Soul Spa Wellness Weekend for BIPOC Leaders

Belonging: To Ourselves and the World

A DHARMAKAYA CENTER STILL PROGRAM

THE 2024 PROGRAM IS FULL, BUT YOU MAY SUBMIT AN APPLICATION TO BE CONSIDERED FOR 2025.

Let’s face it: Implicit and explicit racism is draining. Soul depleting. And in some cases, life threatening.

At this juncture in history, the time for change is more than ripe.  We need to find creative and meaningful ways to support the leaders who bring this critical work forward.

Our response: The Soul Spa Weekend, led by two fabulous BIPOC presenters.

Join us as we sponsor 12 BIPOC Leaders who must not only navigate their own racialized trauma, but who also hold, support and offer inspiration to the communities they serve. We want to support you in strengthening your resiliency so you can stay the course and show up for the bold and compassionate work ahead. The program focuses on:

• Identifying stress factors that impact healing, activism and service work using the lens of systemic constellations, ancestral healing work and nature-based practices, expressive arts, and ritual as healing
• Cultivating mental, spiritual, and emotional wellbeing
• Developing sustainable self-care strategies

“Brilliant, moving, creative, and healing. The best workshop I have experienced in my life—and I am almost 70!”

“Absolutely incredible!…Amazing and eye opening…Deep Blessing…Can this go on forever? Breathtaking experience…It’s rare that I feel so welcomed in retreat spaces… radical permission to return home…. “

PROGRAM DESCRIPTION

The weekend offers a diverse range of opportunities. Main program sessions will be punctuated by contemplation, healing arts, time in nature, meditation and yoga.

Fostering Belonging through Family Constellations as Ritual with Rev. Salome Raheim

Our sense of belonging to ourselves and within the spaces we inhabit is influenced by many factors, including the unhealed traumas of past generations.  These traumas manifest in our experiences and bodies—literally in our DNA—and can hinder our abilities to navigate the challenges of our micro and macro environments.

Salome will facilitate family constellations as ritual to create space for a deeper sense of belonging, as we tap into the bountiful field of ancestral wisdom and resilience.

At the 2017 North American Systemic Constellations Conference, Salome co-led a powerful constellation process to promote trans-generational healing from the trauma of the Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade.  Here she will lead participants in exploring systemic constellations as ritual; it is a stunning process of discovery, bearing witness, and generating authentic integration and healing.

Circles of Belonging: Healing and “Wholing” the “I” and the “We” with Sushmita Mukherjee

Using the imagery of Chakras from Eastern spiritual traditions, and the modalities of guided meditation, expressive arts and ritual, we will deepen our sense of Belonging.  We will be invited into a felt experience of arriving home in our own bodies using the Chakras as a map of wholeness, as each of the chakras offer psycho-spiritual invitations for wisdom and guidance. Simultaneously, we will invoke experiences of healed and whole relationships – with our intimate others, with our community and with the earth herself.  We will end with a Blessing Ceremony: The Circle within the Circle.

Sound Bath, given by Ben Brown

The experience of sound encourages more space, rest, and resilience in the body and nervous system. Sound also provides an opportunity to experience ourselves more deeply, to connect to our higher consciousness, to create a sanctuary within ourselves, and to provide a path to the present moment. Sound practitioner Ben Brown will facilitate this experience through singing bowls and various other sound instruments.

Coming Home: An Earth-Based Mandala Ritual, led by Rev. Sushmita Mukherjee and Rev. Salome Raheim

As a group, we will co-create an earth based mandala, a collective visual meditation connecting us more deeply with the medicine of the land and nature as healer and with each other.  Through the ritual of the mandala building process we will weave and witness our history and ancestry, our dreams and aspirations, our celebrations and frustrations, and finally we will part as a circle of friends, gifting the earth herself a stunning expression of our beauty, power, and radiance as individuals and as a community.

APPLICATION

This program is free of charge, but requires an application, which you can access here. Please note: We are only able to accept one applicant from any single organization.

SCHEDULE

(subject to change)

Friday, July 19

Saturday, July 20

Sunday, July 21