We are going to spend a few days together so you would probably like to know a bit more about me, find out who your retreat leader is. Who am I?
Road to LondonAfter I finished my Bachelor’s Degree in English Language and Culture I wanted to visit the place I’d studied about but had never seen, so I came to London. Initially, it was supposed to be a short stay which then turned into a whole summer. The experience was so new, exhilarating and eyes-opening that it made me think about staying here for a bit longer. I was supposed to go back to Poland to start my Master’s degree in Warsaw in October that year but instead I decided to apply for a university place in UK. As studying English language and culture did not make much sense in England I decided to start a course in Computer Science. It’s a decision I still can’t logically explain but which shaped my life for the next decade. When I got my first serious job in the City in the IT department of an investment bank, I was already so much into my London life that I stopped thinking about going back. My awakening
Following my passionFollowing your passion is not as easy as it sounds. At that time, I had been following what I ‘should’ be doing for so long that I didn’t know anything else. I found a piece of advice that said if you don’t have this obvious great passion that just overtakes your life, you just need to start with little things you enjoy. The first thing that came to mind was running. Before I had kids, for years I used to go for lunch time runs with a group of colleagues, and I remembered those moments very fondly. I thought, why not start a running group (Isleworth Running Club) through Facebook? To my surprise the club grew very quickly. Suddenly, I was sharing my passion with newly-found friends. Exercising made me feel much better physically and mentally. I helped many women who had never run before to start their new hobby, which was extremely satisfying. In return, they offered me their skills and knowledge. One person helped with our logo, another one with printing running tops, someone helped with building a website, another with photos etc. Things were falling into place, and I finally felt like I was ‘in flow’. I thought to myself that I could try to do the same with the other things I enjoyed. I wanted to share my passion for finding happiness and my passion for the part of Poland which I come from, just like I shared my passion for running. That’s how the idea of my Happiness Country Retreat came about. Plans for the futureCurrently I’m working towards becoming a certified Mindfulness teacher, and I am really excited to start sharing my knowledge and experience of Mindfulness at the retreat. I am also planning to take on a life coaching course. I’ve always been curious about human behaviour and why people do what they do, as well as just helping others. It took me awhile to realise that this is also one of my passions. Now that I’m aware of that, I have great desire to turn it into a full time career. In the future I hope to offer life coaching sessions as well as mindfulness courses. You know what they say … do something you love, and you will never work a day in your life.
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Communistic Concrete JungleI was born in Poland in 1980 during communist times where everyone was supposed to wear the same simple uniform to school, drive the same car – if you were lucky to have one – and live in exactly the same block of flats. Those blocks of flats were identical in any town you would visit. They were made of massive concrete slabs - always grey and usually with no greenery around them. That’s why as my family really loved spending time surrounded by nature. We tried to go on day trips outside of our town as often as possible. Escape to the Countryside
My Life in LondonWhen I moved to London around 2002 I missed the freedom of being able to just jump into a car and be in the middle of a scenic countryside within ten or fifteen minutes. London is such an amazing place full of different cultures, beautiful architecture, theatres, world-famous events, restaurants etc. Opportunities are endless. If you are ready to learn, to work, and to be adventurous there is no limit to what you can see, do or achieve here. There is another side to it as well though - it’s very fast paced, and if you don’t watch yourself you can suddenly wake up one morning and be 10 years older ☺ Working Mum of TwoI’m sure that I’m not the only mum who realised that London is a great place to live in until you have two kids and have to work full time. The working hours are usually 9 to 5 or 5:30. Then you have to add an hour for the commute each way. What you end up with is your precious 1-year-old being in a nursery from 8am to 6pm, being brought up by strangers. By the time you catch up with all the house chores, shopping, preparing for the day ahead and other bits and bobs, you have almost no time left for yourself or your other half. Sometimes you don’t even have time to think about whether this is what you really want. You just get sucked in by this list of things to do that never seems to get any smaller. That’s when I decided I had to change something in my life to get more quality time for myself and my family. I needed a new career. Search for HappinessMindfulness and meditation were tools that helped me to take some breaks from my hectic life and start looking into myself. I faced the reality and admitted that I was rather miserable despite all my achievements. I wanted to start feeling peaceful and happy instead of always feeling behind with my to-do-lists and then internally beating myself up for that. I had to go back in time and find the moments when I was the most joyful. Those moments for me where spending time with family, or like-minded people, being outside and close to nature, practising mindfulness, being active, helping others or having a go at being creative. Now it was only a matter of introducing more of that into my life. How could I turn all this it into my career, I wondered. Getting Back to the RootsWhen I got married in 2005 my husband and I got some money from our families as our wedding gift, and we decided to use it to buy a piece of land somewhere close to our home town. One day we thought we could have a little holiday place there. Back then, I asked my dad if he could have a look at land for sale near our town. He just went to a little village next to our picnic spot by the river and asked around. It turned out that someone was selling! Without even seeing the plot ourselves we decided to buy it, and it was one of the best decisions of our lives. It took us years of saving money but with the help and hard work of our families we managed to build a house on that land. The end of this project coincided with my decision to change my career. It was like this missing part of the puzzle that suddenly fell into place. Just like that, from a place for our family to share some holidays together we ended up with an amazing spot for a retreat.
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