So Many Wings

Join Sascha Altman DuBrul and Jacks McNamara for a wide-ranging conversation with therapist and author Laura Mae Northrup on her new book Radical Healership. Topics we cover include: -The path and calling of being a healer, and the complexities of using the term “healer” -The nuances of boundaries inside healing work -Desire and living our values -The “shadow” why - trying to heal your own baggage through getting your clients to heal -Class, grief, and building a financially sustainable practice -Healing as threatening to the abusive power structure of capitalism About Laura: Laura Mae Northrup, MFT is the creator and host of the podcast Inside Eyes, a series that explores the use of entheogens and psychedelics to heal sexual trauma. She is the author of the book Radical Healership and is a practicing psychotherapist and educator in Oakland, CA. Her work focuses on defining sexual violence through a spiritual and politicized lens and supporting the spiritual integrity of our collective humanity. You can learn more about her at www.lauramaenorthrup.com. Find Laura online: On the web: http://www.lauramaenorthrup.com On Social Media: @lauramaenorthrup Use discount code somanywings to buy Radical Healership with 35% off +free shipping here: https://www.northatlanticbooks.com/shop/radical-healership/     Applies to print, e-books, and audio Links to So Many Wings’ social media and websites SMW on the web: https://somanywings.org Donate to SMW: https://somanywings.org/donate On Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/somanywingspodcast On Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/somanywingspodcast On Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/join/somanywingspodcast Jacks McNamara’s website and social media: On the web: https://jacksmcnamara.net On Instagram: @jacksmcnamara Sascha Altman DuBrul’s website: On the web: www.saschadubrul.com

Can survivors be therapists – and even be better at it? Jacks McNamara – poet, trauma healing coach, and co-founder of The Icarus Project – joins Will Hall - advocate, counselor and founder of Madness Radio - to discuss the calling to become a therapist/counselor/coach inspired by their own struggles and survivor mutual aid. Topics discussed include -What makes a “good therapist”?  -Is mutual aid and friendship enough or do we need professional healers?  -How does sharing your trauma and oppression with clients affect working as a therapist?  -What about licensing and credentials – can they get in the way of truly helping people?  -And is a therapist at heart a wounded healer? Find Will Hall and Madness Radio online: On the web: https://willhall.net/ Madness Radio on the web: https://www.madnessradio.net/ Will on twitter: @willhall  Free book download: Outside Mental Health, http://www.outsidementalhealth.com/ Find Jacks McNamara online: On the web: https://jacksmcnamara.net On Instagram: @jacksmcnamara  Jacks’ book of poetry, Inbetweenland: https://jacksmcnamara.net/inbetweenland-book/ The Big Queer Poetry Class Details and registration at https://jacksmcnamara.net/spring-2022-big-queer-poetry-class. Use the discount code SoManyWings to get 10% off if you register before February 8th. Links to So Many Wings’ social media and website On the web: https://somanywings.org To donate: https://www.somanywings.org/donate/ On Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/somanywingspodcast On Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/somanywingspodcast On Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/join/somanywingspodcast

Join us for a wide-ranging conversation with Vesper Moore. Topics we cover include: Getting involved with the Mad Liberation Movement How disability, ableism, and saneism intersect with “mental illness” Survivor led mutual aid spaces Decolonizing the gender binary De-pathologizing the experiences that get diagnosed and labeled under the western mental health paradigm How restrictions on psychedelics and the western medical model's suppression of indigenous culture are interconnected. The history and reemergence of Madness Network News. About Vesper: Vesper Moore, is a mad liberation activist, trainer, writer, and psychiatric survivor. They have been advocating as a part of the mad movement for several years and have been the recipient of many social justice and diversity awards. Vesper has brought the perspectives of mad people, disabled people, and psychiatric survivors to national and international spaces. They have experience working as a consultant for both the United States government and the United Nations in shaping strategies around trauma, intersectionality, and disability rights. They have been at the forefront of legislative reform to shift the societal paradigm around mental health. Vesper as a mad queer indigenous person has made it their life’s mission to rewrite the narrative psychiatry has enforced on our society. Find Vesper online: On Social Media:  Facebook: @Vesper.Moore777  Twitter: @MooreVesper  Instagram: @vesper_j_moore  Linkedin: @VesperMoore Links to relevant resources: Kiva Centers of Massachussetts: https://kivacenters.org/ Karaya Peer Respite Center: https://kivacenters.org/peer-support/karaya-peer-respite/ Peerrespite.com Madness Network News: https://madnessnetworknews.com/ Psychedelics, Madness, and Awakening Conference: http://www.psychedelicsmadnessawakening.com/ Links to So Many Wings’ social media and website On the web: https://somanywings.org On Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/somanywingspodcast On Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/somanywingspodcast On Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/join/somanywingspodcast

Join us for a wide-ranging conversation with somatic trauma therapist and educator Andrea Glik. Topics we cover include: Trauma and the polyvagal theory Being a sex-positive therapist Working with internalized oppressions as a form of cognitive distortion caused by trauma Digital minimalism Finding accessible and politicized language around trauma healing The word witch as a healing term, reclaiming ancestral trauma Finding your voice as a healer & therapist About Andrea: Andrea Glik, LCSW is a somatic trauma therapist, supervisor, and educator. Andrea specializes in treating trauma, nervous system dysregulation, and PTSD, prioritizing women, survivors, and queer & trans folks. She utilizes neurobiological, body-based and feminist therapy practices to help clients feel safe in the present and come home to themselves. Andrea practices online, lives on stolen Osage & Sioux land at the confluence of the Missouri, Mississippi, and Illinois Rivers. She can also be found on Instagram @somaticwitch and at andreaglik.com. Find Andrea online: On the web: www.andreaglik.com On Social Media: @somaticwitch Links to relevant resources: Pat Ogden - Sensorimotor Psychotherapy: https://sensorimotorpsychotherapy.org/ Janina Fisher - https://janinafisher.com/ Deb Dana and The Rhythm of Regulation - https://www.rhythmofregulation.com/ Digital Minimalism by Cal Newport: https://www.calnewport.com/books/digital-minimalism/ Trauma of Money program: https://www.thetraumaofmoney.com Tempest sobriety school: https://www.jointempest.com/ Links to So Many Wings’ social media and website On the web: https://somanywings.org On Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/somanywingspodcast On Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/somanywingspodcast On Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/join/somanywingspodcast

Join us for a conversation with Tehseen Noorani and Erica Hua Fletcher where we discuss the origins and highlights of the Psychedelics, Madness, and Awakening Conference, as well as each interviewee’s personal research and links to these subjects. Topics we cover include: Why madness is excluded from psychedelic therapy and left outside the emerging conversation, and how to involve mad folks in these conversations Community harm reduction responses to spiritual awakening, and harm reduction with psychedelics The consequences of psychedelic exclusion criteria How themes of overground and underground experimentation and healing show up in each participant’s research And more! About Tehseen Noorani and Erica Hua Fletcher: Tehseen is an independent researcher in the final stages of a five-year postdoctoral project documenting how 'psychedelic' and ‘psychotic’ experiences, practices and histories are connected.  This has involved an ethnography of the overground and underground experimentation happening with, (1) psychedelics, including leading qualitative research with the psychedelics research team at Johns Hopkins University, and (2) madness, including as a long-standing ally of the Hearing Voices Network, and more recent membership of the Hearing The Voice project. His book - planned for publication in 2021 - puts these twinned sites into conversation, locating their joint possibilities within the raced and gendered politics of contemporary drug-taking and spirit-making. Erica is a postdoctoral fellow at UCLA's Semel Institute for Neuroscience and Human Behavior and the co-chair of the Society for Medical Anthropology's Mental Health Interest Group. Over the last decade, she has worked closely with community members, peer support specialists, and community health workers on collaborative alternatives to traditional psychiatric treatment. Erica writes about contemporary mental health social movements, community health and healing, and carework; her scholarship spans the health humanities, social medicine, and mad studies.  About the Conference: Psychedelics, Madness, & Awakening: Harm Reduction & Future Visions To watch recorded presentations and panel discussions with the Psychedelics, Madness, and Awakening’s conference, check out the PMA website: http://www.psychedelicsmadnessawakening.com Find Tehseen online: On Twitter @tehseennoorani To download Tehseen’s articles: https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Tehseen-Noorani-2 Find Erica online: On the web: https://ericahua.weebly.com On Instagram @erica.hua To download Erica’s articles: https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Erica_Fletcher3 Links to relevant resources: Anthropology & Mental Health Interest Group: http://amhig.medanthro.net  Alternatives Conference: https://www.alternatives-conference.org  Hearing Voices conference: http://hearingvoicesnetworkireland.ie/intervoice-congress-2021/  Links to So Many Wings’ social media and website On the web: https://somanywings.org On Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/somanywingspodcast On Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/somanywingspodcast On Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/join/somanywingspodcast

Join us for a conversation with T. Aisha Edwards where we discuss recovering from complex trauma, somatics for liberation, Radical Rest, and so much more. Topics we cover include: Unburdening the impacts of socialized oppressions for POCs and Queer/Trans folks Using healing justice to support folks on the front lines of racial justice uprisings The Emergent Liberation Collective podcast The trauma-informed stabilization model Parts work: unblending and befriending About Aisha: Aisha Edwards, LMHC (xe/she) is a somatic trauma therapist, healer, writer, performance artist and fire breathing light warrior. She uniquely weaves Gestalt, Somatic Experiencing, early developmental movement, Neuro Emotional Technique, ancestral healing and concepts from Traditional Chinese Medicine and Western Herbalism into a holistic approach to emotional and spiritual health that fosters the sovereign  relationship with the body as the vehicle to wellness, wholeness, connection and liberation from all forms of oppression.  Find Aisha online: On the web: www.fullflightwellness.com, www.radicalrest.org, https://linktr.ee/emergentliberationcollective On Instagram: @full_flight_wellness, @emergentliberationcollective Links to relevant resources: Somakinese school @somakinese.school  Embodied Biotensegrity https://biotensegrity.podia.com/ Janina Fisher and Trauma-Informed Stabilization model: https://janinafisher.com/tist  @langstonkahn ancestral healing around trauma Magdalena Weinstein @magdalenaweinstein Emergent strategy https://alliedmedia.org/speaker-projects/emergent-strategy-ideation-institute Nurturing Resilience/Somatic Resilience and Regulation Training: https://www.resilienceandregulation.com/ Links to So Many Wings’ social media and website On the web: https://somanywings.org On Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/somanywingspodcast On Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/somanywingspodcast On Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/join/somanywingspodcast

Today Jacks shares a mini-episode update on how they’re handling pandemic fatigue and parenting burnout, grieving the loss of things like getting fancy before a live audience, hoping we all get to feel more radiantly alive sometime soon, and why they’re taking a little break from releasing podcast episodes. Links to relevant resources: To suggest a guest for us to interview, go here: https://forms.gle/3FmteexUQabK3h2U8 Jacks’ column on Radiance and Burnout that they read on the show: https://www.sfreporter.com/columns/necessarymagic/2021/02/03/necessary-magic-14/ Find Jacks online: On the web: https://jacksmcnamara.net Instagram @jacksmcnamara Links to So Many Wings’ social media and website: On the web: https://somanywings.org On Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/somanywingspodcast On Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/somanywingspodcast On Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/join/somanywingspodcast

Join us for an interview with Wheels Darling where we discuss her path towards becoming an acupuncturist, herbalist, and health educator with an anti-oppression analysis. Topics we cover include: Mutual aid as medicine Coming of age as full-time activist  Possibility magic as a tool and anti-oppression lens Becoming a healer and educator Choosing to pursue an advanced degree/medical license Dynamic transformation, sacred openings, nervous system repatterning, cognitive reframing, and the magic of dreaming and thinking bigger Being a healthcare worker during COVID Connecting to ancestral earth-based spirituality Cultural appropriation in spirituality and medicine About Wheels: Wheels Darling is a queer acupuncturist, herbalist, body worker, healer, educator, witch, and collaborator of educational projects. They are based in the place currently called Portland, Oregon. Wheels is particularly excited to work in the places that are in between, the liminal spaces between what was, what is, and what could be. She uses this imaginal vantage to dream up educational programs, treatment plans for her patients, health equity plans of action, intimacies with her family, friends, lovers, communities, the larger world of humans, and all that is other than human.  Wheels' specialty is that she is a generalist. She's studied literature, political economy, herbalism, East Asian Medicine, queer and feminist theories, revolutionary and radical movements, ways of honoring each of the beings of this planet, histories and stories of those not represented in normative history books, magic, euro-pagan-earth-based spirituality, somatic healing, creative writing, and many other forms of Liberation Studies. Find Wheels online: On the web: Wheelsdarling.com, www.openhandhealth.com On Social Media: Instagram @WheelsDarling, @openhandhealth   Links to relevant resources: Wheels offers classes at Openhandhealth.com Links to So Many Wings’ social media and website On the web: https://somanywings.org On Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/somanywingspodcast On Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/somanywingspodcast On Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/join/somanywingspodcast

Join us for a wide-ranging conversation with Crystal Davis of Blooming Fire Healing where we discuss how magic helps us survive, becoming a BIPOC healer, and much more. Topics we cover include: Shapeshifting Learning to live with depression Becoming a healer and reiki master Being a “feral witch” (or Crystal’s term for solitary magical practitioners) Building relationship with the things we can see and the things we can’t BIPOC healing circles Tarot as a mirror and a map About Crystal: Crystal Davis (she/they) is an intuitive empath, healer, and magic maker living in Portland, OR. She moves through the world as a queer Black cis woman. The alchemy of her interests, experiences, and survival have led her down this winding road of exploration, reflection, and the path of the witch. She found her way to metaphysics in her hometown of Richmond, VA. After beginning her Reiki training, Crystal was called to the Pacific Northwest to continue her study of alternative healing and magic.  Healing is a journey - one step inevitably leading to the next. Her perspectives on healing have been informed by her lived experiences, work with youth, and individuals surviving houselessness and poverty at Sisters of the Road. She is an alumni of the Blue Iris Mystery School and a Holy Fire Reiki Master/Teacher. She is a volunteer practitioner with healing justice organization Radical Rest which provides mental health and wellness services to support BIPOC organizers and activists in their continued work of liberation. Through Blooming Fire Healing, she offers tarot, energywork, and monthly BIPOC healing circles to support the healing and magic that her clients bring into the world. She believes that when individuals are in full bloom they give a gift to their entire community.  Find Crystal online: On the web: www.bloomingfirehealing.com On Social Media:  IG: @bloomingfirepdx FB @bloomingfirehealing Soundcloud: Blooming Fire Healing Links to relevant resources: Black Lives Are Magic calendar - https://www.instagram.com/blacklivesaremagic WooPDX - POC-owned magic shop in Portland - https://woopdx.com Sisters of the Road - https://sistersoftheroad.org/ Radical Rest - https://www.radicalrest.org Blue Iris Mystery School - https://www.blueirismysteries.com https://www.wweek.com/culture/2020/09/23/in-2020-everyone-is-struggling-with-mental-health-heres-our-guide-to-finding-peace https://soundcloud.com/bloomingfirehealing/the-shielding-song Links to So Many Wings’ social media and website On the web: https://somanywings.org On Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/somanywingspodcast On Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/somanywingspodcast On Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/join/somanywingspodcast

Join us for a wide-ranging conversation with Crystal Davis of Blooming Fire Healing where we discuss how magic helps us survive, becoming a BIPOC healer, and much more. Topics we cover include: Shapeshifting Learning to live with depression Becoming a healer and reiki master Being a “feral witch” (or Crystal’s term for solitary magical practitioners) Building relationship with the things we can see and the things we can’t BIPOC healing circles Tarot as a mirror and a map About Crystal: Crystal Davis (she/they) is an intuitive empath, healer, and magic maker living in Portland, OR. She moves through the world as a queer Black cis woman. The alchemy of her interests, experiences, and survival have led her down this winding road of exploration, reflection, and the path of the witch. She found her way to metaphysics in her hometown of Richmond, VA. After beginning her Reiki training, Crystal was called to the Pacific Northwest to continue her study of alternative healing and magic.  Healing is a journey - one step inevitably leading to the next. Her perspectives on healing have been informed by her lived experiences, work with youth, and individuals surviving houselessness and poverty at Sisters of the Road. She is an alumni of the Blue Iris Mystery School and a Holy Fire Reiki Master/Teacher. She is a volunteer practitioner with healing justice organization Radical Rest which provides mental health and wellness services to support BIPOC organizers and activists in their continued work of liberation. Through Blooming Fire Healing, she offers tarot, energywork, and monthly BIPOC healing circles to support the healing and magic that her clients bring into the world. She believes that when individuals are in full bloom they give a gift to their entire community.  Find Crystal online: On the web: www.bloomingfirehealing.com On Social Media:  IG: @bloomingfirepdx FB @bloomingfirehealing Soundcloud: Blooming Fire Healing Links to relevant resources: Black Lives Are Magic calendar - https://www.instagram.com/blacklivesaremagic WooPDX - POC-owned magic shop in Portland - https://woopdx.com Sisters of the Road - https://sistersoftheroad.org/ Radical Rest - https://www.radicalrest.org Blue Iris Mystery School - https://www.blueirismysteries.com https://www.wweek.com/culture/2020/09/23/in-2020-everyone-is-struggling-with-mental-health-heres-our-guide-to-finding-peace https://soundcloud.com/bloomingfirehealing/the-shielding-song Links to So Many Wings’ social media and website On the web: https://somanywings.org On Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/somanywingspodcast On Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/somanywingspodcast On Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/join/somanywingspodcast

Join us for a conversation with Ahjo Sipowicz where we discuss their path into radical embodiment and the creation of their book EarthBodyBoat. Topics we cover include: Coming into wholeness as a neurodivergent, genderqueer creature Meaning-making and integration after altered state experiences Using scores and performance to connect with the earth and ourselves Freeing the rivers dammed by patriarchy and colonialism Croning, eldership and aging Divination and art-making with an Iphone Making a book to make community About Ahjo: I am a white, non-binary, neurodivergent, pansexual, elemental creature, residing for 30 years on Tewa land at O’gha Po’oge—White Shell Water Place—Santa Fe, New Mexico. My ancestors, primarily Lithuanian and Norwegian, migrated to the Chicago area where I was born and raised. In 1989 I studied the Life Art Process at the Tamalpa Institute with Anna Halprin. The values of the Life Art Process continue to guide me—including creative process over end product, creating dialog between expressive mediums, communicating with the self, life through ritual, performance, and art making. I call myself a “somatic earth artist,” one who is in apprenticeship with both the personal and earthly soma, and expresses both the conflicts and the Eros of these relationships through art. My art arises out of my InBodyNature practice, in which I actively dialogue with nature—communicating, performing, witnessing, and creating in collaboration. I bridge these experiences with writing, video documentation, and visual art through the technology of iPhone apps and composite photography. I am a self-published author of the newly released memoir/artist journal, EarthBodyBoat: Queer Journey of A Somatic Earth Artist. Find Ahjo online: Ahjo’s book, EarthBodyBoat: https://ahjo.art/earthbodyboatbook Ahjo’s website: https://ahjo.art/ On Social Media:  https://www.facebook.com/Sipps.sipowicz https://www.instagram.com/ahjo_k_sipps/ Links to relevant resources: Tamalpa Institute: https://www.tamalpa.org/ Karen Divine Iphone Artist: http://www.karendivinephotography.com/ Links to So Many Wings’ social media and website: On the web: https://somanywings.org On Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/somanywingspodcast On Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/somanywingspodcast On Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/join/somanywingspodcast

Join us for a conversation with Israel Francisco Haros Lopez where we discuss how art saves lives, how ancestors help us, the evolution of the Alas de Agua Art Collective, and much more. Topics we cover include: Poetry of the people Healing and respecting ourselves Moving beyond the spirit of the colonizer that lives in all of us How institutions become borders Asemic writing Relentless hope About Israel: Israel Francisco Haros Lopez was born in East Los Angeles to immigrant parents of Mexican descent. He brings his firsthand knowledge of the realities of migration, U.S. border policies, and life as a Mexican American to his work with families and youth as a mentor, educator, art instructor, ally, workshop facilitator and activist. He studied at U.C. Berkeley and received a degree in English Literature and Chicano Studies followed by an M.F.A in Creative Writing from California College of the Arts. At formal and informal visual art spaces, Israel creates and collaborates in many interdisciplinary ways including poetry, performance, music, visual art, and video making and curriculum creation. His work addresses a multitude of historical and spiritual layered realities of border politics, identity politics, and the re-interpretation of histories. He was formerly the Highschool Homeless Liason at SFPS Adelante and is one of the founders and forces of energy at Alas de Agua Arts Collective and the New Mexico Murals Project. In 2020 he began working with YouthWorks, Reunity Resources, and Mother Nature Center to grow food for the community on county owned land at San Isidro Crossing Find Israel online: On the web: www.waterhummingbirdhouse.com, www.alasdeagua.com  On Social Media: https://www.facebook.com/Waterhummingbirdhouse-472849272822605 https://www.instagram.com/waterhummingbirdhouse/ Links to relevant resources: https://xikanadas.wordpress.com/ https://www.reverbnation.com/lalloronaxroniclesmonologues https://barriosnakesongs.wordpress.com/ Links to So Many Wings’ social media and website On the web: https://somanywings.org On Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/somanywingspodcast On Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/somanywingspodcast On Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/join/somanywingspodcast

Today So Many Wings’ host Jacks brings you up to date about why Sascha is on leave from So Many Wings, and discusses topics including centered accountability, navigating harmful behavior, forgiveness, transformative justice, and love. Links to relevant resources: 9 Ways to Be Accountable When You’ve Been Abusive article by Kai Cheng Thom: https://everydayfeminism.com/2016/02/be-accountable-when-abusive/ Book: Beyond Survival, Strategies and Stories from the Transformative Justice Movement: https://www.akpress.org/beyond-survival.html The opportunity to make amends, Jacks’ column in the Santa Fe Reporter, which they read in this episode: https://www.sfreporter.com/columns/necessarymagic/2020/11/04/necessary-magic-12/ Find Jacks online: On the web: https://jacksmcnamara.net Links to So Many Wings’ social media and website On the web: https://somanywings.org On Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/somanywingspodcast On Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/somanywingspodcast On Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/join/somanywingspodcast

Join us for a conversation with Danni Biondini where we discuss her path from radical mental health activist at the Icarus Project to becoming the Chair of the Community Mental Health Department at the California Institute of Integral Studies (CIIS). Topics we cover include: Coming of age as a radical activist in San Francisco Rebuilding after a breakdown by understanding systems of oppression Using intellectual defenses as a way to grow Foucault’s Panopticon - internalizing the dominant gaze of the social order History of the Bay Area Icarus Project chapter The power and limitations of peer support  The power and limitations of working as a clinical therapist Building a radical therapy practice and the importance of mentorship and supervision About Danni Biondini: Danni Biondini is a Licensed Marriage & Family Therapist in San Francisco, and  Assistant Professor and Chair of the Community Mental Health program at CIIS. She is the Director and Supervisor of a psychodynamic therapy program at Francisco Middle School, overseeing the therapy services provided to kids at the school. As a longtime school-based therapist, she has a major interest in how to intervene on schools as sites of socialization. She came to the field with a background in radical mental health, as a member of the Bay Area Icarus Project in its heyday. She brings a radical mental health lens to her work, trying to build communities of therapists working within the system to change it.  Find Danni online: On the web: www.dannibiondini.com On Instagram: @biond_the_pleasure_principle Links to So Many Wings’ social media and website On the web: https://somanywings.org On Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/somanywingspodcast On Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/somanywingspodcast On Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/join/somanywingspodcast

Join us for a multi-faceted and life-affirming conversation with writer, writing mentor and independent scholar Meg-John Barker where we discuss their wide ranging thoughts on gender non-conformity, plurality, consent, ‘anti-self help,’ and participation in queer and other subcultures. Topics we cover include: What it means to write an “anti self-help book” Plurality and trauma The intersections of psychology, gender non-conformity, and relationship structures outside the mainstream The crucial and complicated nature of consent Navigating the contradictions of academia and DIY media production About Meg-John Barker: Meg-John Barker is the author of a number of popular books on sex, gender, and relationships, including Queer: A Graphic History, Gender: A Graphic Guide, How To Understand Your Gender, Life Isn’t Binary, Enjoy Sex (How, When, and IF You Want To), Rewriting the Rules, and The Psychology of Sex. They have also written a number of books for scholars and counsellors on these topics, drawing on their own research and therapeutic practice. Find Meg-John online: On the web: rewriting-the-rules.com, megjohnandjustin.com On Social Media:  Twitter: @megjohnbarker Instagram: @meg_john_barker Facebook: megjohnbarkerwriter YouTube: youtube.com/c/MegJohnBarkerPsych/ Links to relevant resources: Healing the Fragmented Selves of Trauma Survivors book: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/22760492-healing-the-fragmented-selves-of-trauma-survivors Plural Selves: https://www.rewriting-the-rules.com/plural-work/ The Bisexuality Report: https://www.bimedia.org/bireport/ Life Isn’t Binary: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/43818540-life-isn-t-binary Queer: A Graphic History: https://iconbooks.com/ib-title/queer-a-graphic-history/ Gender: A Graphic Guide: https://iconbooks.com/ib-title/gender-a-graphic-guide-2/ Sexuality: A Graphic Guide: https://iconbooks.com/ib-title/sexuality/ Meg-John and Justin podcast: https://megjohnandjustin.com/ https://www.rewriting-the-rules.com/self/zones-of-stuck-patterns/ https://www.rewriting-the-rules.com/self/plurality-and-trauma-2-practices/ Links to So Many Wings’ social media and website On the web: https://somanywings.org On Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/somanywingspodcast On Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/somanywingspodcast On Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/join/somanywingspodcast

Join us for an intimate and far reaching conversation with scholar, educator, and media producer Erica Hua Fletcher where we discuss contemporary mental health social movements, community health and healing, identity politics, and the rise of Mad Studies.  Topics we cover include: The limits of terms like “madness” and “mental health” The many useful lessons learned from researching The Icarus Project and other forms of peer support The multiple and complex gifts and traps of embracing identity politics  The growth of the Mad Studies field in the academy and beyond Critical psychiatry and how public mental health care can be radically transformed About Erica: Erica is a scholar, educator, and media producer based in Los Angeles, California (Tongva land). She currently serves as a co-president of the Anthropology and Mental Health Interest Group, in association with the American Anthropological Association's Society for Medical Anthropology; and this fall, she is starting a postdoctoral fellowship at UCLA, where she will be doing research on issues related to veterans recovery and resilience. Erica writes about contemporary mental health social movements, community health and healing, and carework; her scholarship and course offerings span the health humanities, social medicine, mad studies, and social work. She has taught at four public universities, most recently at the University of California at Irvine.  Find Erica online: On the web: https://ericahua.weebly.com/ On Social Media: Instagram @erica.hua  Links to relevant resources: To download Erica’s articles: https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Erica_Fletcher3 For more on the return of class consciousness among the Left: See Adolph Reed Jr.’s article “The Myth of Class Reductionism:” https://newrepublic.com/article/154996/myth-class-reductionism Mikkel Krause Frantzen’s article “A Future with No Future: Depression, the Left, and the Politics of Mental Health: https://lareviewofbooks.org/article/future-no-future-depression-left-politics-mental-health/ Recent article and reflections on the Mad Studies movement: Peter Beresford (2020) ‘Mad’, Mad studies and advancing inclusive resistance, Disability & Society, 35:8, 1337-1342, DOI: 10.1080/09687599.2019.1692168  To join Mad Studies Reading Groups (via Zoom), email Matthew Jackman at globalmadstudiescollective@gmail.com the (Australia-based) monthly reading group.   Visit https://www.pinkskythinking.com/mad-studies to register for upcoming reading group discussions (based in the UK). To connect with social researchers with lived experience, visit User/Survivor Research Network at https://usersurvivorresearch.weebly.com/ and sign up for the mailing list.  Links to So Many Wings’ social media and website On the web: https://somanywings.org On Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/somanywingspodcast On Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/somanywingspodcast On Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/join/somanywingspodcast

Join us for a wide ranging conversation with Dick Schwartz where we discuss everything from the origins of the Internal Family Systems (IFS) model to the role of Self-Leadership in contemporary social justice movements. Topics we discuss include: How it’s the nature of the mind to have multiple parts The role of legacy burdens in what gets called “mental illness” The visionary history of systemic family therapy The potential synergy of Open Dialogue and Internal Family Systems Why it’s much easier to train non-therapists in IFS The potential role of Self-Leadership in contemporary social justice movements  About Dick Schwartz: Richard Schwartz began his career as a family therapist and an academic at the University of Illinois at Chicago. There he discovered that family therapy alone did not achieve full symptom relief and in asking patients why, he learned that they were plagued by what they called “parts.” These patients became his teachers as they described how their parts formed networks of inner relationship that resembled the families he had been working with. He also found that as they focused on and, thereby, separated from their parts, they would shift into a state characterized by qualities like curiosity, calm, confidence and compassion. He called that inner essence the Self and was amazed to find it even in severely diagnosed and traumatized patients. From these explorations the Internal Family Systems (IFS) model was born in the early 1980s.  IFS is now evidence-based and has become a widely-used form of psychotherapy, particularly with trauma. It provides a non-pathologizing, optimistic, and empowering perspective and a practical and effective set of techniques for working with individuals, couples, families, and more recently, corporations and classrooms.  In 2013 Schwartz left the Chicago area and now lives in Brookline, MA where he is on the faculty of the Department of Psychiatry at Harvard Medical School. Find Dick online: On the web: https://ifs-institute.com/about-us IFS Institute:  On Social Media: https://www.facebook.com/InternalFamilySystems Links to relevant resources: What is Internal Family Systems?  https://ifs-institute.com/ Inside the Revolutionary Treatment That Could Change Psychotherapy Forever: https://elemental.medium.com/inside-the-revolutionary-treatment-that-could-change-psychotherapy-forever-8be035d54770 Depathologizing the Borderline Client by Richard Schwartz: https://www.psychotherapynetworker.org/magazine/article/179/depathologizing-the-borderline-client Links to So Many Wings’ social media and website On the web: https://somanywings.org On Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/somanywingspodcast On Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/somanywingspodcast On Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/join/somanywingspodcast

Join us for a conversation with Issa Ibrahim where we discuss how racism has affected his experiences of madness and institutionalization, and how radical creativity and underground community led to his escape. Topics we discuss include: Coming of age as a black man in Queens and being driven “crazy” by racism.  Smuggling internet into an asylum and connecting with the radical mental health movement. Structural competency and how mental institutions ignore racism. The joker in the White House, waiting for Superman, and limitations of the heroic narrative. The protest psychosis - how schizophrenia became a "black disease." About Issa: Issa Ibrahim is an artist, writer, musician and filmmaker born in 1965 in Jamaica, New York. He has been the Artist-In-Residence at Creedmoor Psychiatric Center’s Living Museum since 1992. Issa is also the author of the 2016 memoir THe Hospital Always Wins, published by Chicago Review Press. Issa’s artist statement: “My interest in the politics of race, mental illness, and popular culture informs my range of subject matter. I am telling a parallel narrative. My life as a psych patient, a flawed Superman, learning to navigate the many identities I had to assume in the system in order to survive various barriers to freedom, in addition to exposing the Everyman in the world at large. We are living in a comic strip, with plenty of super villains and heroes, love stories, cliffhangers, absurdist comedy and heartbreaking tragedy. With equal parts whimsy and warning, I use familiar icons in historical settings as reflections and metaphors for our own bankrupt culture.” Find Issa online: On the web: Http://issaibrahim.com On instagram: @issaibrahim065 On YouTube: Http://YouTube.com/c/issaibrahim Links to relevant resources: How Schizophrenia Became a Black Disease: An Interview With Jonathan Metzl: https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/side-effects/201005/how-schizophrenia-became-black-disease-interview-jonathan-metzl The History of the Mad Movement & Alternatives to Biomedical Approaches: https://idha.teachable.com/p/the-history-of-the-mad-movement-alternatives-to-biomedical-approaches Mad Love documentary featuring Issa: https://www.youtube.com/watch?list=PLG3aG8SJ2tPvVoAO-6JEufAKQnYjVY_1P&v=HqDMRl2zqbo&feature=emb_logo   Links to So Many Wings’ social media and website On the web: https://somanywings.org On Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/somanywingspodcast On Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/somanywingspodcast On Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/join/somanywingspodcast

Join us for a conversation with Laura Mae Northrup where we discuss her podcast Inside Eyes and the therapeutic use of psychedelics and entheogens in healing sexual trauma.  Topics we discuss include: Entheogens as a “a spiritual remedy for the spiritual wound” of sexual trauma. Understanding sexual violence within a political context. The racist basis of psychedelic exceptionalism and arguments for decriminalization. The therapeutic use of entheogens/psychedelics with folks who experience altered states without the use of medicines. About Laura Mae Northrup: Laura Mae Northrup is the creator and host of the podcast Inside Eyes, a series that explores the use of entheogens and psychedelics to heal sexual trauma.  She is a practicing psychotherapist and educator. Her work focuses on defining sexual violence through a spiritual and politicized lens and supporting the spiritual integrity of our collective humanity.  She is a champion of living more fully engaged and responsible lives through the healing use of entheogens and psychedelics.  She lives and works in Oakland, CA. Find Laura online: Laura’s website: https://www.lauramaenorthrup.com/ Instagram: @lauramaenorthrup    Twitter: @inside__eyes   Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/LauraMaeNorthrup Links to relevant resources: Kitty Sipple - Breaking Convention lecture: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t_BXpv1CSow To learn more about decriminalization:  Drug policy alliance: www.drugpolicy.org Students for Sensible Drug Policy: https://ssdp.org/ Decriminalize nature: https://decriminalizenature.org/ Links to So Many Wings’ social media and website On the web: https://somanywings.org On Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/somanywingspodcast On Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/somanywingspodcast On Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/join/somanywingspodcast  

Join us for a powerful conversation with bilingual art therapist Isabel Ribe on her work inside and outside of US detention centers, her poetry and painting, and frontline community organizing to build a more just world. Content warning: There’s a beautiful and powerful poem at the end of this podcast that has descriptions of gender based violence. In this episode we discuss: Trauma therapy for immigrants, refugees and asylum seekers The critical importance of bilingual counselors and therapists The trials of navigating grad school and legitimacy in the system The importance of recognizing art and creative healing in communities of color Santa Fe Dreamers Project Working as a counselor for trans folks held in detention centers Relationship with the land and painting and poetry as practices of resistance About Isabel: Isabel Ribe is a Bilingual Counselor and Art Therapist providing trauma therapy and case management for immigrants, refugees and asylum seekers throughout New Mexico as well as remotely in detention centers around the country. Isabel did her clinical training at Solace Crisis Treatment Center, Esperanza Shelter and with Gerard’s House’s Nuestra Jornada Program. She also served for many years as a case manager and family advocate with the Santa Fe Public School’s Adelante Program. She is passionate about providing culturally competent, Spanish language mental health services to the immigrant community. Isabel is also a poet and artist and member of Santa Fe’s Alas de Agua Art Collective, and enjoys life on her farmstead in Pojoaque with her husband and four legged family.  Find Isabel online: On Instagram @ceryndipitous Links to relevant resources: Alas de Agua Art Collective:  https://alasdeagua.com/ Santa Fe Dreamer’s Project:   http://www.santafedreamersproject.org/ Adelante: https://www.sfps.info/teaching___learning/student_wellness/s_f_p_s_adelante_program Links to So Many Wings’ social media and website On the web: https://somanywings.org On Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/somanywingspodcast On Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/somanywingspodcast On Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/join/somanywingspodcast