We Heal Together: Rituals and Practices for Building Community and Connection

Description

A hopeful, wise, and practical guide to help us move into spaces of individual and collective healing, community, and relationship building-with practices to shed our isolation, connect, and thrive. _x200B_In times of isolation, heartbreak, and brokenness, reaching out to each other, being in conversation, finding ways to connect with compassion and openness can help us heal, and thrive. This powerful, positive guide coaxes us to go beyond our individual and collective grief, and courageously re-enter and reclaim our sense of community-which then further strengthens our spiritual practice. Through spiritual teachings drawn from the Bhagavad Gita, mindfulness practices, rituals, resources, and journaling prompts in each chapter, Michelle Cassandra Johnson shows us how we can heal and facilitate healing; reclaim what it means to hold space and build community; find joy; connect to and summon support from our ancestors; connect with nature to strengthen and restore ourselves; and love, alchemize, dream, and conjure in community. Examples of practices include journaling on what community means to you; meditation with a ritual object; progressive muscle relaxation; Yoga Nidra; and many more-all adapted for use alone or in a group. Includes simple, evocative line drawings by Vashon Island, WA-artist, Ivan Moy.

Michelle Cassandra Johnson is an activist, social justice warrior, author, anti-racism consultant and trainer, intuitive healer, and yoga teacher and practitioner. She has led dismantling racism work in many corporate and non profit settings for over two decades and she was a social worker for twenty years. She is the author of Skill in Action, and Finding Refuge. Ivan Moy is a freelance illustrator living in Vashon Island, WA.

"This book leaves no one behind. It is potent medicine, a balm for our times of division and disconnection. I am so grateful Michelle has offered this gift of transformative and healing practices and wisdom, born from her own personal journey and skillful facilitating of groups in grief-tending and breaking free from the prison of white supremacy. She is a brilliant teacher and compassionate healer."-Kaira Jewel Lingo, author of We Were Made for These Times "Michelle Johnson offers her decades of experience, her listening spirit, and her open heart to this work. This book offers us tangible ways to act on our deep longing to hold each other and be held in transformation. This book lets us live inside a basic truth: we need each other."-Alexis Pauline Gumbs, author of Dub "We Heal Together is a prayerful guide to learning how to hold each other. In these times, this is the most potent medicine that we can receive. The pulsation of hope and inspiration that weaves through these pages is a gift to the world."-Tracee Stanley, author of Radiant Rest "We Heal Together is the tool we all need to build community resolve conflict and create more equity in these times. Useful, practical, inspiring, Johnson makes the path forward smoother and easier with the tools she gives us in this book. This book will become a classic for change making and community building that is useful for all spiritual and secular communities."-Susanna Barkataki, author Embrace Yoga's Roots "We Heal Together is a powerful book that positions humanity towards collective healing through the essential act of ritual. This book moves us beyond individual trauma-informed healing to united healing-informed rituals. Modern, automated technology has often promised us a better way of life, to do things faster with increased productivity with more leisure time, however, it has only given us more greed, more stress, and more disconnection from each other. In contrast, We Heal Together elegantly allows us to participate in rituals that engage the individual and/or groups in self-mastery, unified healing, and contagious unconditional love and joy. Michelle Cassandra Johnson once again leads the way for us to alchemize our path toward true transformation by living a more peaceful and meaningful life. This book is an essential resource guide for any and all leaders, teachers, and facilitators who want to have a serious healing impact on each participant and group."-Saeeda Hafiz author of The Healing: One Woman's Journey from Poverty to Inner Riches