Resilience Workshop for Rabbis: How to perform at your best and stay energised during Tishrei (lunch-time workshop)

Trusted by hundreds of faith leaders, Matthew Freeman and Tamra Wright bring you practical tools to help you stay focused, productive, and energised through the High Holidays.

Choice of two workshop times: Tuesday 21st July at 1 pm or 8 pm BST

For the 8 pm workshop, please use this booking link:  

Every profession has its busy season, but leading a community during the High Holidays presents a unique set of challenges. Join us for a 60-minute online workshop (feel free to bring your lunch!), and you’ll come away with essential tools and insights to help you thrive and lead with confidence—even during the busiest, most demanding season of the year. 

We’ll teach you:

• How to identify your unique patterns of energy-sapping thoughts and emotions – and how you can intercept them
  
  
• How to create positive new habits to support  your own health and well-being during busy periods
  
  
• Simple stress-busting exercises you can do in 30 seconds or less (without anyone noticing!)
  
  
• An evidence-based technique for clarifying your goals, identifying potential obstacles, and creating a plan to give you the best chance of success, whether you want to knock it out of the park when delivering your Rosh Hashanah sermon, or just make it through a meal with the extended family without minor disagreements turning into a major broigus

We can’t write your sermons for you, but we can help you stop procrastinating/let go of perfectionism/worry a bit less about critical comments over kiddush.

We can't shield you from last-minute programme changes, unexpected pastoral emergencies, or challenging congregants—but we can equip you with fast-acting techniques to stay composed, clarify your next step, and recover your focus.

We can’t prevent your kids from arguing, whining, or breaking things, but we can help you stay calmer when they do.

About the workshop leaders

Neither of us is a rabbi (although Matthew is the husband of a Methodist minister!), but we have trained and coached hundreds of faith leaders. Two years ago we created a unique programme to help leaders develop 'radical resilience', the ability not only to cope with challenges, but to emerge stronger after every setback. 

What participants say about our Radical Resilience course:

The Radical Resilience programme, incorporating the ‘PQ’ and ‘Tiny Habits’ methodologies, is exceptional and highly impactful in very meaningful ways. It enables you to acquire a much clearer understanding of yourself, build a practice of mindfulness, and develop new and usable tools, applicable in a wide range of contexts, that enhance wellbeing, relationships and happiness. This all happens within a wonderfully nurturing group environment, and through Tamra and Matthew’s expert and relatable teaching and coaching. It has been a genuine privilege to be part of this amazingly transformative programme, which I can’t recommend highly enough. --Dan Bacall, Director of External Affairs, Office of the Chief Rabbi

"I have found Radical Resilience to be an eye-opening view of and aid to life, a way of helping navigate through daily challenges in a positive and logical way but in a way that resonates supportively and deeply. Highly recommend anyone to do this if you are prepared to commit to the programme, and especially doing it with Tamra, who is teacher/guide/facilitator/trainer extraordinaire with her unique style and understanding." -- Nicky Goldman, CEO, JVN - Jewish Volunteering Network

"The course offers practical tools to strengthen personal and work relationships and improve well-being. I found it aligned well with a faith-based approach—intentionally striving, committing to action, and doing so within a supportive small community. Tamra was an excellent facilitator. She picked up on subtle cues from us as participants and adapted the sessions thoughtfully. Her approach was flexible, respectful, and insightful. I’d recommend the course to anyone looking to deepen their self-awareness, especially those who see personal growth as part of their faith journey." Lucy Bushill-Matthews, Governance consultant and author. 

Matthew Freeman, an Anglophile American, isn't just a facilitator, author, and coach – he's a bridge builder. His passion is helping individuals and groups overcome differences and find common ground to tackle complex challenges. Sought after globally, Matthew has brought his expertise to diverse audiences – from members of the US Congress and the Federal Reserve to Fortune 500 companies and small charities across the US, UK, Europe, Kenya, and Hong Kong.

With a unique background in science and Christian church history, Matthew sheds light on how our brains can hinder collaboration and progress. He delves into these topics in his book, Overcoming Bias: Building Authentic Relationships Across Differences, and his numerous articles.

Dr. Tamra Wright brings an unusual combination of skills to coaching and leadership development. Her academic background in philosophy enables her to think deeply and critically about leadership challenges and proposed solutions, and she draws on decades of experience teaching, coaching, and mentoring hundreds of leaders and educators from different faith communities.  She is a certified Tiny Habits Coach and a Mental Fitness Coach, and serves as Curriculum Development Advisor at Faith in Leadership. 

Tamra is an academic specialising in continental philosophy and 20th-century Jewish philosophy. She is the author of The Twilight of Jewish Philosophy: Emmanuel Levinas’s Ethical Hermeneutics (1999), and co-editor of Face to Face with Animals: Levinas and the Animal Question (2019) and Radical Responsibility: Celebrating the Thought of Chief Rabbi Lord Jonathan Sacks (2012). She has published numerous articles on contemporary Jewish thought and, more recently, on Judaism and Positive Psychology. She is the co-author of an article entitled "Radical Resilience: Hope, Agency, and Community in the Thought of Rabbi Sacks", which was published in Tradition in 2025. Her article "Serve God with Joy (and Self-Actualization): Positive Psychology and the Thought of Rabbi Sacks" is included in An Ode to Joy: Judaism and Happiness in the Thought of Rabbi Lord Jonathan Sacks and Beyond, edited by Erica Brown and Shira Weiss (2024). 

Synagogue photo: Jewish Community Centre in Regensburg, Germany
Photo credit: Marcus Ebener