Healing Group for White People

*Registration is closed. Please email sweetwaterliberation@gmail.com to get on the list for our next workshop series.*

About

This practice group will be an experiential offering of embodied practice. We will explore together the HOW of letting go of the mechanisms of whiteness through the body while stepping toward possibilities of safety through more connection and interdependence.  

As the facilitators of this space, we are politicized healers who understand whiteness as a false survival strategy chosen by our ancestors that has always had a cost of extreme dehumanization and violence; an unspeakable cost that we will no longer tolerate.  

We will choose life, consent, solidarity and a way forward that makes space for the beautiful diversity of what is.  We are committed to social structures that hold space for collective safety and individual freedom leading toward a collective liberation beyond even our imagination.   

We as facilitators are also people in continuous practice, not experts; we met doing anti-racism and abolition work in 2006 and will draw on our experience in organizing, popular education and healing justice work.  

Our work together will center the values of interdependence, centered accountability, and aliveness. We will use art, theater/role play, ritual, somatic awareness and conversation to explore through the body how we shape ourselves in order to survive and new collective strategies for living in alignment with our values.  

 This space will center consent and disability justice.  You can always say no or ask for adaptations to participation.  

We are in an exploration together of principles; bring your wisdom and experience- practices can adapt to fit the range of needs we collectively present with.  

Registration Questions

This is a space for people who experience white privilege to go deep into how whiteness shapes us, our bodies, narratives and possible actions.  Whiteness is a political and social construct with very real implications on human beings and the earth. Together we will explore these implications in the world and in our bodies, individually and collectively.  We seek to heal the constraints of white supremacy through building trusting authentic relationships, widening our views, facing pain and impact, building tenacity of values to replace white supremacy, practicing centered accountability and bringing our full selves into relationship with the land and actions to bring more freedom, pleasure and equity for all beings.  We want this group to have an impact in our individual lives and also in the actions we are able to take.  We will be prioritizing people local to southern wisconsin who are currently involved in organizing for social change and/or frontlines and care work.  We will be limiting the number of participants to 12 in order to support intimacy and trust building.  We hope these questions can be useful for your own reflection; you might notice your body as you answer;what comes alive/what shuts down; what does your body have to say about it?  Many of the questions are actually a list of questions, you don't need to answer each of them--let them be a guide and notice what they bring up for you!  And as always- consent is a priority, use your discretion in how you answer.

Fees

Noone will be turned away for lack of funds. Please contact us directly to register without paying at sweetwaterliberation@gmail.com. The fee for this group is a sliding scale of $250-$500. We come upon this range taking into account our own needs as creators of this space. We believe all people deserve healing, connection and support and often those most impacted by systemic oppression have the least access to these offers and also bear the burden of proving their lack in order to access services. As you consider what to pay, please take into account your own income, any safety nets (via partnership, family, etc) that you have access to, your debt and caregiving responsibilities, and any other factors that impact your financial access. We are open to payment plans and customized payment options. We encourage you to choose an amount that is centered- not an over extension and at the same time a bit of a stretch.

Please know that 20% of fees collected will be distributed to Sweet Water Liberation Lab and other BIPOC led healing and organizing efforts.

Dates

Tuesdays 6-8pm CT 

8 weeks

Nov. 2 -Dec. 21

We desire for people to be present for each session, if you know you will miss more than 2 sessions we encourage you circle back another time.