Nature-Led Coaching & Team Well-being - Yorkshire - Where The Mind Grows
Coaching that works with your TRUE nature, not against it.
Nature-led coaching, team well-being and leadership development in Yorkshire.
Most of us are very good at keeping things going.
People. Teams. Organisations. We're resourceful and adaptable . often resilient in ways we don't
even notice until something starts to wobble, those cracks appear or tensions form.
Your body gives you signals you can no longer ignore. Your mind feels too full to focus or find solutions.
Until your team starts losing the energy, trust or cohesion that once felt it happened with ease.
That wobble isn't a sign of failure. It's important feedback. And it tends to arrive when the pace,
the pressure, or the path you've been on no longer fits the people walking it.
Whether you're an individual seeking a different kind of space or a leader, HR professional or
organisation looking to genuinely nurture your team's wellbeing and culture . Either way you're a place where those issues aren't ignored, or pushed aside. Here we make space to focus on the challenges, through a strengths based approach to personal or team development and well-being.
Welcome to Where the Mind Grows
I'm JK (Jennie-Kate McQuinn), a nature-led life and career coach, team facilitator and curator of wild and wonderful leadership programmes, based in North Yorkshire. I founded Where The Mind Grows to bring something that most coaching misses, the insight of the natural world itself and the benefits we receive for body and mind, when we have the space of Nature to grow, learn AND unlearn too.
I mainly work outside in private woodland near Ripon, venues across West and North Yorkshire, and sometimes -when needs must- online too, for those too far from the woods.
Alongside more commonly known coaching approaches I draw on 3.8 billion years of nature's mastery in complexity, change, depletion and renewal to help people and organisations find their way through.
It's not just about being in nature. It's about learning from it too.
Whether for your personal life and career choices, support and growth.
Or in the work I do with teams, organisations and leaders helping you create cultures that can contribute to a healthier, hopeful and resilient future.
Three ways in
Where The Mind Grows works across three interconnected areas. Each one is distinct, but all are rooted in the same belief. when people are genuinely well, connected and resourced, they do remarkable things; and live happier, healthier lives in the process.
Rooted Self
Life & Career Coaching one-to-one
One-to-one nature-based coaching for people navigating anxiety, stress or low mood. For adults at
career crossroads, struggling with confidence or identity, working through grief or loss, or simply
needing space to figure something out.
We work together from a private woodland near Ripon, through walk-and-talk sessions across
West and North Yorkshire, or online via Zoom. This is person-centred coaching that works with
your actual strengths and your particular way of being in the world, not a blueprint you have try to fit yourself into.
Nurtured Workplaces
Team & Organisational Well-being
For organisations that know their people are their greatest asset and want to create the conditions for them to actually thrive.
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Whether you're an HR lead managing rising burnout and sickness absence, a CEO navigating
culture change, or a leadership team that's lost some of its connection and trust or want help to grow an amazing team in anticipated change and complexity this is where that work begins. And it begins in the woods.
Team away days, leadership development programmes, employee coaching, and regenerative
organisational work . All grounded in living systems thinking and delivered in nature.
The result healthier, more psychologically safe teams. Better equipped for whatever comes next. Embracing diversity, valuing uniqueness and practicing a resilience strategy that replenishes, not relinquishes the skills and strengths of your team.
Sectors we work with include VCSE and charity, health and social care, conservation, professional services, education and tech. Small, medium or large.
Gathering Community
Retreats, Events & Group Connection
In a world that can feel fleeting and disconnected, Gathering Community is Where The Mind
Grows' third area of focus. One we have learned, helps create a better connected future!
From retreats and events to wild co-working and seasonal gatherings. These offerings aim
to reduce isolation, deepen connection with the natural world, and create the kind of community
that makes a real difference to well-being.
Rooted in belonging, joyful human connection, and a healthy dose of the wild. For people who
want to grow alongside others, not just alone.
Some of the organisations we've worked alongside...
Some of the work we do together is of a sensitive or confidential nature. We only share our partnerships with the agreement of the organisations involved.
What Nature can actually teach us...
Beyond the science of being outside . What happens when you learn from nature, not just in it?
Healthy natural systems aren't built on extraction and exhaustion. They're built on diversity, reciprocity, rest, and cycles of growth and release.
Trees know when to shed, when to root deeper, when to reach and when to pause. Forests manage extraordinary complexity, resource-sharing, communication complexity, mutual support under stress, without a strategy document. Much of what leads people, teams and organisations to burn out or lose faith
is the opposite of those principles.
This approach is curated for sustainable change. Not just another wasted day or tick box well-being activity. Things go deeper here!
At Where The Mind Grows, coaching sessions and programmes draw on this intelligence deliberately. Being in nature optimises learning, thinking and the capacity for change. Cortisol - your stress hormone-drops, muscles relax, blood pressure falls. Focus and openness come more easily among birdsong and canopy of the trees.
Moments of awe — in wildflowers, fungi, the view or 'whats that' moments — create the neurological conditions for
problem-solving, creativity and real decision-making.
For individuals, this means a coaching space that works with your whole self . Mind, body and the environment around you. For teams and organisations, it means a framework for culture and leadership rooted in living systems thinking. Adaptive, regenerative, genuinely sustainable. Alongside you through change and complexity.
Gently, practically, and with a lot of curiosity; we explore what becomes possible when you start working with your true nature, rather than against it.
"My personal well-being has been hugely improved. I'm prioritising my own needs in all areas of my life. I feel more connected to nature and I've built daily habits that allow me to spend time outdoors and can see the impact on my wellbeing. " Bridget
"We couldn't have had these conversations indoors. Nature really helped."
— Kate, Citizens Advice
"Safe, welcoming space which has forced me to make time to address wellbeing for myself
and my organisation."
— Programme participant, third sector leader
Not sure where to begin?
For you — individual coaching
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Plenty of people arrive here with a general sense that something needs to change and not much more than that. That's enough. Here's how to take the next step, whatever your situation.
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Book a free 20-minute discovery call. We'll talk through where you are, what you're looking for, and whether we're a good fit. No expectation beyond a conversation and a chance to explore if we are a great fit for coaching (life or career) together.
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FOR ORGANISATIONS
For your team or organisation
Book a free 30-minute workplace consultation. We'll explore your team's situation, discuss the right approach, and map out what working together might look like. Completely confidential.
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Other ways to explore...
Browse at your own pace the blog, free resources, are a great place to start or join the weekly newsletter for free and receive some free welcome resources and a reflection and offering from me each week, to your inbox.