Brighton youth homeless charity The Clock Tower Sanctuary, were today presented with a £400 cheque by Cat Duval of Brighton Yoga Festival. The Clock Tower Sanctuary provides information, support and advice to young people aged 16-25 who are either insecurely housed or homeless. The Sanctuary offers a safe and friendly space, food and drink, access to computers, signposting to housing, health, education, employment and social services.
The Clock Tower Sanctuary is the only drop-in centre for 16-25 year old homeless and insecurely housed people. The money raised from the festival will be put towards the Move-on project, which helps young homeless people to move-on to independent living – via structured one-to-one case-working, life skills courses, mentoring scheme and creative activities. Based on the successful pilot, The Sanctuary hopes to raise enough funds to fully incorporate yoga into this project. It would be fantastic to provide young people with the space and mental break from the chaos of being homeless.
Cat first became involved with The Sanctuary in April this year when she piloted a yoga class for young homeless people. The session was so well received that the Brighton-based Clock Tower Sanctuary agreed to continue running regular yoga classes for young homeless people.
Brighton Yoga Festival is an annual free community event that aims to introduce new people to the joys of yoga. A not-for-profit organisation itself, Brighton Yoga Festival raises money, via sponsorship and donations, for local charities. Davy Jones, yoga teacher and co-founder of the Festival said:
“It’s an important aspect of us being a community yoga festival, that we keep the event free and also donate to great local charities. As huge advocates of the benefits of yoga we are so pleased the Festival has been able to support The Clock Tower Sanctuary’s yoga project.”
In 2014 the Festival raised funds for The Brighton Unemployed and Families Centre and the Lifelines Older People’s project.
Natalia Borg, Fundraising Assistant at The Clock Tower Sanctuary said:
“We were delighted to hear that the Brighton Yoga Festival had chosen to support us this year. There are so many passionate and kind individuals behind the Festival, it has been a pleasure being involved with an event that cares so much about bringing the community together. We are very excited about what we can achieve together and the difference we can make to the lives of vulnerable young homeless people in Brighton and Hove.”
Speaking about the yoga for young people project, Cat Duval said:
“Yoga is a way to stay fit and healthy and stop our mind from chattering. I want to share useful tools that anyone can use to break spiralling negative thoughts and patterns of behaviour and make clear choices about forming new, positive ones”.
Plans are already underway for Brighton Yoga Festival 2016, and we look forward to welcoming lots of new faces!