The Touching Safe Ground is a yoga, English language and community-building project for women who are migrants, refugees and asylum seekers. 

The project offers inner enrichment and healing alongside the development of practical language skills, through weekly yoga and English language classes.  Each session combines trauma-informed yoga with English language teaching, followed by an informal, participatory and creative English language consolidation session, supported by local volunteers.

Developed in partnership with Sally Ramsden of Natural Connection and Praxis Community Projects, a specialist migrant charity, the project was conceived following an event hosted by GCP with the local Buddhist community to generate new interest and ideas for projects. It was funded by Emergence Foundation. We also received funding for a three month Covid Outreach project, using the Language of Wellbeing methodology, from the London Borough of Tower Hamlets Small Grants Fund administered via the East End Community Foundation. 

“I feel like I can do things again – clean and cook. I have energy to do things. I feel happy.”
— Razia

An independent evaluation found that:

  • 100% felt better in their bodies, calmer, and more able to deal with the pandemic

  • 90% of participants reported their English had improved

  • 80% felt more confident to communicate online

  • Despite barriers to participation, the group was the best-attended of all Praxis groups

Benefits experienced by participants:

  • Increased health knowledge, such as how to care for different parts of the body and how to adopt good sleep hygiene practises 

  • Long term physical health improvements including improved pain management and sleep

  • Increased energy

  • Alleviation of stress, anxiety and social isolation

  • Improved mood

  • Increased confidence to express feelings and receive peer support, through high levels of trust

  • Learning to prioritise self-care, and being more present in the moment

 
“It helps you really to look after yourself. You can be very lazy to do something, you may want to do it and may not be able, but when you have the instructor, you get more focused and you get more serious about yourself.”
— Lucia
“This lockdown time I am loneliness. That’s why, I can see the people and I can do the yoga also. Happy for me.”
— Batini