The Beehive Mindfulness School Limited

Origins

The Beehive Mindfulness School is the umbrella name for the work of John F. Doherty. It first came into being in The Milltown Institute of Theology and Philosophy in 2005. At that time John worked in the Spirituality department with Bernadatte Flanaghan and asked the then president a Jesuit Brian Grogan if he could teach some contemplative courses. These 12 week courses proved so popular that John went on to design a 2-year program and moved this to the Cherith Centre in Firehouse, Dublin in the grounds of a Carmelite monastery. In 2010 with the demise of the Milltown Institute John moved his work to All Hallows college in Drumcomdra where he taught courses on Mindfulness, Meditation, and Contemplation for over ten years. While at All Hallows, John designed and taught three modules at degree level for their ALBA BA in Adult Further Education. All Hallows too closed, and John moved on to teach in the Chrysalis Retreat Centre, The Sanctuary Centre and many other places around Ireland. In 2016 he moved into Teacher Training and designed and taught the first cohort in Mindfulness and Spiritual Wellbeing. To date he has trained 15 people as teachers in this modality.

Training to Date

The Teacher Training contains a mixture of mindfulness teacher training, including spiritual development and was initially combined with a QQI “train the trainer” certificate.  It its last iteration to cut down on the paperwork and bring it more in line with MBSR (Mindfulness based stress reduction) we ditched the QQI module and replaced it with the MBI-TAC (Mindfulness Based Interventions – Teacher Assessment Criteria) which all MBSR student teachers are assessed with. The Aim of the Teacher Training is to provide people with the skills to bring Spirituality into their work in whatever context they work with. With a mindful based approach we offer insights into the three domains of Personal (secular), Spiritual and Religious and how to language within each domain and how they cross over. In our multi-cultural and belief society this is a highly needed skill set.

Future

I am looking for a training partner for this unique training program. All the material is original and created by me over the last fifteen years. The mindfulness elements have been with the help of Dominic Cogan an MBSR teacher, updated to fit their program. The spiritual and religious elements are deigned using the same inclusive ideas as MBSR so that they can be used in any context, Personal, secular, Spiritual or within a Tradition. The program is envisioned to be 1 year broken into four modules with assessment at each stage and a final presentation assessment at the end. It offers a mixture of online work and in-person training, backed up with numerous resources.