open up to learn

Last week I joined a Erasmus+ training course with the Portuguese NGO Ananda in Setúbal, Portugal. I did not have so many expectations to the course in general but it ended up being a most inspiring experience with interesting training - and super cool trainer - and wonderful people, where many turned out to become friendships I believe will keep strong for many, many years.

We were sharing and learning practices concerning healthy behaviour, ways of engaging people and projects we were working on or could be created. The sort of over all topic was unemployment among young people - with Portugal as a case, but we also learned about the situations on the 12 participating countries. We were to representatives from each country; from Denmark to Egypt, Ukraine and Armenia. Also we had to - on the last day - create and implement a project in the city of Setúbal, which in the beginning seemed like a huge and impossible task but all groups created something that spread smiles and wonder among the citizens of Setúbal.

In addition to all that; our group had quite special well-functioning dynamics and every day was worth waking up for. I and three others got up every morning at 6.30 am, walked bleary-eyed to a nearby park and did yoga and meditation the next almost two hours. We changed who were leading the practice every morning, which I also learned a lot from - now I am more confident in leading a yoga practice!