Booking the Compassion Focused Wellbeing (CFW) 8 Week Programme

Join the Compassion Focused Wellbeing 8 Week Programme

If you’d like to develop a kinder, more compassionate relationship with yourself and others, the Compassion Focused Wellbeing (CFW) 8 Week Programme offers a practical, research-informed, and heart-centred approach.

Developed by Nick Cooke and Madeleine Agnew, CFW was created to support mindfulness participants and teachers in deepening their practice by cultivating compassion alongside awareness. It builds on the foundations of mindfulness, helping you move beyond simply noticing your thoughts and experiences, and into learning how to respond to them with care, wisdom, and understanding.

For many, CFW is a natural next step after mindfulness training. While mindfulness helps you recognise patterns, habits, and emotional responses, compassion provides the tools to work with what you find. It supports a shift from awareness into action—guiding you to respond to yourself and others in ways that are more supportive, balanced, and nurturing.

Throughout the programme, you’ll learn practical, compassion-based skills that help you access a calmer, more soothing state of mind. This not only strengthens your emotional resilience and wellbeing, but also enhances your ability to relate to others with empathy and understanding.

Compassion Focused Wellbeing encourages you to develop compassion as both a mindset and a daily practice—towards yourself, your loved ones, strangers, and the wider world. By nurturing this inner environment, you create the conditions for greater mental clarity, emotional balance, and a deeper sense of connection.

As part of your booking, you will also be invited to attend a dedicated day-long virtual retreat. This offers you a valuable opportunity to step more fully into the practices you’ve been learning, allowing you to deepen your experience, slow down, and truly immerse yourself in compassion-based practices in a supportive environment.

Research in compassion-focused approaches highlights a wide range of benefits, including improved mental health, reduced stress, and increased overall wellbeing (Gilbert, 2010; Neff, 2003; Pace et al., 2009; Seppälä et al., 2017).

What You’ll Experience Each Week

Week 1 – Welcoming Compassion
You’ll be introduced to the foundations of compassion, exploring what it is and what can get in the way of it. Through simple practices like compassionate breathing and journalling, you’ll begin cultivating a kinder inner attitude. The focus is on gently opening to self-compassion in your everyday life.

Week 2 – Linking Mindfulness and Compassion
This week helps you connect mindfulness skills with compassion, supporting you to move out of autopilot and into present-moment awareness with kindness. Practices such as mindful eating, walking meditation, and the breathing space deepen this integration. You’ll begin to see how awareness and compassion work together.

Week 3 – Compassionate Body
Your attention shifts to the body, using practices like the compassionate body scan and gentle movement to build a felt sense of safety and care. You’ll explore supportive touch and develop an inner “safe place.” This week strengthens the connection between body awareness and emotional wellbeing.

Week 4 – Greeting Our Challenges
You’ll learn to recognise common thinking patterns and emotional habits that can create difficulty. Compassion is introduced as a way of responding to challenges, supported by practices like loving acceptance and understanding emotional regulation systems. The focus is on meeting difficulties with warmth rather than resistance.

Week 5 – Compassionate Self
This week deepens your exploration of the “compassionate self” and how to relate to your inner experiences more kindly. You’ll work with the inner critic and begin cultivating a compassionate inner voice. You’ll learn practices that will support you in responding to difficult thoughts and emotions with care.

Week 6 – Responding to a Friend
You’ll begin extending compassion outward, exploring how you relate to others and how you offer support. You’ll reflect on how you respond to a friend and learn to balance giving compassion to others with receiving it yourself. The emphasis is on connection, empathy, and healthy self-care.

Week 7 – Compassionate Ideal
You’ll start to embody compassion more fully by developing your own compassionate ideal. Through reflective practices like letter writing and visualisation, you’ll strengthen your ability to respond to yourself with wisdom and kindness. This week supports integrating compassion into your identity and daily life.

Week 8 – The Power of Compassion
In the final week, you’ll bring everything together and explore how to sustain compassion beyond the programme. You’ll reflect on your learning, engage in gratitude and loving-kindness practices, and consider how to apply compassion in your everyday life. The programme closes with a sense of integration, growth, and ongoing possibility.