Finding Peace in the Forest for NHS Staff
Interim Report: Wellbeing 6-week Course, 2025
Finding Peace in the Forest: A Wellbeing Journey for Healthcare Practitioners. Read about this 6-week course and find out what it involved and what participants thought about it.
Summary
In the demanding world of healthcare, moments of stillness can feel like a luxury. Yet recently, a group of healthcare practitioners from BCUHB discovered just how transformative it can be to pause, breathe, and reconnect with the natural world. Together, we completed a unique wellbeing programme set deep within the Gwydir Forest; an experience that offered not only rest, but profound restoration.
This nature-based course was created by Golygfa Gwydyr especially for healthcare practitioners who were feeling the weight of constant responsibility, compassion fatigue, and emotional strain. Its purpose was simple yet powerful: to offer a sanctuary for rest, kindness, self-compassion, and renewal, while demonstrating how time among the trees can calm the mind and restore equilibrium.
Programme
Each week of the programme unfolded around a core theme, gently guiding participants deeper into their own wellbeing and into connection with the forest around them. These themes shaped the group’s shared experiences and offered new perspectives on how nature can support restoration.
Be – An invitation to simply be: to pause, breathe, and notice the self in the quiet presence of the natural world.
Connect – Learning to ground in the forest, to feel its stability and rhythm, and to rediscover connection—with nature and with oneself.
Move – Exploring how mindful movement in the outdoors can uplift mood, release tension, and strengthen overall wellbeing.
Collect – Allowing the forest to inspire clarity and creativity, offering space to gather thoughts and nurture personal insight.
Explore – Practising the art of “sauntering” through the landscape, unhurried, curious, and open while observing the calming effect that nature has on the mind.
Restore – Opening the heart and mind to the forest’s nourishment, experiencing the quiet replenishment of energy that comes from being held by nature.
Impact & Outcomes
Together, these themes created a powerful journey of reconnection, grounding, and renewal; reminding us that wellbeing is both a practice and a path, often best travelled among the trees. Over several immersive sessions, participants stepped away from the pressures of clinical life and into a landscape that encouraged reflection and healing. Guided activities invited everyone to slow down and re-attune to themselves. Mindfulness was the focus: gentle breathing and visualisation exercises, movement and stillness meditations, and creative and reflective sessions, all held within the soothing embrace of the forest.
The programme was not only restorative in the moment, it was also designed to equip practitioners with practical tools they can continue to draw on long after leaving the woods. Each participant received a personal journal to capture insights, observations, and coping strategies that will help nurture balance in their daily lives and support long-term wellbeing.
This shared journey through nature reminded us that healing is not something reserved only for our patients, it’s something we must seek for ourselves as well. And sometimes, all it takes is stepping into the forest to begin finding our way back to centre.
Comments from the Course
‘The benefits have not only helped me personally, but also professionally. I feel more grounded and centred to be better able to manage the demands of work and home.’
‘I would highly recommend this programme to anyone working in the NHS as all work so hard and need a little break.’
‘it is important that all senior members of the trust and heads of departments know about this to discuss in teams. Supervisors and team leaders could refer. I also think staff should be able to self refer.’
‘All patients of all ages would benefit from this programme – it goes hand in hand with resilient programmes for children and young people. It is vital to treat mild to moderate anxiety/depression but also preventative work – to slow your nervous system before it impacts your health.’
‘I will take away so much. The exercises I’ve engaged in. The meditations, both sitting and moving. The shared Practices. The kindness, the common humanity, the caring, the connection, the permission to take time.’
‘I took so much away from this course it came at a personal and professional time when I needed it, to grow slow down and really consider where my focus should be to gain the best for the service I manage the staff and patients. Thank you team GG for giving me this gift of time and contemplation to explore and restore.’
Golygfa Gwydyr, November 2025
Want to know more?
For information on future events, or if you want to discuss specific team sessions, please see our Wellbeing section.
Finding Peace in the Forest for NHS Staff
Interim Report: Wellbeing 6-week Course, 2025
Finding Peace in the Forest: A Wellbeing Journey for Healthcare Practitioners. Read about this 6-week course and find out what it involved and what participants thought about it.
Summary
In the demanding world of healthcare, moments of stillness can feel like a luxury. Yet recently, a group of healthcare practitioners from BCUHB discovered just how transformative it can be to pause, breathe, and reconnect with the natural world. Together, we completed a unique wellbeing programme set deep within the Gwydir Forest; an experience that offered not only rest, but profound restoration.
This nature-based course was created by Golygfa Gwydyr especially for healthcare practitioners who were feeling the weight of constant responsibility, compassion fatigue, and emotional strain. Its purpose was simple yet powerful: to offer a sanctuary for rest, kindness, self-compassion, and renewal, while demonstrating how time among the trees can calm the mind and restore equilibrium.
Programme
Each week of the programme unfolded around a core theme, gently guiding participants deeper into their own wellbeing and into connection with the forest around them. These themes shaped the group’s shared experiences and offered new perspectives on how nature can support restoration.
Be – An invitation to simply be: to pause, breathe, and notice the self in the quiet presence of the natural world.
Connect – Learning to ground in the forest, to feel its stability and rhythm, and to rediscover connection—with nature and with oneself.
Move – Exploring how mindful movement in the outdoors can uplift mood, release tension, and strengthen overall wellbeing.
Collect – Allowing the forest to inspire clarity and creativity, offering space to gather thoughts and nurture personal insight.
Explore – Practising the art of “sauntering” through the landscape, unhurried, curious, and open while observing the calming effect that nature has on the mind.
Restore – Opening the heart and mind to the forest’s nourishment, experiencing the quiet replenishment of energy that comes from being held by nature.
Impact & Outcomes
Together, these themes created a powerful journey of reconnection, grounding, and renewal; reminding us that wellbeing is both a practice and a path, often best travelled among the trees. Over several immersive sessions, participants stepped away from the pressures of clinical life and into a landscape that encouraged reflection and healing. Guided activities invited everyone to slow down and re-attune to themselves. Mindfulness was the focus: gentle breathing and visualisation exercises, movement and stillness meditations, and creative and reflective sessions, all held within the soothing embrace of the forest.
The programme was not only restorative in the moment, it was also designed to equip practitioners with practical tools they can continue to draw on long after leaving the woods. Each participant received a personal journal to capture insights, observations, and coping strategies that will help nurture balance in their daily lives and support long-term wellbeing.
This shared journey through nature reminded us that healing is not something reserved only for our patients, it’s something we must seek for ourselves as well. And sometimes, all it takes is stepping into the forest to begin finding our way back to centre.
Comments from the Course
‘The benefits have not only helped me personally, but also professionally. I feel more grounded and centred to be better able to manage the demands of work and home.’
‘I would highly recommend this programme to anyone working in the NHS as all work so hard and need a little break.’
‘it is important that all senior members of the trust and heads of departments know about this to discuss in teams. Supervisors and team leaders could refer. I also think staff should be able to self refer.’
‘All patients of all ages would benefit from this programme – it goes hand in hand with resilient programmes for children and young people. It is vital to treat mild to moderate anxiety/depression but also preventative work – to slow your nervous system before it impacts your health.’
‘I will take away so much. The exercises I’ve engaged in. The meditations, both sitting and moving. The shared Practices. The kindness, the common humanity, the caring, the connection, the permission to take time.’
‘I took so much away from this course it came at a personal and professional time when I needed it, to grow slow down and really consider where my focus should be to gain the best for the service I manage the staff and patients. Thank you team GG for giving me this gift of time and contemplation to explore and restore.’
Golygfa Gwydyr, November 2025
Want to know more?
For information on future events, or if you want to discuss specific team sessions, please see our Wellbeing section.