Sometimes, I have the honor of sitting down with groups of leaders and facilitators who are ready to deepen their practice—not only by learning tools, but also by staying with the discomfort of not having them or knowing when to use them. We gather to process the discomfort of not-enough, and open into the mystery of burning inward and sometimes burning out too.
This was one of those moments.
1. Context: Why We Gathered
The group arrived with a willingness to lean into hard questions—about emotionally-fluent leadership, about staying present when things feel off, and about what to do when someone shares something that lands with weight or confusion.
We weren’t looking for perfect answers.
We were practicing how to stay when things get messy.
How to listen with our bodies.
How to name what’s hard without collapsing or controlling it.
And maybe most importantly, how to keep returning to each other—and to ourselves—even when it would be easier to retreat.
Over the years, I’ve sat with many groups like this—each with its own rhythm and resistance, its own breakthroughs and blind spots. But this one held something rare: a collective willingness to lean in without rushing, to feel without flinching, and to name truth without needing to be right. That’s not common. And it’s not accidental. It comes from practice. And from the courage to sit in the fire long enough to see what’s underneath the smoke.
2. How We Entered: Questions That Opened the Fire
We didn’t start with a lot of structure.
We started with questions—because questions open the nervous system differently than instructions do. They create space instead of filling it.
Here are some of the questions we sat with:
- Have you ever heard someone say something in a group that stopped you cold—but you didn’t know how to respond?
- Have you ever felt like someone was naming harm—but they didn’t think it was harm?
- What do you do when someone shares a story that makes your stomach tighten, but they’re looking for affirmation, not reflection?
- Have you ever had to choose between protecting the room and protecting someone who wasn’t even there?
- When is awkwardness a sign to step away—and when is it a sign to stay, shift, and speak from your body?
These weren’t hypotheticals. They were deeply lived moments.
And we didn’t answer them all.
We let them work on us.
3. What Emerged: Key Themes & Lessons
A. Pain vs. Suffering: Consciousness Makes the Difference
Pain that is met with presence becomes growth. Pain that is met with disconnection becomes suffering.
We talked about how most of us weren’t taught to stay with pain. We were taught to wrap it in stories, rush to solutions, or explain it away. But in this space, we practiced noticing pain—not analyzing it. Naming what it does in the body. Noticing what it asks of us.
B. Shadow Work Means Naming the Frozen Places
I shared a story from my own childhood to explain shadow work. A moment when I was blamed for something I didn’t do, and I knew no one would believe me. So I disappeared—hid in the cold, coatless, not to rebel but because I couldn’t bear being blamed again.
That moment froze something inside me. And for years, I didn’t revisit it.
But through reenactment work and emotional practice, I returned to that scene—not to rehash it, but to reclaim the part of me that disappeared there. The part that knew something was wrong but didn’t have the words or the permission to speak it.
That’s what shadow work is. Not exposing wounds to the light for performance.
But meeting the parts of ourselves we left behind—and inviting them back into belonging.
C. The Power of Three
Three people is where a group begins. Three departures is where it begins to close.
Not a hard rule, but a rhythm. When three are present in a circle, a group “creature” can form—one with intelligence, presence, and relational capacity. When three leave, the container starts to dissolve.
That pattern matters—not for control, but for care. Knowing when to begin, and when to end, is part of leadership.
D. Power and Privilege Shape Emotional Safety
We also had critical conversations about identity and power.
We named that emotions are not interpreted equally in group spaces.
Anger is racialized. Sadness is gendered. Tears are policed differently based on body, tone, and avatar.
Expressing emotion is not a neutral act—it is read through systems of privilege.
One participant talked about being told by their parent that crying was weakness, and that if they showed emotion, they’d be dismissed or mocked. Others spoke to the rage they carry, but rarely express, because of how often that rage is misread or punished.
We wondered if facilitators and community leaders don’t name those dynamics, we reinforce them. We can’t talk about emotional fluency without talking about justice.
E. Awkwardness Is a Tool, Not a Failure
We considered that awkwardness might not be a sign of failure—but instead a medium for change.
We slowed our cadence. We interrupted stories with body sounds: Hmm. Huh. Wow.
We felt the difference of pausing when something hard has been shared instead of smoothing it all away.
We noticed what shifted when we let awkwardness signal something important was happening.
Awkwardness is often the first sign that something sacred is trying to make itself known.
4. Closing: Returning to the Body
As we closed, we practiced somatic awareness—because embodiment keeps us from collapsing into language or theory. It reminds us that we’re not just minds thinking about feelings. We are bodies that carry them.
So we paused and asked:
- What am I feeling in my belly?
- In my throat?
- Are my feet warm or cold?
- Am I leaning in or pulling away?
People named tightness, heaviness, fogginess, openness, gratitude.
No one had to explain or justify.
Just noticing was enough.
Final Invitation: Let All Emotions Return
If anything stirred in you while reading this, here’s a practice to try:
Place one hand on your chest.
One on your belly.
Take a breath.
And say quietly:
“You are welcome here again.”
Say it to your grief.
Say it to your numbness.
Say it to the parts that were taught to go quiet.
This is not a call to emote loudly.
It’s an invitation to return—gently, honestly, slowly.
Because all emotions have a home in us.
And the ones we exile the most are often the ones carrying our power.
The Fire Itself
Sometimes a group doesn’t feel like a meeting.
It feels like a fire.
Not a bonfire roaring with declarations.
Not a wildfire destroying everything it touches.
But the kind of fire that invites you in with its heat.
The kind that says:
Stay.
That’s what this gathering embodied.
We opened not with structure, but with presence. We practiced deep listening where it was almost holy the way that truth shows up when we’re more interested in growing than moving away from what we fear.
Have you ever experienced a group like this? What’s one question you wish you could have asked if you had been there?
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