We need spaces to speak our truth, to be listened to, believed, and to experience the trust that grows from a foundation of kindness and respect. This group can be that place for you.
Join us for eight weeks of inquiry and connection, starting Sunday September 27th from 1 to 2:30 PM Eastern. This is a small group, with a limit of nine people.
When registering, please use the Message field to tell me a bit about yourself and why you are interested in the group.
If you are currently in crisis, please email me first so we can discuss support and if this is a good fit for you at this time. lynnfraserstillpoint@gmail.com.
We need to know and speak our truth. This can be where you share and folks “get it”. The foundation is somatic mindful awareness and presence within a feminist context.
We have common experiences
Cultural pressure to conform, to be nice, smile and be pleasant, emotional labor, to not take up too much space. Don’t be too loud. Don’t be pushy. Don’t call out mansplaining.
Fear of male violence in our homes and on the street and the relentless injustice of women reporting violence and men not being held accountable. Our disappointment when “good men” don’t speak up in their social circles. We plan night time activities to reduce risk.
Economic injustice keeps us trapped or dependent on a male partner. Overall, women have less money to live in safer neighborhoods, see a therapist, donate time or money, or go on a lovely vacation.
We get good at reading the room, analyzing the risk of speaking up and being ourselves, and paying the price in lost promotions at work and reduced intimacy in relationships.
Why I offer this group
Anger is too mild a word for the rage I feel living in a patriarchy.
In the 1980’s I was part of organizing the first Women Take Back the Night march in Calgary, Canada. As a feminist and lesbian activist, I poured my heart out in collaboration with other women, and sometimes men, working for social justice. Many things have changed and improved, and many have not. In some places, we have fewer rights now.
These are facts. This is life in the patriarchy. We need ways to feel and express rage without burning down our world.
Surviving trauma often means we disconnect from ourselves, our bodies, and each other. It may feel like “too much” to pop our head up, name reality, and risk connection.
We heal in community. We face truth and we build strength and resilience together.
What happens in ninety minutes?
We meet with the same group of people for eight weeks.
I guide a somatic mindfulness inquiry for about twenty minutes. Somatic means we work with our nervous system and what is actually happening in our body right now.
We then move into small facilitated groups to share what is arising. We pay attention to and know ourselves with increasing kindness. We hear ourselves and each other with respect and compassion. We learn to listen without giving in to the urge to fix.
We come back together at the end to share, ask questions, and reflect.
How we keep this safe
We don't share details of traumatic experiences in the group. You are welcome to say what you carry now. You are not asked to describe what happened then. This protects you and everyone else in the room, and it lets people with very different histories work alongside each other. As we move into the harder weeks, I will speak more about how we can share our truth with less activating of each other.
This is guided somatic inquiry, not group therapy. I am not a therapist. This is not medical. This is trauma informed somatic inquiry based in presence and kindness.
Eight weeks, four themes, two weeks each
Being on our own side
The voice in our head that criticizes, and where it learned its lines. Most of what we say to ourselves was said to us first. We are strongly conditioned to conform to society’s ideas of femininity.
The reflex to please. Accommodating, softening, apologizing for the space we take. This is part of how we negotiate safety in a patriarchal system.
Boundaries and voice
Most of us feel the no in our body before we can name it. We come back into integrity and strength as we evaluate risk and benefit of boundaries.
Speaking up, and what it costs. How silence is bought and paid for. We stay because we are scared and cannot afford to leave. We let the comment go because we need the job.
Living in our bodies
Our bodies are evaluated, controlled, and threatened. Gender based violence, appearance policing, being dismissed by doctors, and the daily chore of moving through public space. We look at where our protective attention goes, and increase our accuracy of risk assessment.
Anger. The emotion we are most reliably punished for. We are angry at injustice. Anger is fuel and a fight response is both appropriate and harmful. It needs our careful awareness.
Others and freedom
How we live with and love particular boys and men while knowing what we know about men and the patriarchy. What we ask of allies and what happens when they fall short. The intersectionality of gender, race, class, sexual orientation and gender identity impact what we can afford to challenge and who allies with us.
What would it look and feel like to live without the systemic oppression of the patriarchy?
We are not necessarily looking to replace patriarchy with matriarchy or another system. We are working toward happiness, self-determination and freedom in our present lives, both personal and communal.
Part of our work is smashing the patriarchy, and it is complex and multi-faceted. We need ways to connect and support each other through our lives as they are now and as they could be.
Who this is for
People who identify as women or gender diverse. Trans women are women and are welcome here.
Many participants have difficult trauma histories. You do not need experience with meditation or somatic work, a diagnosis, a particular story, or to have done “enough work” already.
If you are presently in an intense period of change and struggle, this group alongside individual therapy could be more supportive for you right now than the group alone. Let's discuss.
Cost
$195 if paying more is a barrier to participate, $325 standard rate, $425 if you are able to help cover someone else. Choose the rate that fits your situation.
The middle rate is what the group costs to run. The lower rate exists because money is one of the ways this system keeps people quiet. The upper rate is how that stays possible.
$40 off early bird pricing on all levels until September 14. Enter code at checkout. 4NCCN5H
To start
Come to the free introductory session. Forty five minutes with no obligation. There will be plenty of time for questions plus we will do a short somatic inquiry together so you can experience a practice before you decide.
Sunday September 13th at 1PM Eastern.Zoom link
Class size is capped at 9 people. If you would like to go ahead and sign up now, here is the link.
Note: if the tier you want to register at is not available, email me (lynnfraserstillpoint@gmail.com) and we will see what we can arrange.
Questions:
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You will be invited to speak in your small group each week. You can say very little. You can say you are not up for it today. Nobody will push.
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You can keep your eyes open. You can listen to my voice instead of tracking sensation. You can turn your camera off, get up, or step away and come back. We practice nervous system regulating in each class and you are encouraged to take care of yourself.
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No. It is guided somatic inquiry and structured conversation. I am not a therapist and no clinical records are kept. If you are working with a therapist, this group can sit alongside that well, and many people do both.
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Often this is a good combination. Individual therapy is a room with one other person in it. People who have done years of good work sometimes find that being in a group of women who understand without translation reaches something the one to one work did not.
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You have to be willing to sit in a room where patriarchy is named as real and as one thing we are healing from. Beyond that, people here hold different politics and different analyses. This room is for inquiry rather than debate, and we can practice together across real disagreement.
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Life happens and you just come back the following week.
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No. This is for confidentiality and so we can speak freely.
At the end of each class, I prepare a short video outlining the main points we covered. Written resources with the topic and questions are also available to participants.
When registering, please use the Message field to tell me a bit about yourself and why you are interested in the group.
If you are currently in crisis, please email me first so we can discuss support and if this is a good fit for you at this time. lynnfraserstillpoint@gmail.com.