Men's Fire Circle

Available add-ons

You can extend the session on the booking page

• Cacao £5 Add ceremonial cacao to the evening.

What a session is like

From arrival to the last breath in the room

The circle runs from 7pm on the third Wednesday of the month. This is what the evening looks like.

1. 01

   Arrival

   Come through the gate at the back of Well Bath into the garden. Tea from the outdoor kitchen. Introduce yourself if you are new, or greet the men you know. Twenty minutes of arrival time before the circle opens.

2. 02

   Robby builds the fire

   The fire is built and lit before the circle formally opens. Watching Robby build it is part of the evening; the fire holds the outer container of the whole session as a third presence in the ring.

3. 03

   Opening round

   Every man says his name and one word for how he arrives. That is all. No explanation required. Joe holds the opening.

4. 04

   The sharing round

   The circle goes around the fire. Each man may speak or pass. If you speak, the circle listens; no interruption, no advice, no fixing. This is the core of the practice.

5. 05

   Middle section

   Sometimes a longer share from one man, sometimes music, sometimes silence. Robby tends the fire throughout. The evening has no rigid structure; it finds its own weight.

6. 06

   Closing round

   One line each, going the other way round the circle. Joe closes formally.

7. 07

   The fire keeps going

   After the closing, men often stay by the fire for another half hour. Tea. Slower conversation. Not compulsory — leave when you are done.

What the evidence says

Research and clinical literature

Circle-based peer support does not have the same evidence base as clinical intervention. The literature on adjacent practices — male peer support, men's shed movements, structured group work around grief and transition — is what is available.

• Men in mid-life are the demographic least likely to access clinical mental health support and most at risk of suicide in the United Kingdom, a pattern held steady across the last decade.

  Office for National Statistics · Suicides in England and Wales, annual releases · 2023

• Peer-support and men's-shed style community structures have been evaluated for their effect on isolation and wellbeing in older men, with meta-analyses reporting reductions in loneliness and improvements in life satisfaction.

  BMC Public Health · Milligan et al. and later reviews · 2015

• Group ritual with a clear container has been documented in social psychology as producing measurable increases in social bonding and reductions in anxiety, particularly in longer-form group settings.

  Current Opinion in Psychology · Whitehouse and Lanman · 2014