𝐮𝐯𝐞𝐧𝐚𝐭𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐡𝐨𝐮𝐫 𝐢𝐧 𝐲𝐨𝐮𝐫 𝐰𝐞𝐞𝐤. 𝐓𝐡𝐞𝐬𝐞 𝐜𝐥𝐚𝐬𝐬𝐞𝐬 𝐨𝐟𝐟𝐞𝐫 𝐚 𝐠𝐫𝐨𝐮𝐧𝐝𝐢𝐧𝐠, 𝐧𝐮𝐫𝐭𝐮𝐫𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐩𝐫𝐚𝐜𝐭𝐢𝐜𝐞 𝐭𝐡𝐚𝐭 𝐛𝐫𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐮𝐬 𝐛𝐚𝐜𝐤 𝐭𝐨 𝐛𝐚𝐥𝐚𝐧𝐜𝐞.

Surrounded by plants, natural light and space, we move through achievable, straight-forward yoga postures, and learn how to relax, strengthen and connect our bodies and minds. All elements of the classes are invitational and suitable for people new to yoga, as well as people who have a regular practice.

Classes can be booked one at a time for £10.
Or if you book for 6, you get one free ☺️🌿🙏🏼

Wednesdays 6pm
Fridays 9.30am

📍 The Wellbeing Space, Pickford St, Macclesfield

Find out more or book here:
https://www.riseandwild.com/yoga

And if you have any questions at all, feel welcome to message me here or through my website 💌

03/07/2025

Finding quiet joys amidst the chaos of the world. The pink of the roses that blossom once a year & the warmth of my old boy 🐈 happily basking in the summer sun. Watching ducklings grow and their connection to the water; those little orange legs wiggling up in the air as they dive down for insects. Cups of tea with butterflies and gathering with neighbours to watch caterpillars in the long grass.

It all sounds so small, what’s the significance of a strawberry when there’s so much happening that’s out of our control? These are moments we are likely to miss when we are stressed, experiencing suffering and destruction around the world and within our own. They don’t get a look in when we’re busy, busy, busy. But they can be a little burst of presence, maybe even wonder. Here I am, *right now*, igniting a sense of being part of something, anchored to something so much bigger than, just me. The mundane has magic waiting for each of us. The strawberry tasted sweeter than any other of the season, grown and gifted by a lady who brought them to share at one of our classes. Kindness. Togetherness. Nature’s rhyme, the passing of time. The clouds that - if we blink we might miss the light shining, just like that and the way it can feel in our chest to experience such deep and fleeting beauty.

Hands in the earth, toes bare on the grass and legs light, held by a hammock that has carried so many others through the years before. Creating and enabling pockets for rest, comfort and companionship. Man, it’s what we and our frazzled nervous systems need right now. Softness. The intertwining of trees and the rising, hiding and transforming moon illuminating the night. It’s all here, waiting for us to notice ✨

19/06/2025

14/06/2025

Last weekend, we gathered for our Summer Retreat at a beautiful, old farm cottage nestled in the countryside 🌿 words and photographs can’t really capture the magic, although Jamie hit the spot when he said, “who knew it would be so much more than a yoga retreat?!”

To retreat, and to remember nature’s ways. Switching off from the outside noise and settling into the now. A togetherness. Community. Spaciousness. Kindness and rest. Quietness. Silliness. Stillness. Spontaneity. The wild things and the ancient ways, and that giant Sycamore so many of us wrapped our arms around one morning after breakfast 🌳 All that was carefully planned from years of holding weekend retreats, and all that comes about organically. Folks staying up late sharing their stories. Others getting early nights and rising early to go for river dips together. Afternoons meandering, dreaming, being. Some embracing quietness and opportunities to have a little time to be, at one with nature.

Laughter ~ so much laughter! Meals that filled our bellies cooked with love & care & so much goodness, with gratitude for Kelly and all that she brings, embodies, teaches and creates. Yoga… gentle, responsive and restorative with practices to take home. Singing, songs, drums and mornings rising into chanting. Pranayama. More laughter, the hokey cokey (if you know…), folks sharing poems they’d written but never spoken and songs once sang with a mum no longer with us. Fire, embers glowing. Wisdom, honesty, vulnerability - I know it can be nerve wracking going on retreat, to lean into the unknowns. To go to something on your own. But man, this group came together & honoured one another with such ease. Men joined us, and women in their 20s, 70s, and every decade in between. A father with his daughter. A woman with her mother who arrived and said “I’m no good at yoga” - you all know how I feel about that phrase! Let’s change the narrative. Nurture new friendships. New ways. I can never truly know what’s going to unfold when we hold a retreat, and this one moved me to my centre.

So much so, we’re thinking of adding a date for November (Fri 7th - Sunday 9th)…. 😍🙏🏼🌍🍂🧡

25/05/2025

This little pocket of woodland next to Alder Hey Children’s Hospital has been a sanctuary for us this week 🌳 The birds, especially song of Robin and Wren softened the sounds of traffic and ambulance sirens, and the canopy of trees created a sheltered space for us to deliver Nature and Health facilitator training in the middle the park.

Alongside Carl, who is a senior mental health practitioner, psychotherapist & forest school leader in CAMHS, we have been guiding his colleagues and PhD students in the NatureWell approach. This 3-month accredited Green Care journey explores deepening our relationship with nature, anchored in a One Health approach that intertwines personal, social and ecological wellbeing.

Therapists, mental health practitioners, social care workers & students have been immersed in the first part of the course this week, which takes them experientially through the pathways to nature connection, introducing ecotherapy and outdoor facilitation skills. Supporting them to relax, learn about, connect with, feel inspired and immersed with nature, knowing they are going to then deliver green care opportunities within the NHS for young people and families… it’s one of the most fulfilling branches of the work I do.

Slowly, together, within societal systems and beyond, we are remembering these earthly, at one with nature, ways 🍃

19/05/2025

Practicing with the earth, the wind, the birds, sunlight and the insects 🌱🦋🌍🌳🧘🏼‍♂️ Held by the roundhouse, we come back to our bodies, to our nature. With invitation to rest, to move, to breathe, and to be. To remember what this is really all about… Humans being.

Community classes every other Thursday afternoon at Hassall Green Nature Reserve as part of the Green Angels - The Land Trust programme.

17/05/2025

08/05/2025

Sometimes we forget that we’re all just creatures roaming about on planet Earth 🐒🌳🌍
That every day is an opportunity to meet trees, to move and rest our bodies, to get to know and take care of ourselves & one another. To explore what’s possible, what’s necessary, what’s needed today. As adults, and maybe even as children, somewhere along the way we forget to play as a way of being in the world. Work and the news and witnessing disaster, war & climate change, never ending emails and to-do lists and those unnecessary bright lights in supermarkets and traffic and maaan, the routine of modern-day living really isn’t conducive to playing and roaming and caretaking & being with the land. For living our lives as nature intended.

I forget too, along the way, what we’re really here for and get consumed by everything man-made. Often it’s a little reminder that brings me back into being with everything else. Everything other and non-human and the essence of life. Of being life! The sun comes out. A dog asks to play. There’s an invitation… just like there was here. A team of us rangers and a baby and a dog out for a walk together, finding ourselves off the path and under a tree for a shady picnic spot. Somebody said “that’s a great tree for climbing!” And so we went, grinning, finding our feet and sweet spots to just be. Same with the rock, when the oldest, strongest member of the group was the first to the top. We were in awe and laughter and encouragement and we were connected. There’s something about finding and being with your tribe. Where gentle encouragement and wisdom and playfulness and the ignition of something that wakes us up from the daily grind can unlock a whole new/forgotten/longed-for way of living. Come, let’s find the way 🌱

02/05/2025

Space to be. Here 🌿 As you are, in indoor spaces or outdoor places with encouragement to s l o w down and reconnect. To explore ~ right now, in this moment. And sometimes to play with speeding up a little… the breath, our movement, or in my case during days together, the tea-making! Invitations and time to unravel from the doing of our day-to-day lives, settling back into rhythm with nature.

Photographs share snippets from recent…
๑ reset days with medicine woman Miranda and my breathwork brother Sam
๑ community yoga at Hassall Green Nature Reserve with the Land Trust
๑ nature connection walks & meditations
๑ time with the land. Encouraging folks to go barefoot and slow down & watch the sunrise together.
๑ evening light pouring into our Monday evening yoga classes
๑ Wednesdays & Fridays yoga, philosophy and rest
๑ gentle health walks with community groups in the Peak District National Park.

Macclesfield, Rainow, Mellor, Stockport, Sandbach, Shutlingsloe, Alderley Edge, the Peak District and beyond .

🌱🌍🧘🏼‍♂️✨👣🌀🙏🏼 remembering life is sacred.

11/04/2025

Workshop in the Woods 🌳🌍🍃 ~ 3 spaces of 12 available. On Sunday 25 May, join me for an extended morning practice and workshop exploring yoga, pranayama, sound and being nature. There will be time to (un)learn, practice and rest, as well as share brews and space with the trees in this incredible, ancient woodland. There’s no footfall through the space, providing a safe little haven for us to gather, with shelter if the rain comes.

Sunday 25 May, 10am - 1pm
Macclesfield
£38

Would you like to find out more or book one of the spaces? Follow the link in my bio or visit www.riseandwild.com 🌲🙏🏼