‘Positive’ event a new way to meet like-minded people

“This is a an opportunity for people to meet positive people,” says Maria Bourke, who is planning to host a monthly event called ‘Positive’.

The first meeting is on tonight, Thursday October 7 (8-10pm) in the Annebrook House Hotel, and the gatherings continue the first Thursday of the month.

“It’s actually 17 years since I held my first Positive class, which I ran for two years,” said Maria, “but the world has changed dramatically since then. Everybody’s doing yoga, meditation, and people are finding different ways of connecting with their own spirituality.”

The lifestyle coach and ‘My Kinda Magik’ author says the “blessing” she, and so many others, took away from the original class was that “everybody got to meet really lovely people”, and that spurred her on to revive her meetings due to what’s happened in the world in recent times.

“I think an awful lot of people, especially since lockdown, are looking for a new connection. They’ve lost connection with themselves, and I notice that with myself and with others, most of us have almost become like recluses.

“People go to work and do what have to do and then, they come home. We don’t have a lot of personal opportunities to meet like-minded people. For instance, I met my own best friend for the first time in 51 weeks, and I would have normally met her every six weeks.

“But I think since lockdown that’s what happened. We’ve all lost a little of our confidence, we’ve lost our ability to meaningfully communicate with others, and with ourselves.

“If you take a yoga class or whatever, you never really get the opportunity to talk to people at the end, everyone’s always rushing off. But I have made ‘chitchat’ part of the two-hour slot, so people can talk to others and connect, and you don’t have to feel guilt for staying late.”

As well as the “tea, coffee and chitchat” slot, Positive meetings included guided meditation, and a positive exercise.

“I’m going to do it once a month on the first Thursday of every month, from now until Christmas. People need a place to meet positive friends, and place that’s not in a pub. The aim is to create a high vibe positive ethos, to feed body, mind and soul.”

For more information see mariabourke.com/positive. Tickets are €20 and it’s pay at the door. Please arrive at 7.45pm.