Vonetta Maria Winter

July 1973 - September 2024

Martin Luther King famously said “It does not matter how long you live, but how well you do it.” Or as the choreographer Vicki Corona once wrote “Life is not measured by the number of breaths that we take, but by the moments that take our breath away”. 

Vonetta was only 51 years old when she took her final dance steps and went out on her own terms last September. She was by far the most compassionate human I’ve ever met, of incomparable beauty and grace. If you had the honour of meeting her, or being taught by her, treated by her hands and needles or simply had the pleasure of sharing a quiet conversation together in any of the homes or yoga shalas she made in London or Portugal, you will know. And I’m sure this news will be of enormous shock. How can someone so talented and accomplished, so loved by her family and friends, so brave and adventurous, so full of light and sparkle, someone who had created magical moments that took the breath away for thousands of people, feel she needed it all to just end. 

Menopause is a powerful time in a woman’s life, when hormones once again tumultously turn perspectives upside down. A chance for many, they say, to reevaluate what’s truly important. A shedding of old identities and a time of deep reflection that can often be transformative for what is to be the next phase of life.

Vonetta had been suffering for at least a couple of years through her perimenopause, perhaps longer. It was one of the reasons we had deleted social apps from our phones and stopped sharing our personal news with the outside world. We followed the advice of women who have shared their own experience through books and podcasts. We made our world really small. Like a serene cocoon. Bought a new house in a quiet village 25 minutes from Vale de Moses. Took a sabbatical from running retreats in 2024, and instead hired the venue to international studios, teachers and group leaders. Our son Joshua and his partner Ana have taken on the role of hosting groups and managing the facilities and gardens while raising our grandson Elijah in the home we had built together. After 13 years of welcoming more than 4000 guests from over 75 countries, we both felt it was time to take a break and have the space to decide what we wanted to do next through our fifties and beyond. To dream new dreams. And we did just that.

We spent most of 2024 together every day. Walking the dogs. Eating and sleeping really well. Talking. Playing. Dancing. Spending time with Joshua and Ana, Eloise and her partner Rafael, and grandchild Elijah when we could. She drew flowers every day and made some gorgeous lino cuts, continuing her relentless curiosity into the miraculous healing power of plants and the Traditional Chinese Medicine formulas she had learnt about online with the White Crane Academy. Vonetta continued to provide one on one acupuncture treatments to the groups we were hosting at Vale de Moses, although the idea of teaching classes again was too overwhelming. We redecorated two floors of our new home, in vibrant joyful colours. And were discovering all we could on ways to become flower farmers instead of retreat owners, filling our futures with medicinal herbs and plants in our new garden. A quieter life away from the service of people’s well being and into the service of plants, flowers and ecosystems instead.

Yet Vonetta was convinced that her mental health would continue to deteriorate. That she would become a burden to me and the family as a result. Increasingly she was tormented with things she saw or heard, pointing her towards a future incarcerated into psychiatric institutions. No matter how much we all encouraged her that this was a phase that would pass, that she would recover just like the women in her family had through their menopauses, her intuition told her differently. And her intuition was never wrong - it had always been her trusted guide. She knew she was the answer to 500 years of her ancestors' prayers that one day their children would be free. And she was determined never to lose that freedom.

The anti-psychotic meds and online sessions with a wonderful psychotherapist in the UK specialising in menopause and trauma, helped stabilise a little, but she felt they would never be curative. So while she still had the power to do so, she made her sacrifice of love as she saw it. To relieve us from years of being worried for her, caring for her, supporting her through the upcoming menopausal years. Her decision was not one of fleeing her own suffering. She had never taken that path. In her heart and mind, she saw it as a final gift of freedom to those she treasured most on this earth. A gift of love that has left us irrevocably changed as the light and heartbeat of our lives has gone out.

This was us in 1995, in my mum’s garden in Dulwich, London, recently married, giddy with all a young couple's visions of a more beautiful world we might have the chance to create together. Dreams we saw come true in our 30 years of marriage and family adventures. I could list all of her incredible accomplishments here but suffice to say, Vonetta was the first black woman to enrol in an anthropology degree at the London School of Economics, leaving her home island of Barbados at 17 years of age on a hard earned academic scholarship. One of, if not the, first black female yoga teachers to open a yoga studio and acupuncture clinic in London. And definitely the first black woman to open a yoga retreat in Europe, listed as one of the best in the world by Forbes, Nat Geo and several yoga journals.

As her psychotherapist insightfully explained last summer, Vonetta was a like a Bajan warrior bravely entering the European colonial world for more than 30 years. What warrior doesn't bear scars? Internal ones from the 1000s of little cuts that those who have experienced the same will understand. Scars she eventually had to make physical, to be felt and seen.

Memorial October 2024

We held a memorial at Vale de Moses last October. A hundred or so family and friends were able to come, some flying in from the UK, Barbados, Europe and Australia to be with us. All with precious memories to share and hugs for us to cry into together. Joshua has begun to plant out a few of the dozens of oak and chestnut saplings she’d seeded and watered with Elijah, sprinkled them with her ashes so her stardust can become strong sheltering trees to accompany us over the years to come.

There are no stages of grief. That’s a myth that I’m glad is finally being written about extensively. There simply is no end to it. It’s just a new reality we have to live with. The depth of emotions we have been feeling, are an expression of how much we loved Vonetta. Somehow through this devastating loss we have to find our own way to transform ourselves into becoming even more compassionate. We are all determined to live our remaining years dedicated to continuing Vonetta’s insatiable desire for a more beautiful and just world, to create real spaces where those who do not feel safe or belong can do so, surrounded by forest gardens chokka full of iridescent medicinal flowers and homes bursting with nourishing food and family love. We’ll let everyone know at some point as those ideas become plans and how you can support them too.

For now all eyes are on the grandchildren. Joshua and Ana’s second child, Samara Maria Magro Winter, was born on December 1st in Vale de Moses under a new moon, healthy and strong. Enriched by the DNA of both sides of her parental lineage, Bajan, English and Portuguese, one more stunning expression of the life of Vonetta. As both Samara and Elijah continue to grow, we will be telling them all the stories of how amazing their grandmother was and how she will always be watching over them from the realm of light she is now living in, free from suffering and with a heart bursting for all that she loves in this world.

Feel free to share your memories of Vonetta with us in the comments below. A stream of personal messages of condolences and questions on what happened might be a touch overwhelming for us to handle even now, nearly 6 months on. Thank you for taking the time to read this. And thank you to all of you who brought kindness and tenderness into her life.