All posts tagged: yoga for refugees

Community Really is a Super-Power

Published by Minna

We received this precious feedback from our recent refugee yoga retreat, held for the second time at Lockerbrook Farm in the Peak District National Park in the UK. A mix of cultures, ages and backgrounds came together with compassion and embraced the yoga practices that were shared. *** Dear friends, fellow yogis, kitchen warriors, As we wrap up this unforgettable retreat, I wanted to take a moment — from the bottom of my stretched hamstrings and still-tingling chakras — to say a big, hearty THANK YOU. A round of belly-breathing gratitude to our wonderful teachers: Yanar, Kerry, and Lynn, who guided us through flows, stillness, journaling, and something called sankalpa, which we’re still trying to pronounce correctly. You taught us that transformation can be gentle… To all of you who washed dishes, chopped veggies, and scrubbed pots — you embodied karma yoga with sudsy grace. You reminded us that yoga doesn’t end with shavasana. Sometimes, it ends with compost. And then, just when we thought the magic had peaked, came the final night: a fire

Creating Safe Spaces in Lebanon for Trauma Recovery

Published by Minna

“It has been a disastrous period, but we have managed to be there for our community, to help in the ways we can, as much as we can. The tools we learned from you served us well.” – Roula Darwish, Beirut Roula, one of the community yoga teachers Tools for Inner Peace trained in Lebanon, started an initiative for women and children who had been displaced to Beirut from the south. Here is how she went about creating a safe space at the Houna Yoga Center, which she manages: “At first we had no other volunteer teachers to give classes, so I started to offer some simple trauma yoga practices to displaced women. Yoga nidra helped them to get rid of their fears and worries, to be more relaxed, more open. Then we started working with kids. We started with a small group, and then the group grew bigger and sometimes we had 30 kids.” Rima, also trained by Tools for Inner Peace, has been sharing her love and beautiful energy with displaced children. She

Suddenly There is Something More

Published by Minna

Shukriya, originally from Aleppo, has lived in refugee settlements in Bekaa valley, Lebanon, for the last six years. Tools for Inner Peace have been training her as a community yoga teacher for three years since 2020. She smiles when she talks about her experience, “Yoga relaxes me and brings me pleasure. The classes are really beautiful.” “I’ve been doing yoga for four years now, and so much has changed since the first class. After the third class I started experiencing big improvements. I felt changes in my breath and in my overall energy. Whatever stiffness I would feel, I would just go to the class and it would be gone. If I felt anxiety, it would just go during the class. “It became like an addiction. I had so much good energy. Every time I would come for a class, I would feel optimistic afterwards. I would feel fresh, as if reborn. It’s like every time you enter a class you’re entering a different world. You detach from the world, to a world where there

What the Research Says: a study of our Yoga for Peace project

Published by Minna

Mind, body and community: The potential for yoga as mental health and psychosocial support in emergency contexts Jessica Stone Lebanon is home to approximately 1.5 million refugees, numbering roughly a quarter of the entire population—the highest proportion in the world. Many Syrian refugees in Lebanon have witnessed or experienced physical, psychological or sexual violence, and continue to experience food insecurity, discrimination and social isolation. Reports of traumatic flashbacks, uncontrollable emotions, hopelessness, despair, and unusual physical and mental exhaustion are also common, as are high rates of depression, anxiety and post-traumatic stress disorder (1). Women in particular are increasingly exposed to sexual assault, interpersonal violence and survival sex work in the settlements (2), yet there are few mental health services available for Syrians in Lebanon (3), and even fewer that cater to women’s needs. To address these challenges, the organisation Tools for Inner Peace has been implementing a yoga program for mental health and psychosocial support (MHPSS) in informal tented settlements and community centres in the Beqaa Valley region since 2017. This program supports women to