Where we're at as the summer comes to an end

Four summer's ago we opened the gates of our land for the first time to a small group of people we'd connected with who, like me, were in need of time away from technology. They quicky became friends and our informal gatherings grew and grew and we still enjoy them to this day. They are what led to Project Holding Space being born, as it was through these events that I realised that more and more people are wanting to experience time without devices.

As I've talked about before, we're very much at the beginning of our journey as a community interest company. In fact, this has been the first season that we have offered our weekend digital wellbeing retreats to the public. We have a lot of experience in organising events prior to founding Project Holding Space through our informal gatherings and also our Shared Earth volunteer days and Feed the Soul socials, but we had yet to offer a retreat for the public. We wanted to further offer what we do and so we had a weekend in the diary in July which no one booked onto...

I do understand this. Apart from occasional posts on LinkedIn we're not on social media and so how are people going to find out about us? This is something we're still working out. People are finding us slowly, which is wonderful. I am making connections with more and more people interested in what we're doing and that leaves me very hopeful for how the retreats will go in the future.

We then had another weekend in the diary for a couple of weekends time (5th-7th Sept), which we had interest in however last week we found out that there's going to be a car rally using the lane right alongside our land for that Saturday (not really what people want to hear when on a retreat!) and then during our recent gathering the wind whipped up suddenly and ripped our prized tarpaulin which goes over our fire pit creating the heart of our events! I was deeply saddened by this. Everyone there worked together so well and we were able to take it down and save it from being ripped anymore but, unfortunately, it is beyond repair.

We took this as a sign that we shouldn't hold our second proposed retreat either.

Our tarp in its former glory

What this means is that our first retreat season has come to end before it's even had chance to begin. We're not in a position to replace the tarpaulin at the moment and we're quickly moving into autumn meaning we'll be at the mercy of the increasingly inclement weather. I have mixed feelings about this. On the one hand I feel sad that we weren't able to share with people what we've been planning and working on. On the other, I see it as a sign that perhaps it just wasn't the right time... Maybe things weren't quite lined up for us...

Whatever it was, our focus is now shifting to autumn and winter where we can focus on other projects before opening our gates again next spring/summer for another opportunity to share our digital detox weekend retreats.

Our Shared Earth volunteer days run throughout the year so if anyone fancies braving the elements (we have a polytunnel to shelter in in wet weather), you'd be very welcome to join us. 

Also, our bell tent is still up, although not for much longer now. So, if you're wanting to grab a last minute break away from technology then do get in touch soon.

From then on I will be focusing my attention on creative digital wellbeing projects, which I will have more to say about soon.