queer embodiment retreat
Okay, so you’ve come out.
Now, it’s time to come home.
Our culture talks about coming out as if it’s a singularly life-altering moment. It promises that you will speak your truth to the world and watch the world around you change. In an instant, the aches and hurt of your entire existence will melt away, and you will be healed in the arms of those who love you.
And for so many, this moment does alter the course of their lives.
But for so many more, stepping into the person you’ve always known yourself to be invites more questions than answers. In the years before this one glittering moment of humanness, you were silently learning about the way that the world sees you, sees your queerness, sees your body. About the roles that you must play in order to live.
You undoubtedly developed clever, creative ways to navigate the discrepancy between the queerness in your heart and the disapproval of the world around you. When you felt desire in your body, when you noticed sensation that didn’t align with what was “allowed,” you had an exit strategy.
When your body became a place that felt too honest, you knew how to leave.
You ascended into your mind. If you could control your thoughts and ignore the whispers of your body, you could be safe, right? If you could just think your way through all of this, those feelings would fade. You could assimilate. It would be okay.
But it wasn’t. The friction between your mind and your heart became so great that it created the sacred fire of your coming out. And in the years that followed your liberation, you may have found that your joy feels dimmed, your pleasure feels shameful, or difficulty noticing how your body is feeling until it’s screaming. But this is by design. The tools that helped you survive your childhood did not allow space for you to feel.
And because those tools were learned, they can be unlearned.
You can learn to come home to yourself.
You can learn to experience your body, your emotions.
You can learn step into the sacred presence of your body.
Want to do it together?
“Our bodies tell the stories that our minds sometimes don’t know how to use words for... and in doing so, our bodies are directing us toward healing.”
QUEER EMBODIMENT RETREAT is a one-day experience of yoga, meditation, self-inquiry and community building. In a small group of queer-identified folks, we will explore and rewrite the learned cultural and familial narratives around our bodies, practice responding to our bodies in new, embodied ways, and endeavor to allow ourselves to feel. This experience will be an in-person retreat in Dallas, TX.
This retreat is guided by Claire Howard (she/her), LMFT-Associate, RYT200. Claire is a yoga and meditation instructor with ten years of experience in guiding human beings home to themselves. Claire utilizes breathwork, meditation, and internal exploration to encourage students to seek their own wisdom. Claire’s experience as a mental health professional who specializes in working with the queer community (and a queer human being herself) empowers her to draw from evidenced-based teachings and methodologies to facilitate depth and healing. Claire believes in ritual & in scrolling Tiktok, in laying under the full moon and in watching reality tv, and in the life-altering power of a hot caramel latte.
For more information about the retreat’s specifics, click the link below!
how do i know that this retreat is right for me?
If you have personal questions about this retreat, I would love to speak with you via email!
This retreat might be a place of healing for you if…
You can talk yourself out of any feeling. Maybe you’ve been called an “intellectualizer,” a person who isn’t bothered by emotion & instead finds comfort rooting yourself in the logic of it all. Sometimes, this helps you feel protected from the big emotions that you have. Other times, it makes it really difficult to empathize with yourself & others.
You don’t even know that you’re feeling something big until it explodes. You’ll burst into tears on a random Wednesday evening as you realize that you’ve been feeling something for months. This might make you feel foreign to yourself or worried that there’s an entire world within you that you don’t have access to.
You long for connection - with queer community and with self. You want deeper, more meaningful friendships with folks who exist outside of heteronormative culture.
You grew up in a high-control, high-demand religion (or an area of the country that is dominated by one) which had a lot of ideas about what your body was & wasn’t supposed to feel. You notice that even though you’ve separated yourself from these belief systems, old ideas & self-judgments find their way of sneaking into your thoughts.
You find yourself stuck in your head. Sometimes this keeps you protected, but other times it prevents you from enjoying the sights, sounds, touch, taste, or feel of a moment.
You are ready to feel like you have control & power in your life rather than walking the path that life has handed to you.
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