Freedom Blooms
biweekly Online Somatic Practice Group
Dear Community,
You are welcome to join a biweekly Online Somatic Practice Group led by James-Amutabi Haines and myself, Tuesdays 6am-7am PST, starting April 2! Amu and I have been creative collaborators for over a decade. We are offering 10 weeks of guided practice in meditation, mindfulness, sharing somatic concepts and lightning rounds focused on answering a question or responding to a teaching. Suggested Donation: $5–$25 per session (no one turned away). RSVP here
We’re also offering Workshops on 1) Reimagining Justice and 2) Somatic Storytelling, Movement and Theater. Amutabi and I are trained in many traditions such as a trauma transformation methodology called Somatic Experiencing; a Brazilian participatory, liberatory theater called Theatre of the Oppressed; and various forms of facilitation, meditation and bodywork — and we are both published writers. For more information, including pricing options and how to bring our workshops to your community email shourdsomatics@gmail.com.
“Sarah Shourd and james-amutabi's groundbreaking work as facilitators for Theatre of the Oppressed has deeply impacted our community. For nearly a decade, they have dedicated themselves to empowering young people, using theater as a transformative tool for social change. ” —Liz Jackson-Simpson | CEO Success Centers
“james-amutabi and Sarah Shourd are both exceptional and inspiring facilitators who create an inclusive environment that allows participants to express their thoughts and experiences freely. I especially loved the games and activities that added a fun and unique dimension to the learning process.” Seneca Beth Miller, Founder of Be Just Bodies
The Guest House is a Somatic Storytelling, Movement and Theater Workshop. Join us to restory our body’s narratives. Through stillness, writing and movement creativity is unleashed, limited beliefs are shifted and space is made for new myths to emerge as we welcome our guests — all of ourselves. This inclusive, decolonial and intersectional program addresses the connection between personal and collective stories, empowering each of us to transform.
Reimagining Justice Workshop is a healing workshop for system-impacted organizers who are daring to imagine and create a world beyond prisons. As activists and system-impacted citizens, we spend our lives fighting institutions designed to oppress us. Rarely do we have the time to funnel our brilliance into envisioning a world beyond America’s failed prison state. These forums will use participatory role-play exercises, somatic movement, writing and meditation to generate community solutions; the visions generated by the group will then be creatively shared back, creating space to strengthen and repair our collective roots and move together into possibility.
More about The Facilitators: James-Amutabi is a Baltimore-born, Bay Area–breed queer and questioning multimodal artist, educator and guide with 25 years of facilitation experience teaching meditation, mindfulness and JEDI (Justice, Equity, Decolonization and Intersectionality) processes with an emphasis in somatics. Sarah is a Somatic Coach trained in trauma transformation and participatory theater, as well as an award-winning journalist, playwright, producer and author. In 2009, Sarah was captured and held as a political hostage in Iran for 410 days. This experience became a springboard for her anticarceral and healing justice work. See sarahshourd.com and jamesamutabi.com.