Happy November to you!
Here's our latest newsletter with updates on our recent events, news of what we have coming up next, and we are so excited to share our new Archetypes Mini-Book available in our online shop, alongside our other lovely merchandise.
Have a read below about our Recovery Cabaret live in Exeter on November 29th and two events in our Family and Friends Support Programme before the end of the year.
We will all be off on a well needed winter break and away from emails from Friday December 17th until Tuesday January 3rd.
New Archetypes Book and other things to buy in our shop!
Have a look at our online shop full of our lovely archetypes merchandise.
We have the really exciting brand new addition, being printed as we speak, of our new mini book 'Creative Pathways - a journey through the archetypes'.
This is a beautiful introduction to the four archetypes; the Lover Creator, the Warrior Protector, the Magician Healer and the Sovereign Overseer as an internal compass for navigating the individual and collective recovery journey. With inspirational poetry by Caspar Walsh, and stunning original images by Philip Harris.
This book is designed for anyone interested in the archetypes and how they relate to their own personal journey, with no specific focus on addiction recovery. It has been put together as an accessible and universal read, easy to relate to and great for presents - it fits easily in an envelope. You can order online to be sent direct to anyone of your choice or purchase at any of our in-person events.
We are offering this book with two different cover options and at a range of prices, £6 - £10. The higher the price you select the more that will support the work that we do.
All purchases on our shop support long term addiction recovery through Rite to Freedom, with all sales going towards the running costs of the charity. We hope you enjoy these magical illustrations and insightful poetry and that they support you in your journey as much as they have us in ours.
We have also recently added all of Caspar Walsh's books to our online shop with a range of fiction and non fiction.
Do take a look as Christmas approaches with lots of other lovely present ideas on here.
The Recovery Cabaret!
We warmly invite you to join us in celebrating and amplifying the voices of the addiction recovery community in Devon at its first performance of original work: The Recovery Cabaret! November 29th, 7.30pm live at the Exeter Phoenix.
The Recovery Cabaret is an evening of refreshingly celebratory live work, devised by participants on our Creative Pathways programme led by South West artist, Charice Bhardwaj. Creative Pathways works with and through the devising process as well as incorporating the four archetypes; the Lover Creator, the Warrior Protector, the Magician Healer and the Sovereign Overseer as an internal compass for navigating the individual and collective recovery journey.
Weaving comedy, spoken word, performance, music and film into experience and raucous honesty, The Recovery Cabaret takes a bold look at the light and dark of life in recovery.
Buy your tickets here >>
Family and Friends Support Programme
Our new support programme for family and friends of those in active addiction or addiction recovery is offering another two dates before the end of the year.
The impacts of addiction are far reaching. Our families and friends are usually the first to feel these impacts, often supporting us to navigate this crooked path into freedom and healing. The energy, time and love our friends and family put in to help us in our recovery journeys is immeasurable alongside others who are still supporting those in active addiction.
Creating a programme to support family members and friends has been in development for some years now. They too need a place to gather, share stories and connect to other like-minded souls; a sanctuary to resource themselves and find new inspiration and meaning inside an often confusing, painful journey.
A free online call on Wednesday, November 30th, 4-5pm introducing this support programme. Book here >>
An in person day on Thursday, December 15th, 1-6pm in Chagford.
Book here >>
Click here for more details.
Facilitation Training, from Caspar
Creating space and time for our community to practice their skills as facilitators and deepen their own healing process has, for some years, felt like a luxury we couldn’t afford. Deepening experience and training is something essential to our community's growth and stability. There never seemed to be the time or money to make it happen. I suspect there was also something of my control freakery in the mix holding it back. A kinder way to look at it would be my fear and care in putting our volunteer facilitators in situations they weren’t prepared for. And so it follows, potentially impacting new participants negatively. This hasn’t happened on any of our New Tribes residentials in our 14+ years of delivery. And it didn’t happen on our first facilitator training residential.
My own training as a facilitator was initially around working with my own gender. After ten years working exclusively with men, I knew my work, my growth and my gifts, would grow and deepen if I stepped into working mixed gender. This has been a welcome, learning, healing edge.
The first Rite to Freedom facilitator training weekend was more than I hoped for. It did indeed take me to these learning and healing edges. I was humbled by the willingness of our trainee facilitators to look compassionately at their shadows, dark and light, in pursuit of their own healing. And from this base line, this place of even greater stability, to begin building confidence and skills in helping others with similar backgrounds in addiction and trauma recovery.
If I’m not growing and learning I quickly lose interest. I need to feel these many and varied edges and I need to know where my overwhelm lies. The more training and support our trainee facilitators receive, the more personal growth and healing we receive and the stronger our community becomes. This requires trust, a willingness to step back; to support and honour the work each member of the team is involved in. And inside all of that, I let go more and more. And when I allow it, ease into the knowledge that I do enough, have enough, am enough. That’s the essence of what I want to pass on to the next generation of recovery facilitators: we each have something special to bring, we are welcome and we are enough.
Our First Ireland New Tribes Residential, from Ali
With a fizz in my belly of nerves and excitement I set off with Caspar for my first visit to Ireland. Having done the assessment calls with participants I had the knowledge that a warm and engaging group of people were coming to join us at the Boghill Retreat Centre.
There was a lot to navigate and think about – a new country, new site, new processes, much smaller staff team. All of these factors adding to the fizz and curiosity of how we would be received.
The staff met up as usual on the Thursday, for me it felt like a reunion – Phil was already in Ireland, Noel I hadn’t seen for four years since he did his retreat at Heathercombe and Miri who pulled out all the stops flying over from the UK having only just completed her New Tribes residential a couple of weeks before. As we gathered in our first circle I looked around and had such a sense of pride and gratitude, acknowledging the commitment there was in the room for us to put on a wonderful residential.
Highlights – so many but what stands out for me are those moments when you are privileged to witness a participant moving through something, putting their trust in you and the process.
Another highlight was definitely Caspar’s storytelling of Tribe Warrior, requests were made every night for a story last thing before we fell into silence. I glanced around the beautiful forest room space and there were all these bodies lying on mattresses, cuddled up in blankets in stillness ... just listening.
It was definitely worth all the time and energy it took to put it on – so proud of the team and what we achieved.
Have a read also of Caspar's recent blog about the journey to setting up our work in Ireland.
2023 Dates
We are working on our dates for 2023 and our next Dartmoor 'New Tribes'residential will run at the end of March, and our next Creative Pathways residential will run in mid May.
Applications for both of these will open in the new year. Please keep an eye out or drop us an email if you'd like to be alerted for applications.
Support
We have different ways that you can support the work that we do at Rite to Freedom. We rely on a variety of income streams and are working hard to diversify these to ensure the longevity and sustainability of our work. Every little bit helps enormously with what we do.
See our Donate page here where we have an easy new facility to make a monthly donation, for as little as £2 a month - the price of a cheap cup of coffee!
