Led by Kelly

We begin this year by coming home — not as a retreat from the world, but as a way of tending to what feels tender and precious within us. This moment in our country carries an undercurrent of uncertainty. Many of us move through our days with quiet vigilance — tracking threats, absorbing stories of harm, holding concern for the communities we love, while continuing to show up and override our own signals. Over time, that shapes the body into bracing, into speed, into subtle numbing or disconnection from its own needs. In this first gathering, we will move at a different pace. We will feel our feet on the ground. We will notice our breath. Through somatic, nervous-system–guided practices, we will slow down and bring compassionate awareness to how we have been shaped — by training, by supremacy culture, by systems that reward urgency, and overextension — not to critique our adaptations, but to honor their wisdom and sense where more choice is possible now.

At Empowered Spaces, we hold that personal healing and collective care are inseparable. The body is where systems land, and it is also where dignity lives. Coming home to yourself is not separate from justice-rooted work; it is what makes that work sustainable. When we are embodied, we can discern our yes and our no. We can rest without guilt. We can stay present without overriding or collapsing. Tending the nervous system is not indulgent; it is protective. It allows us to act from steadiness instead of stress, to clarify boundaries, to remain relational in the midst of strain. This gathering sets the tone for our year by reclaiming the body as our ground — the place we return to as we move through grief, resilience, and shared care. Your body is not something to push past in order to serve the world. It is where your discernment lives. It is where your dignity lives. It is where the future you are shaping first takes root.

Led by Tiger

Our values are expressions of our unique paths that manifest in our interactions with others and the world. By making space for difference in values across the collective, we create space for shared authentic leadership that endures.

Justice work is inherently a practice of healing, yet this work can generate its own suffering when we grip too tightly, hoping others will share our precise values to reach our collective goals. Through guided somatic practice and courageous dialogue, participants will explore what it feels like to hold their interior value system with open hands and to navigate where collective values are both shared and differ. We'll feel into the discomfort and tension in this open-handed practice, and explore the opportunity in the space between our individual values and collective values.

Led by Laurie

As a healer, you often bravely hold the suffering and emotional experiences of others. This work can feel especially heavy during times of upheaval and uncertainty, personally or collectively.

This 90-minute experiential session offers grounded, accessible practices drawn from yoga, including breathwork (pranayama), gentle movement, meditation, and mudra (intentional hand gestures). We’ll explore how to balance the nervous system, reconnect with the wisdom of the body, and cultivate steadiness in order to stay connected to self and stay present with your work even in challenging times. 

Alongside these practices, you’ll be invited to reflect on your strengths and values as sources of inner and relational support. We'll focus on resourcing toward collective care, exploring how tending to your own needs and capacity encourages the ability to care for others and your community. You’ll leave with some practical tools to stay grounded in your work and life and a clearer sense of what sustains you, especially when the world feels unsteady.

Led by Alicia

Drawing on the wisdom of the elements, and the wisdom of our emotions, this practice is a landing place to wiggle, rest, and reconnect. It is often the case that in times of great upheaval, we pull away from glimmers and feel guilty over experiencing joy while so much around us causes sorrow. In the same vein, we often pull away from slowing down when there is so much to fight for and protect. But both pleasure and rest are vital parts of expressing our humanity, and being present and embodied in all the moments that matter most.

The spirit of this session is inspired by activist Dan Savage who wrote, “During the darkest days of the AIDS crisis, we buried our friends in the morning, we protested in the afternoon, and we danced all night. The dance kept us in the fight because it was the dance we were fighting for.” No matter the crisis or the way you ‘dance,’ this gentle movement and Restorative practice is designed to help reignite and keep alive the spark of joy inside us all. (All equipment and props will be provided.)

Led by Gayla

Belonging is not something we have to become worthy of — it is something we remember. This 90-minute gathering invites you to gently shift from the busy mind into the wisdom of the heart through slow, accessible movement and breath. Together we will soften the nervous system, creating space to notice what it feels like to be here — in our bodies, in this moment, and in community. The theme of Belonging and Mutual Care guides our practice, reminding us that healing happens in connection, not isolation. 

We begin with somatic practices to help move our energy from our heads to our hearts.  Then we will circle together for guided reflection and the opportunity for heartfelt sharing, cultivating a space where every voice matters. We close with a restorative sound meditation with singing bowls, gongs, and chimes. This offering is an invitation to experience the truth that we belong — to ourselves and to one another — and that care flows both ways when we gather with intention.

Led by Kryssi

In this 90-minute collective healing session, we invite you to explore the profound truth that grief and joy are not opposites, but neighbors that share the same deep well of the heart. Through gentle, trauma-informed movement and restorative postures, we will create space for the body to release the physical weight of mourning while remaining open to the flickers of light that sustain us. By moving together in a shared container, we transform individual isolation into collective presence, honoring our personal losses while acknowledging our common humanity.

The gathering will integrate mindfulness meditation and intentional breathwork to help navigate the waves of complex emotion without being overwhelmed. Whether you are moving through a recent loss or simply feeling the heavy pull of the world, this practice offers a sanctuary to sit with what is. We conclude with a period of deep rest and reflection, leaving you with tools to integrate both your sorrow and your vitality into a more resilient, wholehearted daily life.

Led by Laurie

As a healer, you may often stretch beyond your limits to provide compassionate care. Over time, this overextension may take a toll on your energy, focus, and joy in the work. This workshop offers a supportive space to gently turn that same care inward and explore ways to sustain your healing work without depleting yourself. Through restorative yoga, nourishing breathwork, self-compassion meditation, and guided reflection, you’ll be supported in softening accumulated tension, settling the nervous system, and reconnecting with your deeper intentions that first brought you to your work. 

Through a lens of yoga philosophy, we'll look at burnout, vicarious trauma, and moral injury and explore balanced effort, acceptance, and non-attachment to honor both dedication and limits in your healing work. You will be guided to develop a personalized plan for ongoing awareness of your own warning signs of burnout, alongside consistent practical tools, supporting nourishing and sustainable healing work.

Led by - Coming soon!

Led by Deanna

Anger and rage that arises as a result of experiencing & witnessing injustice, violence & systemic oppression is a Sacred Container for necessary conflict, necessary revolutionary change. Patriarchal conditioning & mainstream wellness culture teaches suppression of anger, which dilutes embodied agency, and diminishes ancestral & intergenerational wisdom. To be in power-*with* anger is to reclaim the full expression of Sacred Rage as a vehicle for liberatory choice, speech & action. All essential ingredients in our principled struggle together, and to engage skillfully with conflict to generate liberatory conditions instead of repeated cycles of patriarchal harm.

In this workshop, participants will be guided through a practice of body & sense-based exploratory movement, connecting with the 4-elements of nature as a way to reclaim self-agency and power-with anger. Through a “sites of shaping/sites of change” mapping exercise, participants will unlock pathways to tap into embodied Sacred Rage, and engage through ritual to transmute suppressed fire into Collective Sovereignty.

Led by Deanna

The nervous system frequencies of saviorism, shame, guilt, hyper-independence, hyper-control & burnout that are prevalent in healing & justice work all rely on the same underlying cause - white supremacy. Decolonizing & unsettling white supremacist principles from healing practices is a necessary, though often too intellectualized, conceptual discussion. How do we actually find our place & “embody” margins-to-center liberation? How do we take concepts and put them into choice, action & consistent practice in context through real life relationships?

Through frank, facilitated discussion, a “sites of shaping/sites of change” mapping exercise, and somatic accessible movement practice, participants will be guided through detangling white supremacists patterns from the inter-relational nervous system. Taking this workshop a step further from simply mapping or understanding colonial & patriarchal patterns, participants will also be guided through creating a community-relevant, plan of praxis (that’s theory into practice) towards leveraging privilege for hyperlocal systemic change. 

*An affinity group for People of the Global Majority may be created to parallel portions of this workshop based on registrants with these identities preferences & desires for private healing space.

Led by Kryssi

In a world that often demands we carry our burdens in isolation, this 90-minute gathering serves as a gentle reclamation of our interconnectedness. We will move through a slow, grounding yoga flow designed to settle the nervous system and move us out of survival mode into a space of shared presence. By focusing on responsive movement and rhythmic breathing, we shift the perspective of self-care from a solitary chore to a communal act of resilience. When we show up for ourselves on the mat, we are better equipped to show up for one another off it.

The session will conclude with a guided mindfulness practice and a collective rest, specifically themed around the concept of mutual stewardship. We will explore how our individual well-being is inextricably linked to the health of our community, practicing the art of holding space for both our own experiences and the energy of those around us. Whether you are feeling depleted or simply seeking a more intentional way to connect, join us to breathe, move, and remember that we do not have to heal alone.

Led by Tiger

The future isn't something we dream into existence alone - it's heavily influenced by our reactions to the world around us and what we choose to do in response. In this session, participants will move beyond abstract visioning to explore what it means to materialize a future grounded in present reality and collective desire. 

Through creative reflection and public expression, we'll evoke our innermost gut and soul responses - speaking our visions aloud to discover where will meets dream, and where the body confirms what we're genuinely ready for. This session creates space for weaving visions with teeth - dreams aligned with the will to walk them into being, grounded at the right level for where we actually are, and discovered in collective rather than solitary imagination.