• Daily mindfulness and meditation workshops with Susie Spinks with detailed handouts
• Snorkeling every day
• Daily yoga sessions
• Accommodation – choose from our bures at the front (Ocean View bures), or at the back (standard rooms)
• Meals : breakfast, lunch and dinner – a mix of local Fijian and Indian food and international recipes
• Excursions: visit a Fijian village and thrill to the beat of the traditional meke dance, get absorbed in a demonstration of making masi (traditional bark cloth), revel in the abundant nature of the landscape and experience the rich Fijian culture.

You just need to buy your air ticket – and leave the rest to us.

– and the science behind it.

There is now a huge amount of research showing the benefits of Mindfulness and Meditation.  It has been shown to reduce stress, improve our concentration, our memory, thinking creatively and flexibly, and even build more brain cells.  It increases our positive emotions, builds empathy and emotional intelligence, makes us less anxious, and more accepting of ourselves and others, and leads to better relationships.  But have you ever wondered how?  If so, this course is for you.

You will learn what Mindfulness and Meditation are, and understand what is actually happening in your brain when you meditate, and why it is so effective that even companies are implementing it in the workplace.

A combination of workshops and practices will teach you the different types of meditation and by practicing each you will discover which are the most effective for you personally.

The guided sessions will include:

• breath meditations
• mantra meditations
• mindfulness body scan
• open-awareness meditations
• loving-kindness meditation
• meditation for compassion / self-compassion

The workshops and discussions will include:

• what is meditation and why does it benefit us?
• stress – the physiology of what is happening in your body and how meditation helps
• what is mindfulness and how is it different from meditation?
• what are emotions?
• what is happiness and how can we create it?

Fiji is renowned for the abundant marine life of its reefs: colorful fish, hard and soft corals, mysterious invertebrates – all in the clear warm waters of the South Pacific.  Suspended in the waters above this wonder world is entrancing, mesmeric…..it’s a floating meditation, an opportunity to immerse yourself in another aspect of our planet. It is deeply and wonderfully complementary to the rest of the week.

After starting a regular meditation practice in 2011, Susie witnessed a transformation in herself.   She realised that the practice of meditation had translated into real life for her in that she no longer held on to emotions or thoughts that would have previously bothered her.  She could let them go.  She no longer dwelled on things, constantly thinking about them.  She didn’t lie awake at night bothered by something.  Anger wasn’t as intense and much shorter lived.  She realised she was happier and more content.

After this self-revelation she became very interested in finding out how mindfulness and meditation work to bring about this change.  She is particularly interested in the science of what is happening in the brain.

Susie has past experience of teaching Maths in high schools.  This training and experience has given her the ability to express information in clear, concise and easy-to-understand terms.

Susie is an accredited meditation teacher with the Meditation Association of Australia.  She is the founder of Sydney Institute of Meditation and teaches the Meditation Teacher Training Course.  You can read more here

And finally, she is an avid snorkeler and has created this course with an eye to bringing together two of her great passions.