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Fall 2026Leadership & Collective CareIn Session

Embodying Liberation

Developed by Ashira Darwish under siege and in exile, Ashira Active Meditation draws on Sufi whirling, somatic release, and Indigenous Palestinian practices to help you heal from personal and collective trauma, in community.

  • Live Online
  • 8 sessions · 90 min each
  • Starts October 14
Ashira Darwish

Course Overview

Embodying Liberation

Ashira Darwish developed Ashira Active Meditation while living under siege and in exile, drawing on Sufi whirling, somatic release, and Indigenous Palestinian practices to process what her body was carrying. In this 8-week live course, she teaches that practice to people living with ongoing trauma, whether it’s personal, inherited, or the kind that comes from watching collective harm unfold day after day.

Each session combines movement, grief ritual, and storytelling, so you’re learning with your body as much as your mind.

Over 8 weeks, you’ll:

  • Understand how continuous trauma shapes the nervous system

  • Work with the body as a place that holds both memory and the capacity to heal

  • Practice movement, grief rituals, and storytelling in community

  • Reclaim joy as a form of resistance

Questions we’ll sit with together:

  • How do we grieve and build resilience at the same time?

  • How can our bodies carry healing across generations?

  • What does it mean to be fully alive in times of collapse?

This course centers SWANA and global majority communities, and everything you learn is rooted in culture, grounded in the body, and built to sustain you long after the cohort ends.

Who Is This Course For?

  • Artists, activists, healers, and therapists
  • Anyone living through generational or political trauma, or supporting others who are
  • Members of colonized and marginalized communities, especially Black, Brown, SWANA, and diasporic - peoples

Anyone looking for embodied tools for personal and collective resilience

What You’ll Learn

  • Explore somatic tools rooted in ancestral and cultural practices
  • Create a personalized integration map for sustainable wellbeing
  • Critically examine and decolonize Western psychological frameworks
  • Embody Sumud — Palestinian steadfastness — as a physical and analytical practice of resistance

What’s Included

Live Sessions

Interactive classes with your instructor

Session Recordings

Lifetime access to all recordings

Community Access

Connect with fellow learners

Certificate

Proof of course completion

Course Modules

  1. 1
    The Body Keeps the Score

    Understanding how oppression lives in our bodies

  2. 2
    Somatic Practices for Release

    Tools for releasing stored tension and trauma

  3. 3
    Reconnecting with Body Wisdom

    Listening to what your body knows

  4. 4
    Embodied Freedom

    Living liberation in your daily life

Real-World Project

Learners will design a personal or community-based ritual (eg guided meditation, movement practice, storytelling circle, or grief ritual)

They will also prepare a personal case study + presentation documenting their healing journey throughout the course and how they’ve applied Ashira Active Meditation in service of their communities.

Session Schedule

  1. 01Wed, Oct 14 · 1:00 PM – 2:30 PM ET
  2. 02Wed, Oct 21 · 1:00 PM – 2:30 PM ET
  3. 03Wed, Oct 28 · 1:00 PM – 2:30 PM ET
  4. 04Wed, Nov 4 · 1:00 PM – 2:30 PM ET
  5. 05Wed, Nov 11 · 12:00 PM – 1:30 PM ET
  6. 06Wed, Nov 18 · 12:00 PM – 1:30 PM ET
  7. 07Wed, Nov 25 · 12:00 PM – 1:30 PM ET
  8. 08Wed, Dec 2 · 12:00 PM – 1:30 PM ET

About the Instructor

Ashira Darwish

Healer

Somatic practitioner and liberation educator guiding others to embody freedom and healing through body-centered practices. Ashira is a motivational speaker, investigative journalist, and the visionary creator of Ashira Active Meditation — a trauma integration modality rooted in embodied movement, ancestral wisdom, liberation psychology, and neuro-somatic healing. Her work is a lifeline for those navigating the impacts of war, displacement, and intergenerational trauma, particularly among Palestinian communities. Ashira’s journey into healing began after a life-altering injury in 2012 that left her paralyzed with a severed spinal cord. Defying every medical prognosis, she embarked on a personal and spiritual path of recovery that not only restored her mobility but led to the creation of a groundbreaking method for trauma transformation. Her approach blends active meditation, Sufi and Kundalini practices, sound healing, and trauma-informed movement into a dynamic, culturally rooted modality. Grounded in the principles of liberation psychology, Ashira’s work emphasizes healing as a collective, justice-centered process — reconnecting individuals not only to their bodies, but to their communities, histories, and power. Recognized for its effectiveness in treating ADHD, PTSD, and continuous trauma in both children and adults, her method transcends clinical frameworks by restoring dignity, embodiment, and spiritual sovereignty to survivors. Ashira’s pioneering research established a link between spinning movements and trauma therapy. Her studies revealed that spinning can safely activate the prefrontal cortex — a key area affected by trauma and neurodegeneration — offering a transformative tool for emotional regulation and nervous system restoration. She is a certified EFT therapist, trauma coach, and sound healer, and her healing philosophy is both deeply personal and globally relevant. In 2021, she was honored by the Indian Society for Applied Behavioural Science for her contributions to societal transformation. In 2023, she was named one of Palestine’s most inspirational women by Build Palestine. Beyond her healing practice, Ashira is known for her fearless journalism and advocacy. She has collaborated with organizations such as BBC, Internews, Amnesty International, and Human Rights Watch, bringing global attention to Palestinian voices, stories, and resilience.​ Through her initiative, Catharsis Holistic Healing, she has trained over 200 Arab-world practitioners and continues to offer free trauma support to communities in crisis — from Gaza to refugee camps, from classrooms to frontlines of resistance. Ashira’s life is a testament to what is possible when healing is embodied, liberation is holistic, and community is sacred. Her work weaves together science, spirit, and struggle — offering not just recovery, but reclamation.

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