Decolonizing Therapy for Black Folks
a Kindred Wellness® Program
Registration Reopens Spring 2023
Be The First to KnowA virtual learning experience where you will explore the colonial foundation of the mental health profession, uncover ways to help Black folks heal from race-based trauma and gain access to the tools needed to provide therapy that liberates.
On-demand access to 8 pre-recorded lectures, readings and reflective activities to explore when it works for you. Connect in Real-Time with Shawna Murray-Browne and DTBF Co-Facilitators. Get 4-month access to the Therapy That Liberates Network and Library.
Transform what you do, how you do it and who you do it with.
600+ Practitioners Trained
Network of 200+ Folk, Ready to Grow Together
Library of over 35+ Teachings on Liberatory Praxis
What You'll Learn
In Module 1, Whitewashed Wellness, the colonial foundation of the mental health and human service sector in the United States.
In Module 2, History of Black Healing + Resistance, how Black folks healed themselves through enslavement and how their collective fight is relevant to the African American health today.
In Module 3, Creating Space for Black Queer and Trans Folx (w/ Randall Leonard, LCSW-C), insight around Black SOGIES (Sexual orientations, Gender Identities, and Expressions) people and gain a foundation for its unique history, terminology, and culture. Explore how colonization has assisted in the erasure of Black Queer identities and how systemic oppression has implemented barriers that maintained health disparities for this community.
In Module 4, Modern Mental Health Needs of Black Folks, the present day implications of historical trauma and demystify mental health challenges prevalent in the Black community to include race-based trauma, internalized oppression, racial battle fatigue and suicide.
In Module 5, Black Thought in Psychology and Social Work, the insight, theories and practices of Black scholar trailblazers in the mental health field.
In Module 6, Liberation-Focused Healing Framework, the major tenets of liberation-focused healing, why each is important and what steps should be taken to apply the concepts in clinical practice.
In Module 7, Healing and Raising Critical Consciousness, how to apply the framework in client scenarios; treatment planning, treatment modalities and processing. We will discuss how to move from crisis to the development of critical consciousness in a client.
In Module 8, Locating Self as Practitioner, what it takes to embody these concepts to heal yourself so you can hold space for your client's healing.
You Get Therapy That Liberates Membership!
Community cultivation is a necessity for radical transformation and reimagining a new path ahead. Decolonial works are futile without connection and accountability. When you invest in this learning journey, membership to our learning community is included for 4 months. This is how we move beyond intellectualizing toward embodiment.
Sample of Over 36 Topics Explored: Black Liberation and Food Sovereignty, Stepping into Space Holding Through Ancestral Connection, Injected Fatphobia in Black Communities, Exploring Anti-Capitalism in Praxis, and more...
Affinity Group Space & Community Building
We understand that radical change happens from a basis of collective growth, accountability and connection.
Monthly Lectures & Study Sessions
Engage in study, healing circles and insight from special guests to raise our consciousness and shift our praxis. (Replays included.)
Feature on the Therapy That Liberates Directory
Practitioners that successfully complete the training and Growth Assessment are featured in a directory for community.
What Folks are Saying ...
This training was the best professional and personal development training I've ever attended so far in my career. Being a black woman, navigating the clinical space can be both challenging and frustrating when you recognize the drawbacks of what you learned in school and how it perpetuates colonial and oppressive ideals. This training not only acknowledged that challenge, it also provided a creative and innovative framework for how to change the stuck and frustrating feelings and therefore changing how you service the folks you work with. It was dope! And if you are not afraid to question everything you know about yourself and your perspective-then you are coming to the right place!
Grace Moore, Cohort 1
I have learned so much more about how to help my Black clients heal than I ever did in grad school and have gained so much from the community that Shawna cultivates through the training as well. I would encourage all my colleagues to take this training so we can continue to move towards the healing and liberation of Black people.
Zoë Carter-Woodbridge, Cohort 3
This training is a must for all White-identified clinicians. If you are looking for guidance in how to work with Black folx and Non-Black folx of color in a way that uplifts their experience and limits harm, this is it.
Matthew Spector, Cohort 2
Secure Your Seat
- On-demand access to all 8 pre-recorded lectures in the Decolonizing Therapy for Black Folk Training for 3 months beginning January 1, 2023
- 4 Month Membership in the Therapy That Liberates Learning Community
- Invitation to be featured in the Therapy That Liberates Directory
- Eligible for 13 Category II Continuing Education Units sponsored by the University of Maryland, School of Social Work, Office of Continuing Professional Education (additional fee, see below for details)
- Real-Time (Virtual) Q&A Consultation Sessions for Connection and Processing with two DTBF Co-facilitators
Question & Answer Consultation Dates:
Modules 1 and 2: Monday, January 9, 5:30 - 7:30 pm EST
Modules 3 and 4: Wednesday, January 25, 5:30 - 7:30 pm EST
Modules 5 and 6: Wednesday, February 8, 5:30 - 7:30 pm EST
Modules 7 and 8: Wednesday, February 22, 5:30 - 7:30 pm EST
Additional Q&A's: March 8 and 22, 5:30 - 7:30 pm EST
Tiered Pricing
Tiered pricing allows us to acknowledge that we are not all coming to this work from the same economic position. Tiered pricing allows us to take a step back from the capitalist mindset that would seek to commodify this work, strike bargains and leave behind those who are not as steadily resourced. It also offers a way for resources to flow where they are needed, so that we can bring this work forward together.
Pay-It-Forward Rate
$1800
or 3 Payments of $600
Standard Rate
$1600
or 3 payments of $533.34
What Folks are Saying ...
Robert "Bobby" Marvin Holmes, LMSW
Cohort 1, July 2020
Jess Wynn-Grant, ASW
Cohort 3, January 2021
CeShaun Hankins, LCSW
Cohort 3, January 2021
Meet The Team
Shawna Murray-Browne, LCSW-C
Instructor & Founder of Decolonizing Therapy for Black Folk
Shawna Murray-Browne (she/her/hers) is a community healer, professional speaker, and Liberation-Focused, Mind-Body Medicine Practitioner. She is the Principal Consultant at Kindred Wellness LLC and trained as an integrative psychotherapist. Shawna is curious about what happens when we question colonial thinking and make space for the ways of knowing held by folk of African descent in every aspect of life.
In her hometown of Baltimore City, Shawna is known for holding grassroots healing circles to equip Black families and change-makers with the tools to heal themselves. Over a span of more than 13 years, she has worked in residential treatment, in grassroots community organizing, child welfare policy, research, in community school settings, juvenile detention centers and initially opened Kindred Wellness LLC as a liberation-focused healing private practice. She pulls from her lived experiences of navigating carceral, oppressive institutions and co-creating free, radical healing space for Black folk young and wise.
Shawna is supported by her own council of elders who offer guidance and have been committed to the fortification of her life's path for a collective of over 20 years. She identifies as a Womanist and is informed by African-Centered and Black Radical teachings.
She is a doctoral candidate at the University of Maryland, School of Social Work where she gained her Master of Social Work. Her dissertation explores oral histories as a decolonial site of inquiry around the healing ways of Black women advocates during the civil rights movement. She earned a Bachelor of Science in Criminology and Family Science from the University of Maryland, College Park.
Dedicated to continued growth, her practice in QiGong, Black spiritual traditions, and sitting at the feet of elders maintain. She lives in Baltimore with her excitable 5 year old, and her husband, "B."
JaVon Townsend, LCSW-C
Therapy That Liberates Program Manager & Co-Facilitator
DTBF Cohort 3 Participant
JaVon L. Townsend, LCSW-C is an artist, play enthusiast, and Licensed Clinical Social Worker in the state of Maryland. JaVon primarily sees her role across titles as a facilitator, creating spaces and processes that make it easier for people to keep going. Before entering the field of Social Work, JaVon completed a BA in International Languages and Cultures at St. Mary’s College of Maryland. She approaches all of her work from the lens of understanding and appreciating who people are within their specific contexts. With over 12 years of experience working with individuals, groups, and communities, she provides spaces proven to give people opportunities to heal and thrive.
JaVon has demonstrated ingenuity and resourcefulness in developing and executing creative approaches to working with diverse groups of people as an Albert Schweitzer Fellow in Baltimore City, MD and as a J. William Fulbright Research Program alumna in Accra, Ghana. She founded Jubilee Counseling and Wellness, LLC in 2021 as a way to bridge her love for the healing powers of play, the creative arts, and fostering community. JaVon is delighted to bring these skills and experiences together to facilitate a thriving learning and nurturing space for healers in her role as Program Manager for the Therapy That Liberates Network & Library.
Randall Leonard, LCSW-C
Instructor & Co-Facilitator
DTBF Cohort 1 Participant
Maryland-native Randall Leonard (they/them/theirs) is a proud nonbinary licensed clinical social worker specializing in the care of LGBTQIA, poly, and kinky individuals. They currently hold healing space focused on the liberation of Black and Queer people through encouraging authenticity, reconnecting to history and lineage, and empowering shared lived experiences. Their healing roles include independent therapy within community, public advocacy, and facilitating a weekly group for trans and gender-diverse Black folx focusing on the intersections between race, culture, and gender.
Randall is also an avid gamer geek, sex educator, and storyteller. They find pleasure in enjoying cuisines, connecting people, interacting with nature, and shared storytelling
Randall holds a Master of Social Work from the University of Maryland School of Social Work. As a strong advocate for transgender and gender non-conforming individuals, their recent achievements include testifying for the “X” gender marker on Maryland driver’s licenses passed and enacted in 2019.