Friday is International Women’s Day and in Peterborough there were a number of events taking place, including a conference hosted by 13 Moons Wellness Retreat.
A number of sessions and workshops were offered and one, in particular, featured a reflective painting exercise that invited women to illustrate their lives as a garden.
“I feel like a five year old doing this painting,” said participant and registered psychotherapist Colleen Caruthers.
Conference facilitator and registered social worker Maureen Pollard says the idea is to show if the ground in their life is bumpy or smooth and what features are in their garden of life.
“As a therapist, I hear an awful lot of people coming to me telling me how lonely they are,” said Caruthers. “So I’ve been spending a lot of time doing research on how people can develop friendships and having levels of friendships. We don’t just need one good friend. We need a variety of friends for different kinds of reasons.”
“The focus (of the day) is really on helping women connect with themselves so we can go out and serve our families, our workplaces and our community better by starting with the personal,” said Louise Racine, who is with 13 Moons.
Other workshops focused on changing money habits and beliefs along with women in leadership.
The day-long event held at the Ashburnham Funeral Centre was sold out, attracting more than 125 women between ages 15 and 82.