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Theme: Unexpected Approaches
new contexts, new research, new applications
Deep gratitude to everyone who attended! According to your generous feedback, this was our best edition yet! 
Check back soon for photos, videos, and our impact report.


Edition 5 will take place in October 2025, but
we are excited to announce that we also plan smaller events and projects throughout the year. Stay tuned!

A selection of images from past editions

Welcoming leading Mindfulness experts to Manchester
Prof Willem Kuyken. A Life Well Lived
46:20

Prof Willem Kuyken. A Life Well Lived

An average life, around the world as of 2020, lasts 72 years, 4,000 weeks, or 26,000 days. What does it mean to live well? To be the change we want to see in the world. Mindfulness offers the keys to unlock a life well lived, to being the change we desire, to living in alignment with our values, amidst life's inevitable challenges. It can cultivate clarity, balance, and wisdom, enabling us to align our actions and values. We learn not only to live with awareness and purpose, but also navigate the everyday. More than this, it is a call to action, a reminder that each moment holds the potential for change, growth, and connection, and to rise to the challenges we’re all facing in the 21st century. Willem Kuyken is Professor of Mindfulness and Psychological Science at the University of Oxford, United Kingdom. His work focuses on preventing depression, promoting mental health, and flourishing across the lifespan. He has published more than 150 journal articles and was named by Web of Science as in the top 1% of the most cited scientists in the world in 2019, 2020, 2021, 2022, and 2023. His new book, Mindfulness for Life, is due to be published by Guilford Press in September 2024. It is a practical guide to help people improve well-being, enjoy life more fully, handle life's challenges better, and live aligned with personal values. It accompanies his earlier book with Christina Feldman, Mindfulness – Ancient Wisdom Meets Modern Psychology, published in 2019. His work has been featured in the New York Times, New Scientist, Nature, Scientific American, Times Educational Supplement, the BBC, CBS, New Statesman, Le Monde, der Zeit, the Telegraph, and the Guardian. He lives in London.
2024 Promo Video
01:43
Mindfulness for Life, with Prof Willem Kuyken
44:01

Mindfulness for Life, with Prof Willem Kuyken

One of the reasons mindfulness is becoming mainstream is because it can help us live well in the contemporary world. It is an antidote to busyness and distractedness, however compelling these can be. Many mindfulness practices have been used by people for thousands of years. The science of mindfulness is coming of age. This confluence of ancient and modern is what can give it depth and realism. Mindfulness can be masculine and feminine, it can move in and retreat, it is being strong and vulnerable, ordinary and profound, eminently practical and potentially transformative. Mindfulness skills have extraordinary potential to help us respond to some of the challenges we’re facing in the contemporary world. It can help us understand how we react and behave. It can help us respond with greater wisdom and compassion.  This presentation briefly overviews the translational story to date of mindfulness-based cognitive therapy (MBCT). This includes the key milestones over 20 years of definition, theory, innovations in research methods, effectiveness, cost-effectiveness, and implementation. Most importantly, we have learned that MBCT provides a cost-effective approach to helping people to prevent depression and that both can be integrated into mainstream mental health services. But we have also seen a growing evidence base suggesting that MBCT can promote mental health and well-being in the wider population and potentially across the lifespan. How can this work best evolve to meet its full potential? How can we unlock all that we have learned to use these psychological approaches as a vehicle to create a world without the devastating effects of depression, where we enjoy mental health and well-being and are resourced to meet the challenges of the next 50 years? When I say “we,” I mean all of us as individuals, but also as communities and as wider humanity. But for this potential to be realized we need it to be taught and learned well, with solid foundational values and in close dialogue with rigorous science.   Willem Kuyken is the Ritblat Professor of Mindfulness and Psychological at the University of Oxford, United Kingdom, and Director of the Oxford Mindfulness Centre. His work has focused on depression across the translational pathway from theory, through treatment and implementation. In particular, his research examines how cognitive therapy and mindfulness-based programs can prevent depression, promote mental health and enhance well-being across the lifespan. Dr. Kuyken has published more than 150 journal articles. He was named by Web of Science as in the top 1% of the most cited scientists in the world in 2019, 2020, 2021 and 2022. Together with Christina Feldman, he wrote Mindfulness – Ancient Wisdom Meets Modern Psychology, published in 2019. A new book for the general population, provisionally entitled Mindfulness for Life is due to be published presently, also with Guilford Press. Published with kind permission from the Speaker.
Deeper Mindfulness: Exploring Feeling Tone, Frame by Frame
45:50

Deeper Mindfulness: Exploring Feeling Tone, Frame by Frame

Oxford Professor Mark Williams gives a talk based on his latest book, Deeper Mindfulness, co-authored with Dr Danny Penman. From the book description: Use the hidden foundations of mindfulness to rediscover calm and reclaim your life in our chaotic world... There are moments in life that decide your fate. They ripple into the future and dictate how you experience the world in the moments that follow; either positive and uplifting, dark and chaotic, or flat and dull. What if you could recognise these moments before they seized control of your life? What if you could use them to set sail for a better future? What if all moments, big and small, could be harnessed this way? In Deeper Mindfulness, Prof Mark Williams and Dr Danny Penman reunite to present a new eight-week guided meditation programme that takes mindfulness to the next level. Deeper Mindfulness reveals how the latest advances in neuroscience, combined with millennia-old wisdom, can be used to transform your life. These discoveries open the doors to a deeper layer of mindfulness known as the 'feeling tone'. This sets the 'background colour' that tinges your entire experience of life. It is also the tipping point from which you can reclaim your life in an increasingly stressful and chaotic world. Proven effective at treating anxiety, stress, and depression, the practices in Deeper Mindfulness offer a new and more fruitful direction for both novice and experienced meditators. It also allows the rest of us to approach life with renewed strength, vigour, and equanimity. Publisher: Piatkus / Little, Brown Book Group Professor Mark Williams is Emeritus Professor of Clinical Psychology at Oxford University. He co-developed mindfulness-based cognitive therapy (MBCT), is co-author of the international bestsellers The Mindful Way Through Depression and Mindfulness: Finding Peace in a Frantic World, and author of Cry of Pain: Understanding Suicide and the Suicidal Mind. Published with kind permission from the Speaker.

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A day of talks, practice, and community

This is not a typical wellbeing event where people can “escape” for a day and
“forget about their problems.” The Manchester Mindfulness Festival is an independent event that aims to serve the community with a comprehensive programme filled with highly informative mindfulness-based talks and workshops, making mindfulness more easily available to everyone and inspiring ripples across the region and beyond. All proceeds from ticket sales go towards covering event costs, with any profit reinvested in next year’s event. 

The festival enables many connections, leading to the creation of community initiatives, creative partnerships, and other projects based on the social application of mindfulness, a practice that often appears as me-centric due to its inward focus but can significantly contribute to a more inclusive world.

"So many incredible, thought-provoking sessions and speakers. I've come away feeling positive, motivated, and hopeful for what we can achieve when supporting people with long-term conditions."

"Thank you for organising this fantastic event! There were many highlights and so much inspiration for me to take back to our school and community."

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The Bridgewater Hall, Lower Mosley Street, M2 3WS

Committed to Equality, Diversity, and Inclusion
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