Session 46: Mental Health for Activists

Published Feb 28, 2018, 8:00 AM
This week's episode features Licensed Clinical Social Worker, Shawna Murray-Browne. Shawna and I discussed some of the unique mental health concerns related to activism and advocacy, the importance of self care and boundaries for activists, and her work with other therapists to create spaces that are anti-racist and liberation focused.

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Welcome to the Therapy for Black Girls Podcast, where we discussed all things mental health, personal development, and all the small decisions we can make to become the best possible versions of ourselves. I'm your host, Dr Joy Harden Bradford, a licensed psychologist in Atlanta, Georgia. To get more information and resources, visit the website at Therapy for Black Girls dot com. And while I hope you love listening to and learning from the podcast, it is not meant to be a substitute for a relationship with a licensed mental health professional. Hey, y'all, thanks so much for joining me for session forty six of the Therapy for Black Girls Podcast. I could not think of a better way for us to close out Black History Month than today's interview with Shawna Murray Brown. Shawna is the director and founder of Kindred Wellness and Integrative Practice, dedicated to honoring culture, expanding mindfulness, and holding safer space for change makers, black women, leaders, and their families to heal. She holds a master's degree in social work from the University of Maryland, Baltimore and a Bachelor of Science in Criminology and Family Science from the University of Maryland College Park Shawna is a licensed clinical social worker in the state of Maryland, Keygong instructor, speaker, and mind body medicine practitioner. She provides liberation focus integrative psychotherapy, community healing spaces, professional workshops, as well as key Gong and mind body skills groups that honor the power of movement, breath, and connection to nature. She is a consultant to trailblazing organizations ready to tackle tough topics about race. From the Heart Center, Shauna and I talked about some of the unique mental health concerns related to activism and advocacy, the importance of self care and boundaries for activists, and her work with other therapists to create spaces that are anti racist and liberation focused. Here's our conversation. Well, thank you so much for joining us today, Shawna. Yes, I'm so excited. I'm very excited you were able to join us. So I knew that I wanted to have you on the podcast because you do some incredibly important work. UM. You work with activists, advocates, and change makers as a part of your practice. Can you tell us more about what those different UM populations are. Absolutely so in my work, it's it's toofold where I'm serving like women in UM leadership positions that are really really passionate about social justice. And then from our community aspect, I'm serving activists from on a broad perspective, right. So this could be the activists that's a community organizer that is really connected to the the the grassroots movements around UM political activism. It could be folks in public office that are sort of low key, really really pro black and for social justice, but seem to have to wear like a mask in their spaces. It could be an advocate that's working, you know as a case manager or a social worker, but it feels like their life is driven by social justice so very much, so across the game, and I'm working with folks who at their core feel like they have dedicated their life to social justice and or black liberation. Yes, San, Yes, so you know, I think again, this is incredibly important work. Can you tell me like how you got into this work? Like what made you decide that this was going to be the population that you targeted for your practice? Now this is like a really deep like I knew you weregard to ask this question, and I was like, Oh, what am I gonna say because it's so deep, UM, I would I have to say that my life walk has guided me to the space. I was very much so an activist UM growing up in high school and then in college. I was really like, you know, wearing the afro with the black power fists, doing all of those things. But I sort of left that and ended up doing UM and found myself doing just therapy and wasn't really sure who I wanted to focus in on until later. I would say that after UM this Black Lives Matter movement started to happen, and some of my own personal experiences where my family was directly impacted by the Black Lives Matter UH movement UM and the tragedies of it UM, I really had to sit with myself and figure out, you know, how could I UM really live a life that would be centered in legacy and like doing really powerful and honorable work honoring my ancestors. And so during that time where I was really contemplating that, I was super duper pregnant, like super super duper like wobbling, and UM, a community organization that I hoped to co found that is now like doing really honorable work, asked me to do to offer healing spaces for UM some activists here in Baltimore City after one of our trailblazing activists was um I murdered by way of community violence. And during that time, I'm holding these spaces, you know, UM. Community folks are like Shana, I would never go to therapy, but your therapist you cool. I would love to come to therapy with you. But it was like forty people. So so I was like, I love y'all and I can't. But what that What that highlighted for me was I needed to ensure and provide the support and training and guidance for other folks to be able to do this work explicitly. So I would say the community called me to this work as well as my sort of life path. Yeah, isn't that so amazing? And see, that's why I think it's so important to be exposed to so many different kinds of therapists who are doing different kinds of things, because I think all it takes is one experience with the therapist who is unlike what you thought therapy was like to open up your eyes to how therapy can be helpful for you. It's the truth. I mean, all of us are not the same We're not a monolith. And like, for me, the I'm like deeply, um did I participate very often in all of the things happening in the community and grassroots level in Baltimore City, So folks know me and it's normalized and really destigmatized this whole concept of what it means to go to therapy because I would be like, hey about and yeah, I'm a therapist. Right, those two things that I have to you know, exist separate from one another. Right, So can you talk about some of the unique mental health needs and challenges may be related to, um, the kinds of people that you typically see in your practice, like activists and advocates and those kinds of things. Absolutely, So, I mean it really runs the gamut. But I would say that some of the underlying things is that we're looking at things from our framework where things are masked, meaning like aggression is showing up in a in a different way, and you might not know that the person is struggling with deep seated anger because they're crafted so well and eloquently and they're on their Twitter feed, or you know that their email don't seem like that that's what's happening, or they feel like they have to sort of alter themselves because they're in the public eye, um, increased suspicion. Right, So, because many of the folks that I'm serving could be in high profile UM roles and responsibilities, or they might be like I have thousands and thousands of followers, they might be on CNBC. Right, So because of these things, they're wondering, Okay, can I really trust this person? Is this person out to get me? So suspicion, suspicion of the genuineness of the folks around them is a thing that often comes up. UM. I would say, like suppression of your emotions through um, alcohol, use, smoking, weed, UM, spending money, you know, shopping, but absolutely like not being able to spend a lot of time focusing on their own well being and sort of picking up whatever is around them to sort of cope. Um. And the same thing would be with eating, not eating often right or eating too much and the things that they're eating is not particularly healthy because you know, they feel like they're always on, like they can't shut off, like they're running against the clock. I mean that's a few other things, um joy but like I mean, it's it runs the gamut of all of the sort of mental health challenges that we might see UM and our community. It just I would just say it looks different. Yeah, I mean that's what I was gonna add that. You know, you're adding all of this on top of the like all the other mental health challenges that we might typically see someone come into therapyfore UM And something that you you said that really struck me related to like the suspiciousness, right and like kind of paranoia that is sometimes very warranted UM. You know, and we talked about that. I've talked about that with other guests, like this kind of cultural paranoia, like what's going on in the world and like not knowing who you can trust. So what kinds of things are you may be doing with your clients UM to kind of help to UM assuage some of this like paranoia, Like how do you help them deal with that? So I think, like I tell them really explicitly like that oftentimes they're paranoia. It makes sense the way that they're sort of reflecting on it. Right. Oftentimes Folks that UM my clients have read about historical figures and where something happened to them when they were in the limelight and they were doing all of this move these social justice movements, and they were taken out by the government, right, and so I affirm and sit with them about the fact that y'as history history shows that these things have happened, and let's sort of get clear about where the fear and the shame and all these other motions, what's fueling this paranoia, what are the worst things that could happen, and what has actually happened. So really sing them into the present moment, oftentimes using mindfulness, meditation che gong, which the traditional Chinese form of meditation, and movement, um prayer and ritual right and alignment whatever they're sort of religious or spiritual background is right, So to try to bring them back into the moment, like Okay, you're cool now, right, Like, let's let's take a scan and then let's get clear about what might be fueling these thoughts. And it's usually a bunch of stuff layered on top of it that's fueling their their PARANOIDA. Yeah, understandably. Yeah. I mean the other thing that I would say is everything for the the activists or change makers, it's amplified, you know what I mean, because these are um leaders, like these are the same folks where you know, uh, community sort of calls them whenever something happens within the city, right, like, so what are we gonna do? The police that X by and Z, you know, they are expected to know what the next step is, and so you know, uh, there's a lot of things and a lot of people that they're interacting with and they may not even personally know. They could be walking around in the street and somebody just comes up to them. You were on the news or I know who you are, or I follow you on Twitter and you just you know, So it's normalizing it and then helping them sort of get figure out some tools to be able to get grounded when they are out in the community so that they can be their best possible. So I would also imagine shown that another thing that probably comes up or probably something that you're on the lookout for when you're working with these clients are ways that they're taking care of yourself, care of themselves, right because you just mentioned like you know, complete strangers will look to them to be able to like galvanize the community and like we need to do something about this. And so the only way you can do that is if, of course you're taking care of yourself. So what kinds of things are you, um, like encouraging your clients to do in terms of like self care. Absolutely. So, I think one of the underlying things that I tend to have to break through with my clients is that they're worthy of taking a break and that if they take a break or if they take some time to care for themselves, that they are not doing the community harm. Right, So they sort of hold this sort of weight on their shoulders where they're like, well, you know, I have to keep going. If I do this, you know, then something else may happen. Um. And So the way that we sort of I bring them down to really strategizing about self care is always start with reflecting on history, history and culture. And I know you might be like, what, girl, what do you mean you're reflecting on history? I asked them to reflect on folks that they are inspired by that doesn't have done powerful work, and we seek to find out how did they take care of themselves and how how did that work for them? And that's really important because it helps to like reaffirm why it's important for them to take care of themselves. If we can't find any narrative for them around what worked UM then and then usually there's a story that follows about you know why that movement wasn't sustainable so um so certainly my breath. I always start folks with learning how to breathe. I asked a question, so you think you know how to breathe, and then you know they're like, of course, I know how to breathe. Girl, I'm breathing right now. I'm right here. But I teach them how to do diaphragmatic or belly breathing right, how to get into their body. UM. I teach them about UM some grounding techniques like drinking water, like carrying things in their pocket to support them UM and being able to calm in the midst of UH, in the midst of the work that they're doing. But I also work with them on like scheduling time and for themselves. So the activists has might have several actions to do, or the tenured faculty that's doing participatory research may feel like they, you know, they're scheduled this book to capacity with all of these outputs UM, and so I work with them that sort of find the time and redefining like what time looks like for them to commit to themselves. So oftentimes there's like this misconception that, oh, I have to take like a full on spy day. Um, it's gonna cost me, however, many hundreds of dollars, and I don't have that, And so we demystify those concepts of self care being something that costs a whole lot of money, and we simplify it to actually, like, no, it's let's schedule in time for lunch. Let's you know, figure out a way where you can do use use this app to help you do some meditation or just taking a walk, right, And so scheduling the time out really helps to helps folks to really get reconnected to themselves. So, Shana, I'd really like to hear more about, like the healing circles that you do as a part of your work. Can you share more about what that looks like and how those are youthful? Absolutely so. UM. The the initiative here in the city that I've established is called Healing Be More Activists, And essentially what it is is it's two and a half hours on every month that's free to activists in the community UM and partnership with other black organizations. The spaces are specifically for black and brown change makers, activists and advocates. So the first like, we do a check in, right, folks are getting to know each other. Reconnecting is usually like a mini community or family reunion. So we do a check in where folks are are practicing, naming their feelings, getting into the moment, and practicing breath. Um, there is a movement aspect that's infused into the experience. So UM one of the ones that's coming up here and February, they're gonna start with some yoga and they're gonna have a forty five minute yoga session that's gonna be centered in them returning to their bodies and affirming the powerful work that they're doing, but honoring themselves beyond the work that they're doing. Right, like that your worthiness isn't associated only with the work that you do for community. And then they eat, right, so we break bread. Um, everybody gets to eat for free. It's dinner included. And while we break bread, while we are connecting over food, we are dissecting and reflecting. Um in the sacred space, some of the deep seated issues that they've presented, they'd like to explore. So I surveyed UM activists and change makers here in the city of Baltimore, And I asked them, like, what are the things that you feel like you are struggling with, what are the things that you wish you knew, what are the things that you need? And then we took that data and we sort of infused it into the experience. So like the next UM healing space will be we'll be talking about how oftentimes the narratives of pain UM have been infused into their personal identity and how to do the healing work, but changing the pain story into a story of transformation, so that you're not doing social justice work from a place of pain, but from a place of love UM And and yeah, so those things that sort of happens on a on a monthly basis here in the city. It is a new initiative that I'm really really excited about because the support that we've gotten in the city has allowed us to do it for free. Nice and it sounds like an incredibly powerful experience, Like I definitely have heard more talk about, you know, like not having to have your narrative be wound up with pain, but how can you then use it to, like you mentioned, be transformational. Yeah, I mean, because the truth of the marriage joy is that usually about a hundred percent of the time, like the experiences that activists are are navigating through, they're listening to and honoring the pulse of community, right, but they're also dealing with their own family challenges, you know, like their own experiences, and often come come to time have to come to terms with are they going to utilize their platforms solely for the initiatives of community or are they going to be able to honor themselves. I can't tell you how many um of the folks that I'm serving have, you know, have they had their own sort of personal family tragedies that they don't talk about, They don't mention until they've been sort of nourished and nurtured into let's sort of build community in a village around you so that you're not coping with this um and a silo. Yeah, And that kind of makes me think of, you know, like, just like anything else could be used as a way of avoiding these other issues in our lives, it feels like maybe activism could also be one of those things. Right, Like, it feels very important to throw yourself into into this kind of work, but it can also, I would imagine, separate you from the other issues that you do have going on in your life. Absolutely, And I think it goes both ways. Right where you're not you're not dealing with your personal stuff, or you know you are, you're really sort of this, I would just say, just disengaged even in the work that you're doing because of it, So you're never present, not in the community aspect or in your personal life. It's true, it's it's it can function as a drug just like anything else. You can function like an addiction, right, right. So another important part of the work that you do is to train other mental health professionals about how racism impacts the work that they do as therapists. So can you talk more about how you got into this work and maybe share some topics that you discussed in these trainings. It sounds very, very interesting. Absolutely, So I would say that I got to this I had to be reminded, I had to be continually pushed into having these conversations, I would say, because it showed up in two ways. One way was so you remember I mentioned the um the Healing Spaces that I held in the city of Baltimore the first time for activists that sort of led me to established the initiatives. And so at the end of that, you know, all of the folks that were participating in these healing spaces were talking about their horrible experiences with therapy and how you know they're not gonna go and talk to some white woman or a black woman that doesn't know that they're black. And that was you know, some of the recurring theme that would come up as well as and just in my professional setting, like I have these experiences where I had colleagues that were well meaning UM white professionals who you know, maybe they're sitting across from a young black boy or a black girl who who disclosest to them that they wished they were white, and and the therapist sort of freezes, doesn't know where to go from that space. UM you know, allows the child to continue to express these um uh manifestations that really internalized UM um inferiority and self hatred and UM does nothing with it. Like I literally had an experience where our colleague of mine had that experience with a client came to me for support and console right, and so I shared with her some strategies that she could use UM gave her like a book to read, and UM sought out training that didn't exist for her to be able to redefine or we um to figure out what powerful and healthy next steps would be for her client. And she became so overwhelmed and disillusioned with the concept of the fact that she could be perpetuating racism, that whiteness was a thing, that her white privilege could somehow be harming her client, that she became she lost herself, I would say, in the shame and guilt and did nothing like she never readdressed those topics, and so that child continued to exhibit these topics that at the end of the day I ended up having to like go above and beyond to figure out a ways to effectively and ethically address those things. So though that those situations and my professional experience UM really left me in a space of fury, um and fuels a lot of the what happens in the training space. So you you asked me to talk a little bit about what happens in the training and what kind of topics were exploring exploring and so oftentimes where we start is we unpack this concept of race. I say Ray explicitly that if you folks aren't going are not going to be okay with being uncomfortable, then the training space UM with me isn't the space for them, right that it's gonna be a space of growth of UM. I try to center it also around and like not shaming folks for their their UM ignorance or you know, the experiences that they've had where they thought that they were doing the right thing and and centering ourselves UM in mindfulness and using mind body medicine to support us and being able to stay present. But we unpack like different scenarios where I'm asking clinicians like how would you handle this very same scenario that I found myself with my colleague, or what does it look like when these topics of race UM, white supremacy or white UH privilege sort of show up um in UM and leadership and we unpack those folks become really really uncomfortable, and then I share with them some concepts around black psychology, liberation psychology, and ways that we can apply those concepts too, and those strategies and frameworks in a way that could help them better serve their client. And so generally, like what is the outcome from your training because of course you know it will take more than one training for somebody to really get it UM. But I am curious about like the kind of feedback that you get and like how people then may be able to continue to work with you, or like what kind of you know, like what is the pattern. Then after they've completed maybe this first training absolutely so, at the end of the training and they have gone through, they do some personal and self reflection where they are really doing a self assessment about what their biases are expressing UM really honestly with themselves, what areas they feel like they need to do some healing for themselves in order to show up best for clients. And then there where they dissect there the frameworks that they're using in their practice UM and try to identify how whiteness may be perpetuated within those frameworks or what's missing, and they they sort of outline with their questions are I provide a resource guide of different books and videos and things that folks can can can utilize. But I also UM find myself working more long term with larger institutions where I have a series called Liberation Focused Healing where I'm really literally supporting UM supporting teams of clinicians and dissecting these topics UM, doing case studying, case management, um, UM, applying these these themes. And I'm doing clinical supervision UM for trailblazing clinicians that are ready to really sort of unpack the stuff and figure out how to show up in a different way. But I always sort of share with them that, like, you have to do your own healing work as well in order to effectively hold space UM. And that's it's an ongoing thing, Like none of us are ever done, you know, like no matter if you are a person of call, are a black person, or if you are a person of privilege, a white privilege, you're a white person. Like we all have work to do because we've all been negatively impacted by racism or white supremacy in America. Ante Siana, you make it clear in your work that there is a difference between the things that you teach in terms of like being anti racist versus liberation focus. So can you talk more about what that difference is? Absolutely so like for so, it's really important for folks to understand the racism is systemic, right, and so it shows up um in every aspect and every entity and every institution that we interface with. And so for me to say that I am an anti racist social worker, right, that would mean that I am doing work beyond the couch to try to seek to dismantle the institution that perpetuate these experiences of um of black pain. Right. Whereas to say that I'm liberation focused, that then informs how I'm engaging my clients on the couch like and what strategies, what methods, what frameworks am I using to support them and being able to return to a sense of freedom or to find a sense of freedom that really honors their existence and experiences in America. Does that make sense? Yeah, so it sounds like more like strengths focused, strengths focused, but from a framework that is honoring their their blackness. UM. To be anti racist might mean that I am working on policy or advocating or for policy or advocating for change in the way that that academic institution trains other social workers. Right. But for me to say that I am liberation focused might mean that the way that I'm engaging my client is gonna be Um, how am I going to support them in establishing a strategy that aren't recognizes the fact that they're interfacing with these racist, racist environments. So that's where the black um psycho psychological framework sort of comes in. Like, am I looking at this from the context of the black person in their environment? Got you? Got you? So, like I've talked about before, you know, this is incredibly important work that you do, but I can also imagine that it can be like exhausting and frustrating. Like just even sometimes having conversations, you know, with colleagues on Facebook like will leave you drained. So I can imagine like doing this work more directly the way you are, we'll leave you even more exhausted and frustrating. So how like do you take care of yourself? And like what other suggestions might you have for other therapists or other activists who are doing some of this work to take care of themselves while doing it? Absolutely it gets real. Okay, So I have some rules for myself about engaging on social media specifically, and that is that I only you know that I that I only engage if I feel like I have a solid resource where I'll be able to give them. I really try to be really intentional about like, Okay, here's a resource, and then I disengaged like I give the resource and I walk away. If folks want more, they can reach out. UM. But I also limit my time on social media, so like, if I see someone that continued that's continually posting like horrendous things that I feel like are damaging to my psyche, Um, I'm going to unfollow and the delete right. UM. When it comes to how I just take care of myself in general, I mean I wake up and walk into my day in um and a rhythm or ritual. Right, So I'll wake up to prayer. You know, I'm listening to Oprah and depact Chopra's meditation on Pandora. You know, I am um drinking and sipping my tea as I'm walking walking through my day. I and sitting in meditation and creating my day using visualization to keep me grounded and honestly joy Like, I only work a couple of days out of the week because it's really intense when I do work. So I'm working two and a half or three days out of the week, and then the rest of the time, I'm committing to being with family and UM, to being with family and UH and rejuvenating myself or doing nothing. It might mean doing absolutely nothing UM. And then the last thing I would say is like I tried to really get away and unplug grant UM, get being with my sister's UM sister circles within the community and village UM. And so the way that I would say that, I would encourage other therapists, other activists, UM, just listeners to really sort of pour in. I mean, of course, you know, I'm a mind body medicine practitioner, so I'm like, explore mindful nash y'oll, you know, be alone, spend time alone, get inside solitude, focus on your breathing, explore meditation, UM, try yoga, try che gone, try type cheek UM, do it from UM your YouTube channel. If you can't, you know, go to a class UM. But also like figuring out really simple ways to infuse mindfulness or ways to be UM intentional into your day. So an example might be so like in a few hours, I'm going to UM unplug and I'm just going to sit and focus on my breathing for a couple of minutes. Or I'm just gonna drink my tea with my eyes closed and listen to some some tunes. So scheduling time to really reconnect um. And then the last thing that I could that that comes to mind in the moment is connecting to community. Like I really feel like central to the healing and well being of us as black and brown people is um, reconnecting to each other offline, So like go just spending time together, UM talking, going to community events that are celebratory that allow for space for developing genuine relationships. Um. Like that has been sort of my saving grace. Those all sound like amazing strategy, Shanna. And I really like how you infuse so many different kinds of modalities into your work, like the cheekong and the yoga and the mindfulness. Like I think, you know, you can get a little bit of everything. It sounds like in working with you in your practice, I try, you know, you might do some cheekong in the middle. It might be like okay, so we're gonna breathe because you're not breathing. Yeah. Um. And I mean also humor, I mean joy, Like we need to laugh, like seriously, this is so heavy, I mean, if we need to, Like who is it? There's somebody that I follow on Facebook and sometimes I just go to his Facebook page because he's a comedian, and I just pushed Platt, what's the keV on tab on stage? I figured that's who you were talking about. Sometimes you just have to laugh. And I we also infused like those sort of UM comic relief into all of the work that I'm doing, So you know, yeah, I pay attention, though sometimes it just sneaks sneaks with you. It's time, it's time to get goal and just right. So you have mentioned some incredible you know, kinds of modalities and different things, and I'm sure people are going to want like some resources for like how they can find out more about what you're talking about. So what are some of your favorite resources for these things you mentioned, like the mindfulness and the anti racism work and the liberation focused work, Like, what are some of your favorite resources that people may want to check out? Yes, so okay, so a national sort of resource for everybody, like no matter where you are, like checking out the Emotional Emancipation Circles UM. It's an initiative by the Community Healing Network and the Association of Black Psychologists and oftentimes these are free healing spaces for people of color to do UM to get to to do this unpacking around UM. The cultural trauma and the waste space trauma that we've been enduring UM and so you know, Joy, I'll make sure that I share that with you UM and and on their website they actually have like a self care toolkit that they created specifically for people of color and seeking to do some healing work for themselves. So that's one of my favorites UM. Another would be UM there's a healing platform that I actually established a couple of years ago, is called Evolved UM Sacred Self Work to Heal a system and essentially like it's like if folks are familiar with black board, it's like healing on blackboard. So it's align in alignment with the chakra system UM, which is an energetic UM system that supports sort of the energy within your body. It helps you to align with your your body and being. So on this platform you can do everything from yoga and belly dancing to guide of meditations, to classes about how to UM change your pain story to a story of power and transformation, and all of this is being curated on this website where you can just sort of log in and get access. So that's pretty dope. UM And that's a healing sister Dot com um there is a super awesome and amazing system. Her name is Dr Candice Nicole. She established a Black Lives Matter meditation for healing Racial trauma UM on her website. Like you can literally like push play and get your meditation on and it's specifically curated for folks that are connected to and identify as activists. So I think that it's all super awesome and I think I have one more. You got to run for one more join all right? Um the Headspace app, so like I love apps, okay, and especially for folks that are doing so much um so often, the the mindfulness app called Headspace is really awesome because then it will prompt you or remind you to take a breath. It will you can listen to a guide that meditation like that last one or two minutes or even ten minutes depending on where you are, and check it. It's free, y'all. I mean, of course, they have like an aspect where you do have to pay, but you get a pretty good amount on that application for free. And so I think like those are those are some of my most favorites. And of course the folks are in the bottomore area. The healing be more activists UM healing space like that it's free and it's it's about to go down. So yeah, So are there any other events or other things that will be coming out of your practice that you want to share with the audience? Yeah, okay, so let's see. UM. So one of the other initiatives that I established specifically for the healing of black women is called the Healing Sister Project, which is sacred spaces for UM for teaching women how to heal themselves using movement, meditation, and sisterhood. So, like, I don't know when this is gonna come out, but quarterly we have UM Sister Circle, many retreats that occur that are either free ninety nine or you know, up to thirty five dollars, and it's literally like a four hour healing space where sisters come together, we eat, you're gonna do some movement, you might. The next one we have coming up is Chee Gone. We are exploring the black female form and you know where that came from, don't you? Don't you? That's she's gotta have it. So we're unpacking some of the reality that have to do with being a black woman in America. UM, and everybody leaves with some really concrete tools to be able to apply to them like their lives UM from my mind body perspective, UM, hell and be more activists. Yeah, we're doing a healing work. I think. I think that's I think that's it. Yeah. I mean, and if any therapists are listening and they're interested in doing some training, you know, UM, connecting with me on my website is the best way to Yeah, it's the best way for us to move forward because I'm doing a couple of trainings around specifically healing, being more activists, and the training for folks that are interested in how to apply this framework of UM liberation focus healing and what is your website? Say that's important. That's www dot SHAWNA. Murray Brown with an E dot com and www dot hell a Sister s I S t A dot com and any social media handles you want to share. Yep, you can follow me on Twitter at SHAWNA. M. Brown with an E or on I g at Healer, Sister s R, s t A and less but certainly not least. I have two Facebook pages. One is Kendrick Wallness UM and the other SHAWNA. Murray Brown l C s WC when we have a Facebook group, y'all, it's already like Sisters in the spot and it's the Healer Sister Project um so with hashtag Heller Sister Nice. And all of this information, of course, will be in the show notes for everybody to find very easily. Yes, well, thank you so much for spending some time with us today, Shawna. I really appreciate it. Thank you so much for having me joy, You're welcome. I hope that y'all enjoyed that conversation as much as I did it. Shauna is such an incredible sister. To learn more about her work and to check out the resources she mentioned, visit the show notes at Therapy for Black Girls dot com slash Session forty six. We'd love to hear your thoughts and feedback about the episode, so please make sure to share them with us on social media by using the hashtag tb G in session. You can also tag our social media accounts. We're at Therapy for the Number four b Girls on Twitter and at Therapy for Black Girls on both Instagram and Facebook. Remember that if you're looking for a therapist in your area, be sure to check out the therapist directory that you can find at Therapy for Black Girls dot com slash directory. And if you want a place to chat about the episode with other listeners or discuss other topics relevant to you, join us over in the thrive Tribe, which is our Facebook community. You can request to join at Therapy for Black Girls dot com slash tribe. Please continue to share your love for the podcast by sharing it in your instant stories on Twitter and texting those who should also check it out. If you listen on Apple Podcast, please also consider leaving us a review. Thanks so much again for joining me this week. I'm looking forward to continuing this conversation with you all real soon. Take you care, I oftor Actor Actor

Therapy for Black Girls

The Therapy for Black Girls podcast is a weekly conversation with Dr. Joy Harden Bradford, a license 
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