The Grief Room
Hello and welcome,
I’m delighted that you are here.
I’ve envisioned this gathering space out of desire to share practices of grief, change and mourning. I believe that denials and failures to acknowledge loss, death and dying disrupt our most essential connections to our embodied, living needs.
By acknowledging what is lost, we can make room to sense and feel what is present, vibrant and real.
During these gatherings, participants will be invited to play with language, symbols and tools as portals of liberatory transformation.
Please read on to learn more about these gatherings. If you feel called to participate or have questions, feel free to reach out to me.
Warm regards, Elena
DETAILS
The Grief Room is a space where participants convene online twice a month for six months. This virtual space and time is designed to support artists, writers, healing professionals, carers, organizers, and any-body who is interested in deepening into practices & rituals of artful re-generation through compound crises.
The Grief Room will utilize shared time with intentionality: intention to contain and witness personal and collective losses, seeds and growths; intention to grieve, compile, compost and mourn; and intention to practice objectification* toward personal and collective healing. (*the expression of something abstract in a concrete form.)
Notes from your host:
Acknowledging that “the self” is not a universal concept, this group will convene around the concept of “the self” as a container or regulatory body that each “individual”/participant occupies.
Participants will receive guidance in self-regulation and co-regulation. Creative prompts for contemplation will be provided between and during gatherings.
In this space, participants are encouraged to locate tension and ease, to embrace personal sovereignties and choices and to move autonomously in accordance with the needs of the body.
In this space, participants are encouraged and challenged to observe, track and trace embodied needs/desires. This group is designed to promote self-intimacy and to examine the radical roots of connectedness.
No-body will be called upon to perform or extend beyond their desires during gatherings. Participants will be invited (at times) to share only what they feel moved to share.
*This group is not a therapy group. This is a collective, online learning space. The Grief Room is intended to stir, digest, process and compost personal & collective grievances in service of communal liberation. This group will be capped at 7 participants.
What you will need to attend this group:
-A wifi connection and a device that allows you to join Zoom for online gatherings.
-A completed application and confirmation email from your host
-An object/tool of your choice that allows you to make marks to your satisfaction (this can be a single sheet of paper, a journal, a tablet or computer, a tray of sand or any other object that you’d like to commune with during group gathering times)
Teachers & Texts the group may call upon:
(Reading/purchasing these texts is not required. Participants will receive relevant quotations & excerpts that will be shared & read aloud during gatherings.)
“Crisis Contemplation: Healing the Wounded Village” by Dr. Barbara Holmes
Various works by Vine DeLoria Jr., James Baldwin, Octavia E. Butler, Dr. Cornel West, Audre Lorde, bell hooks, and others
DURATION
12, twice-monthly gatherings on zoom - 90 minutes/gathering
Dates & times for 2024 gatherings: TBD
Accepting applications for future cohorts
Tuesday Cohort meets on 1st & 3rd Tuesdays, 5:00pm-6:30pm CST, November 7, 2023 - April 16, 2024 - applications CLOSED
Friday Cohort meets on 1st & 3rd Fridays, 1:00pm-2:30pm CST, November 17, 2023 - May 3, 2024 - applications CLOSED
COST
Poverty & scarcity are inbuilt features of our capitalist systems. In light of this fact, group costs are calculated based on my household financial needs + participants’ financial positionality and access.
I encourage potential participants to read more about mutual aid and how to assess relative financial positionality here. And here.
Suggested payments based on financial access:
Participants experiencing financial abundance are encouraged to pay $150-300/session to subsidize the cost of other participants.
Participants experiencing financial stability are encouraged to pay $50-150/session.
Participants experiencing financial vulnerability are encouraged to pay $10-50/session.
In my ideal/dream world, no-body would be turned away based on a lack of funds. If you would like to sponsor an-other’s participation in this group, please do so here.
Application Questions
If you are interested in joining this group please copy & paste the following questions into an email and send your responses to: feelingndealing@gmail.com
What draws you to this group? What would you like to offer to the group? What would you like to receive?
What days and approximate times* are you available to attend a twice-monthly 90-minute gathering? (Host will send out a doodle poll for exact times when there is enough interest to constitute a group.)
*Please include your time zone in your response.
What challenges are you facing during this time? What & who are your current supports? What practices do you have in place to ground & support you? (i.e. meditation, embodiment/mindful movement, therapy, creative practices)
What would you like to share about your identity?
Do you have accessibility needs or accommodation requests in order to attend a zoom meeting? If so, please let me know how I may accommodate you.
Please estimate your payment amount. Meetings take place twice monthly for 12 sessions. Please take all of your financial responsibilities and obligations into consideration when estimating your payment amount.
Is there anything else that is important for me to know about you or your potential participation in group?
