the facilitators
Holding space for the two wings of grief and praise
SHONA SUNDHARI
Shona’s heart and soul is on fire with the question... 'How can we create supportive, resilient communities in our world today?' She holds a vision of humans coming together, living in balance with nature and each other, and of relighting the ancient ways of simple yet profound connection.
shona's Story
The weaving together of people, ceremony and ritual is where this vision comes most alive for Shona, and particularly in Community Forest School sessions, Wheel of the Year celebrations, Way of Council circles, Vision Questing and Grief Tending in Community gatherings.
Shona’s formal training is in Psychology, Teaching and Forest School facilitating. She has learnt alongside Sophy Banks and Jeremy Thres on the Apprenticing to Grief programme and is mentored by Pippa Bondy in her practice of Way of Council. Shona lives in deep connection with nature and has spent the last five years home-making in small spaces on the land, living with the daily rhythms of the seasons. She is a food-grower, a tender-of-gardens and wild spaces, a food and medicine forager, and a wild water swimmer. She can be seen cycling around on her electric bike with her dog in tow in his trailer!
liz day
Liz's lifelong quest has been around the question of how we can restore the lost circles of life. This has brought her to grief work and to study, train and practice a number of collaborative modalities including Sociocracy 3.0, Dragon Dreaming, the Way of Council and more.
liz's Story
Liz has completed a 7-day training with Joanna Macy and a 5-day Apprenticing to Grief programme with Sophy Banks and Jeremy Thres. She has been holding space for this work since 2020, and is co-founder of Norfolk Grief Tending and The Gathering Gates -- community projects that aspire to pave the way to a more beautiful world.
Liz is grounded in many years of her own personal development work and activism, and more than 34 years of service and abstinence in 12-step addiction recovery groups. Having studied the mystical stream of Christianity for many years and undertaken various trainings, Liz has also run workshops, groups and contemplative worship events at the Norwich Christian Meditation Centre.
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Liz has a background in campaigning and communication roles in the non-profit sector, and she holds a first class bachelor's degree in English Literature and Creative Writing. She is a campfire musician, an aspiring writer and poet in the mystical wisdom tradition, and a 5Rhythms dancer.
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"The tears, the anger, the essence of our story lifted up in words or in bodily gesture, is good medicine for the humans, and also for the earth," says Liz. "The weight of our sorrow is the curious burden and blessing of what it is to be human, and it is also our glory; through this lens I see anew just how beautiful we all are."
SARAH DURRANT
Sarah’s work explores the power of compassionate presence and witnessing and presence to transform human suffering.
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She loves holding and participating in intentional spaces in which people are lovingly witnessed as they share from their heart and being. In 2025, she will be offering compassionate spaces for Shame Tending alongside her Grief Tending and other work.
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Sarah first came to grief tending work through her own experiences of loss and grief, and the inspiring beauty and wise alchemy of the work of Francis Weller, Joanna Macy, Sophy Banks (and others).
SARAH'S Story
After careers in academic publishing, international development, and consultancy, Sarah qualified as an ICF-accredited coach in 2012. She established Lead From Within soon after, offering leadership coaching and transformational learning experiences. To date, close to 800 people have engaged with her immersive workshops, talks, webinars and small group learning journeys in the area of Imposter Syndrome.
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Sarah is trained in Mindfulness and Mindful Self-Compassion (MSC) and has taken trainings led by: Brene Brown, Deb Dana, Rick Hanson, Chris Johnstone, Mac Macartney, Gabor Mate, Diane Poole Heller, Kristen Neff, Francis Weller and others.
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Sarah is devoted to compassionate circle work, forests, hills, rivers, swimming, walking and wandering, podcasts, poetry, stories, song and silence, and spending time with loved ones, human and other than human. As she approaches 60, she is ‘living the question’ of what it means to elder well in support of personal, familial and collective nonviolent liberation.
SU SQUIRE
Su Squire is a storyteller and theatre maker with a passion for creating work that sparks our deeper sense of connection with each other, the land that supports us and the ones we share it with.
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Showing up for her first Grief Tending in Community event turned out to be a bit of a ‘hallelujah!’ moment for Su and she has since gone on to complete the Apprenticing to Grief programme with Sophy Banks and Jeremy Thres.
Su'S Story
​​A transformative experience of personal loss inspired Su to set up Off the Twig, a performance company exploring death, dying and grief which integrates ceremony and ritual and encourages conversation and community around these themes.
She has arrived in the current chapter of her story via a meandering route through theatre, spoken word, street performance, community arts, singing and general tomfoolery.
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Su is also a facilitator of the Norwich Death Cafe, part of a worldwide movement that aims to create a culture in which conversations about death (especially over tea and cake) are embraced as part of life, the impermanence making it all the more sweet.
jackie stewart
Jackie is a flower essence practitioner, energy healer and space-holder who loves creating spaces for people to connect with the power of their hearts and the wisdom of their souls.
She came to grief tending through personal experiences of grief tenderising her heart, which led her to the work of Francis Weller and the grief tending in community approach. She completed the Apprenticing to Grief programme with Sophy Banks, Sarah Pletts, Liz Day and team in July 2024.
jackie's Story
For over 25 years, Jackie has been helping people to walk a Path of Love guided by plant spirits and the sentience of the living world. Her workshops, courses and self-published Bach Flower Spirit Cards have reached thousands of people worldwide, and her writing has been published in some inspiring places including The Earth Pathways Diary, Elephant Journal, Tiny Buddha, and Crystal Herbs Flower Essence Blog.
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Jackie is passionate about what it means to truly live from the heart, how we alchemise pain and trauma, dismantle systems of oppression, live in right relationship with the natural world, and experience the vastness of our souls. She believes in the subversive power of love to transform our world into one where we live in conscious, sacred relationship with all of Life.
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Happiest outside, you're most likely to find her barefoot in her garden, kissing flowers, playing in the woods, stroking moss, going for long walks in the countryside, drumming to the ocean, or singing (tunelessly) to the nature spirits.