Our Story
I'm Soulla Demetriou, Yoga Teacher and Founder of Soulshine Retreats and The Hope Collective. The Hope Collective was a spontaneous response to the image of Aylan, the 3-year old boy, just a baby, drowned at sea trying to escape to freedom and washed up upon a beach. Another utterly tragic innocent victim of this ongoing refugee crisis.
The contrast to my life was just too stark and this was one image too many, the final straw. Imagine the fear that child and his family felt? The hopelessness of his parents. Imagine if it were one of us or our loved ones? It's simply unbearable. Images like that must never become normal or acceptable. That was the moment when I realised that I couldn't sit back and teach compassion and love from the comfort of my privileged life without at least trying to do something to reach out and extend that love and compassion to those so desperately in need. It may just be one tiny drop in the ocean, but surely if we come together, many many drops will create ripples that will help? Every life counts and to make a difference, even 1 minute in 1 day of 1 person's life is worthwhile.
I realised in that moment that we had to do something, that these horrors couldn’t just remain images separated from my reality through random good fortune on my part. The ‘I’ quickly turned into a ‘we’ as I drew upon one of the key pillars of the Soulshine vision – a community based on acceptance, love and compassion. And so The Hope Collective was born.
The response that we have received from the global community of yogis, healers and compassionate beings in response to The Hope Collection intention has been astonishing and has has filled our hearts with hope and gratitude.
From the bottom of our hearts, a million thanks.
Much love
Soulla & The Hope Collective Team x
The Hope Collective - Events Schedule
Our primary aim is to get as many wonderful people as possible participating to raise awareness and make donations on Saturday 3rd October. All our Hope Collective event hosts are listed on our Facebook Events Page.
Interested in running your own event? Hurray! Please simply click here to get full details on how to set up your Hope Collective event or drop us an email at thehopecollectiveworldwide@gmail.com to get more information. We'd so love to have you on board.
Join The Hope Collective Mailing List
If you'd like to receive all the latest news and final event listings, sign up here and we'll stay in touch. From the bottom of our hearts, thank you so much for your support.