A mandala is a circular drawing that builds from the centre outwards around repeating shapes. Designs can be simple or complex, quick and easy, or take time to create. Once you become familiar with mandalas you notice them everywhere: from flowers in nature to everyday objects.

With roots in Sanskrit, the meaning of ‘mandala’ is more than a circle. It is a container of essence, similar to a scented flower holding its unique perfume and depth of aroma. The psychoanalyst Carl Jung viewed his mandala drawings as ‘precious stones’ referring both to their self-healing and self-revealing qualities.

The Monthly Mandala Workshop is a theme-directed online monthly event that follows the changing seasons. In each session you will be invited to explore something of your inner world, set intentions for the month ahead, and create a spontaneous mandala using basic materials. No artistic knowledge, skill or training is needed. The workshop adopts mindfulness-based approaches to support creative self-expression. This includes journaling with your mandala and opportunities to ‘show and share’ within the group.

How often do we get to the end of a day, or a week, month or even to the end of a year and wonder where did all the time go? We can get so swept up in daily life it is hard to stop and press the pause button. When we look back we can wonder what did we do with our time.

It might seem pointless to take time out to draw circles, but research shows that practising creativity lights up otherwise unused parts of the brain. This stimulates the slower and meandering pathways at a neurological level, allowing new and different connections to be made.