Barcelona Encomana Salut Program at the Oncolliga Foundation Mireia Coma-Cros Brings BBM Practices to High Schools

Mireia Coma-Cros is an experienced yoga teacher and a BBM Level-1 teacher. In 2019, she started teaching BBM to students through her work with Encomana Salut (“Spread health” in Catalan), a program created in 2019 by the Oncolliga Foundation (“Oncology League” in Catalan), a nonprofit institution that offers free psychosocial services to people undergoing cancer treatment and their families to improve their wellbeing and quality of life. In Barcelona, Oncolliga Foundation also provides awareness-raising and prevention. Encomana Salut teaches students of the Spanish 2º Cycle of Compulsory Secondary Education (14-15 years old) healthy lifestyle habits in the context of cancer prevention. The program is offered to schools in Catalonia as part of community service, a curricular activity with three main goals:

• informing teenagers about key lifestyle habits and their effects on health,

• giving tools to integrate those habits in their life, and

• fostering students’ participation to improve their communities’ quality of life and wellbeing.

Each student attends 10 lectures (nutrition, wellbeing, physical and psychologic effects of cancer, mind body practices, etc.) and can then choose to either create a communication campaign for Oncolliga Foundation or participate in a solitary activity. In 2021 Encomana Salut reached 54 groups at 17 schools, including more than 1600 students. The program was well received and the numberof participants continues to increase. All schools were private or semi-public. Three of the public schools were classified as Centers of Maximum Complexity (CMC), meaning schools with the highest number of immigrant students, students with special needs and families receiving the Minimum Insertion Income (RMI).

BBM sessions were introduced to students as efficient tools for anxiety reduction and emotional balance. They lasted one hour, led by one BBM trainer in the presence of the group teacher and one member of Encomana Salut. Session began with a brief introduction about BBM practices as tools for self-regulation and emotional balance. Practice sessions included: 1) Shaking 2) Ha breath 3) Qi qong 4:4 breath 4) Abdominal breathing (seated or laying down), 4:4 breath with 2 bells pacing, 6) Body-scan (a light version 8) After the meditation, we asked students to summarize the experience in one word. “Peace, calm, gratitude …” were the most frequent responses

Larger groups start with more hectic energy and distraction. As the sessions progress, the teens start to focus and access a quiet, introspective mood. By the end, the peace and serenity were palpable. After the session, students often said how much they felt relaxed and some asked for tips to help their parents. For example, “my dad has a lot of anxiety because of his job, how can I help him with these tools?”