Broken Open Community Grief Ritual

We live in a grief-heavy culture, land and world. We have lost much of the traditional wisdom about how to move toward our grief, to feel it and process it. Lacking tools and context for befriending grief, we tend to suppress and deny the grief that is in us. This contributes to the stuckness, overwhelm and avoidance so many of us experience, and the tragic repetition of cycles of dysfunctional ways of being in our lives, relationships and world.

We are in the times of learning again how to tend to our sacred grief. There is no other way but through. Our grief holds the keys for our most honest and true path of right action, relationship and renewal. If we do not honor and contact our grief we cannot receive the hidden wisdom, power, and love awaiting as the essential medicine for these times.

Many of us lack a literacy of grief and often fail to recognize how unprocessed grief inhibits our aliveness, purpose, passion and joy. Grief has many faces and expressions: loss, death, transition, unmet needs, unfulfilled dreams, illness, change, failure, betrayal, ancestral traumas, environmental change, social injustice, rupture and violence in our personal relationships, communities, and world.

Through the resource of community, embodiment, connection to the earth, our ancestors, and ritual we can allow our hearts to break open for cleansing grief to pour through. All grief, no matter how big or how small, how old or how new, can be met with kindness, presence and the resource needed for its tending and transformation. Opening to these places with support we can heal. We recover our inherent resiliency and contact the shared heart of humanity and the dignity of the human spirit.

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In this ritual, you will

-Co-create a safe and sacred space in community to honor individual and collective grief.

-Learn about different types of grief and ways to identify how it may be showing up in your life.

-Expand perspectives on how grief is held in wisdom traditions and indigenous ways.

-Express your grief through writing, movement, song, and time in nature.

-Experience the healing power of honoring grief by being witnessed and witnessing others grieving without trying to change, fix or solve the grief process.

-Open your heart and increase vitality through the liberating energy of forgiveness.

-Cultivate a renewed intimacy with yourself and recover the aliveness that is awakened from choosing to honor and embrace grief in your daily life.

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We hold tenderly in our hearts that each being has their own relationship with prosperity and the flow of money.

Honoring this diversity, we offer a sliding scale, as well as a benefaction/reparation program specifically for BIPOC and LGBTQIA+, and individuals who identify financial need.

The scale is intended to be a map, inviting each of us to take inventory of our financial resources and look deeper at our levels of privilege. It is a way to challenge the classist and capitalist society we live in and work towards economic justice on a local level. Please look within your heart and pay what is in alignment with your level of abundance.

10% of the proceeds for this event will be donated to the Dagara Empowerment Water project, that is empowering the Dagara community with sustainable drinking water and support. The wells are being built in Malidoma & Sobonfu Some's family compound and community. This project was built as a way to give back to the Dagara people for their profound grief wisdom and healing ways that inspired this ritual remembrance. See more details here: https://support.thesonderproject.org/fundraiser/4625276

Sliding Scale Guide:

$450-650- SUPPORT - If you comfortably meet basic needs and have ample income, your payment of $450-650 helps to support the work and assists those who cannot pay the full amount.

$325-450- SUSTAIN - If you are able to meet basic needs and have expendable income, your payment of $325-450 allows us to meet the operating costs and supports the facilitators so they can continue to offer this work.

$285- RECEIVE / REPARATIONS - If you are struggling to meet basic needs and have no expendable income, your payment of $285 allows you to be supported by receiving a discount off the full cost. This is reserved for those in financial need and those that would benefit from reparations.

Partial Scholarship available by application for those in severe financial need.

REFUNDS: We are unable to offer refunds but you can transfer your attendance to a future ritual or your registration fee can be donated to someone in need, to be used within 1 year.

All are welcome regardless of race, religion, gender, sexual orientation, ethnicity.

REGISTER SOON! Space is Limited!

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Friday December 7th, 2024 5:00pm - 9:15 pm

Saturday December 8th, 9:15 am - 5:00 pm

Sunday December 9th, 9:15 am - 5:00 pm*

*Optional & highly encouraged beach fire circle, Sun. 6-7pm-ish, Seabright Beach, Santa Cruz, Ca.

After Ritual Integration Circle (virtual): TBA

Held at Highlands Park Senior Center in Ben Lomond, Ca.

Tea and light snacks will be provided. Bring your own lunch for Saturday and Sunday. A refrigerator will be available.

Register by using the Eventbrite payment system, or by sending payment via Venmo @Dana-Schlick with an email to [email protected].

If you have any questions, contact Dana Schlick at (831)-515-8262 [email protected] or Mikyö Black-Wangmo (408) 335-3186 [email protected]

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COVID Safety:

Please do not come if you are feeling ill, or have had any known exposure.

Host or Publisher Dana Elaine Schlick & Mikyö Black- Wangmo