From Grief to Liberation: Healing Practices for Collective Resilience

In times of seemingly increased darkness, as we turn toward it—we can discover the power of our light. At times this can be considered a cliché, especially in yoga and meditation spaces. But I have found that directly addressing what lurks in the shadows or the ‘elephants in the room’ that people outright ignore unleashes healing that is necessary to meet the moment AND allows for the cultivation of resilience, discernment and community.

Creating Space for Black Men to Heal

When I began working with Kripalu in 2022 as an Activist in Residence and later a member of the Visionary program, they asked me what I wanted to work on with them. As an activist, I am naturally skeptical of anyone following through on anything I am interested in doing so I quipped, “You wanna help me? I want to help black men heal with your resources.” And to my surprise, Kripalu said yes.

This flippant response has spawned a program that is now almost three years old and has served the healing journeys of nearly 100 men of color ranging in age from 21 to 83 from all over the country. Not every participant that comes is on scholarship, but many participants never would have been able to experience this level of healing in their lives absent scholarships for programming, room and board. This healing has spurred deep repair in their families, communities, in their vocational lives and provided tips and techniques to grow peace and perspective to navigate the ebbs and flows of life.

Every time we come onto campus, we not only help one another heal, but our joy and dedication to collective liberation impacts others on campus. The Permission and Refuge program helps people find a level of healing and peace that impacts their lives, communities and spiritual well-being. And now as we partner with the Yoga Retreat for Women of Color, we continue to increase the healing of the collective by exposing communities of color to the amazing nutritional, spiritual, topographical and energetic blessings of Kripalu AND exposing the greater Kripalu ecosystem to the alchemical impact of joy and healing out loud in community.

Grief Is the Work We Haven’t Been Taught

In the Spring of 2025, I partnered with Kripalu to launch the “How We Heal” series as part of the Amplify the Voices of the Global Majority program. I wanted to share lessons learned from my experiences with acute recovery from a stroke and share deep wisdom to inform the collective of how we can influence our own healing journey. Through honest and heartfelt conversation, community care and deep practice we explored the range of healing—from individual concerns to collective responsibility; from centering pleasure to honoring grief. This experience planted the seed for deeper collaboration on a subject all of us are dealing with but very few of us feel equipped to manage—grief.

Over the past several months, myself, AmarAtma Singh Khalsa and Akilah Richards have been heartstorming about creating a combination virtual program/in-person experience that equips the collective to mend, tend and process grief in all of its forms—death, unexpected change, systems change and systems failure, job loss—among others. What has emerged is a framework rooted in authenticity, community care and reclamation of power through an honest engagement with an under appreciated, unavoidable part of the human experience.

Why Is This Work Important Now?

There is a phrase common to activist spaces that none of us are free until all of us are free. And from my interpretation of spiritual practice (yogic and meditative), liberation from suffering and its root causes is the goal and the purpose. Creating conditions for more individuals and communities of color to find spiritual practice and deep healing blesses all of us.

For years we all have been conditioned to ‘get over it’—the deep loss and dislocation of the pandemic, the rapid decline of social norms rooted in civility, our deep personal loss being treated as a nuisance or inconvenience by ‘good vibes only’ milquetoast versions of spiritual practice.

Holding Joy and Sorrow at the Same Time

When we are honest about how we are feeling (with ourselves and one another) we unlock deep spiritual muscle memory on how to integrate the wisdom gained from adversity to build perspective, compassion, community and ultimately, deep healing and liberation. Cultivating the capacity to hold the joys AND the sorrows yields the gift of equanimity—the ability to experience life as it is with deep peace and presence.

The wisdom of spiritual tradition, especially around the darker parts of our experience, is that dark times are not the end of the story, but the beginning. The beginning of deeper inquiry and introspection—a gentle interrogation of circumstance to shift perspective and yield a path toward transformation.

It is an honor and blessing to be at the cutting edge of helping people confront the shadow work we must do as a society and/or individually to experience enduring peace and mutual thriving. People will respond powerfully to something that is authentic and speaks to their deep needs. Being raw and honest connects to the heart, getting us out of our heads and making an impact to broader communities than polished, perfect and sanitized spiritual practice.

Practice with Reggie at Kripalu

On Campus

Tending and Mending

A spring retreat on being with grief

March 20–22, 2026