Wellness Day for the Healthcare Community
Cost:Â FREE
Language:Â English
Location:Â Online
Who this event is for: The series is open to all healthcare workers and volunteers.
When is it offered: Thursday, November 12, 2026, 9:00 a.m.-3:45 p.m. (Eastern Standard Time)
Wellness Day Session Descriptions and Speaker Bios:
More Than Exercise: How Movement Builds Capacity, Resilience & Well-Being
9:00.-9:45 a.m. EST with Hayley BennettÂ
What if movement isn't another item on your to-do list, but one of the tools that helps you manage everything already on it?
Healthcare providers face long shifts, competing demands, and constant pressure to care for others. In this engaging and interactive session, we'll explore how physical activity supports not only physical health, but also energy, mood, focus, stress resilience, and burnout prevention.
Drawing on current research and practical strategies, participants will discover realistic ways to incorporate movement into busy schedules, even when time and energy are limited. Participants will leave feeling energized, empowered, and equipped with simple tools to build capacity, strengthen well-being, and show up as their best selves at work and at home.
Hayley Bennett is a Wellness Coordinator at Bruyère Health, speaker, and author of Reclaim Your Spark. She is passionate about helping people build resilience, prevent burnout, and create sustainable habits that support long-term well-being.
Through an engaging blend of evidence-based research, practical strategies, and personal experience, Hayley empowers audiences to build capacity, improve well-being, and show up as their best selves at work and at home.
Her interactive presentations are known for being relatable, actionable, and focused on small changes that create lasting impact.
45-Minute Lying Down Yoga for Body & Mind
10:00 a.m.-10:45 a.m. EST with Jennifer Innes
This 45-minute mindful floor yoga practice is made up of gentle, accessible movements that you can easily continue at home. Guided a little like a meditation, this session will offer cues not only for each posture and its benefits but also invitations to notice how you feel as you move—beginning with a mindful check-in and closing with a brief self-compassion practice.
Even in just 45 minutes, many people notice greater ease in the body, improved circulation, and a feeling of being refreshed, often shifting how the rest of your day feels and inspiring a desire to bring mindful yoga into your daily life.
Come as you are—just wear comfortable clothing and bring a mat! (A yoga strap is optional).
Jennifer Innes, MSc is the founder of Ottawa Meditation & Wellness, where she teaches evidence-based mindfulness, self-compassion, and habit change programs, along with meditation and yoga retreats, for individuals, organizations, and the public. Her teaching integrates scientific research with contemplative wisdom, giving participants practical skills to navigate life's challenges with greater resilience, compassion, and emotional balance.
Jennifer holds a Master of Science from the London School of Economics and has completed extensive mindfulness and compassion teacher training through the University of Massachusetts and the University of California San Diego Schools of Medicine. She is certified by Brown University in Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction (MBSR) and is also a certified yoga teacher.
Her teaching is grounded in rigorous professional training, a deep personal meditation practice, and a genuine commitment to helping others cultivate greater awareness, inner calm, and well-being.
Boundaries or Bust: Strategies for Health Care Workers
11:00 a.m.-12:00 p.m. EST with Rebecca Higgins
Health care workers are caring people by nature and by profession. Rather than inhibit our capacity to care, boundaries help us to make our care work more professional, empathetic, satisfying, and sustainable. In this session we will consider the importance of boundaries, discuss related challenges, and explore practical strategies for setting boundaries in health care settings.
In this presentation, participants will learn:
-the importance of boundaries
-examples of common boundary violations and how to address them
-concrete strategies for creating boundaries
-resources for further reading
Rebecca Higgins has a background in social work and has been specializing in mental health education since 2010.
Before becoming an independent mental health educator in 2018, Rebecca worked for the Canadian Mental Health Association (Ottawa and Toronto branches) and the Centre for Addiction and Mental Health (CAMH).
Rebecca has a Master's degree in Social Work and a BA in English. Her collection of short stories called The Colours of Birds was published by Tightrope Books in 2018.Â
Find Rebecca at www.mentalhealthworkshopstoronto.com
The Power of Sacred Presence: Meeting Difficulty with RAIN
1:00 p.m.-2:30 p.m. EST with Tara Brach, Ph.D.
Those who care for others are often called on to meet moments of stress, uncertainty, grief, frustration and helplessness. Without ways of tending to our own inner experience, these difficult emotions can leave us depleted, reactive or disconnected from the very qualities that drew us to caregiving.
In this experiential workshop, Tara Brach will introduce RAIN—Recognize, Allow, Investigate and Nurture, a mindfulness and compassion practice for bringing healing attention to difficult emotions. Participants will learn how RAIN can help interrupt habitual reactivity, deepen self-compassion, and reconnect us with an inner sense of steadiness and presence.
Yet RAIN offers more than a way to navigate difficult emotions. When we bring a sacred presence to what is most challenging, the very places we tend to resist can become a doorway—revealing a deeper tenderness, wisdom and aliveness, and a sense of coming home to our deepest being.
The session will include a brief presentation, guided meditation using RAIN, and time for questions and discussion. Participants will leave with a practical practice they can draw on both in challenging moments and as a pathway to greater presence, resilience and inner freedom.
Tara Brach is a meditation teacher, psychologist and author of international bestselling Radical Acceptance, Radical Compassion, True Refuge and Trusting the Gold. Her popular weekly podcast on emotional healing, spiritual awakening and compassion-based activism is downloaded 2.5 million times a month.
Tara is founder of the Insight Meditation Community of Washington and has been active in bringing meditation into schools, prisons and underserved populations. Along with Jack Kornfield, she leads the Mindfulness Meditation Teacher Certification Program (MMTCP), serving diverse participants from 75 countries around the world. Tara’s teachings blend Western psychology and Eastern spiritual practices, mindful attention to our inner life, and a dedication to creating a more just, equitable and loving world. Â
Carrying The Heavy Work, Lighter
2:45 p.m.-3:45 p.m. EST with Sandy El Bitar
In this story-driven session, Sandy El Bitar brings together the heavy moments we carry and the funny, absurd, beautifully human ones that get us through the day.
Drawing from her work in hospitals, shelters, end of life care, and from her own personal losses, she shares stories and simple micro practices that offer ways to make the hard work feel a little lighter.
Sandy El Bitar is a Lebanese Canadian artist, drama therapist and researcher working at the intersection of psychology, art, play and humour. With 19 years of experience in hospitals, shelters, palliative and end of life care, she brings a practice rooted in presence, relational intelligence and the courage to stay light in heavy times.
Trained in theatre, psychology, recreation, and drama therapy, her early work as a clown doctor in Lebanon and Canada shaped her belief in humour and play as essential forms of resilience. She later developed a resilience based therapeutic intervention recognized with the PERFORM Centre Award from Concordia University.
Sandy continues to create immersive experiences that help people meet the full complexity of their emotions — the heavy, the contradictory and the absurd — with presence, creativity and playfulness.
Frequently Asked Questions
Will Wellness Day be held online?
Yes, the event will be held online over Zoom.
How will I receive the Zoom link?
When you register, the Survey Monkey page will display the Zoom link for the event and also a calendar link that you can use to add the event to your Outlook Calendar or iCalendar.
Who is able to register for Wellness Day?
The series is open to all healthcare workers and volunteers. Members of the general public are also welcome to attend, although the information in the sessions is geared towards healthcare workers and volunteers.
Will Wellness Day be recorded?
The sessions will be recorded and shared on YouTube and other social media. Note that the interactive activities will also be recorded. If you share or ask a question with your camera and audio on, this will be included in the recordings.
Is it okay if I forward this email to my colleagues or friends?
Yes, please feel free to share the information!
I am not able to attend all the sessions. Can I still sign-up?
If you're not able to join us for the whole day, please feel free to register and drop-in for whatever sessions work with your schedule.
Will I receive a certificate of attendance for participating?
We do not currently offer certificates of attendance for Wellness Day.
I don't live in Ontario, Canada but I would like to join the session live. What time zone is Wellness Day in?Â
Wellness Day 2026 will take place from 9:00 a.m.-3:45 p.m. in Eastern Standard Time (the timezone in Ottawa, Ontario on wellness day). For more information, visit:Â
