🌿FRAMEWORK🌿

In-Person Retreat: 40 hours (5 days @ ~8 hours/day)

FRAMEWORK OF LIVING GRIEF™

These are not steps but interwoven pathways that can be entered from any point.

• The Field of Grief – Spacious Presence – Cultivating a grounded, expansive awareness that can hold grief without collapsing into it or bypassing it. Rooted in nondual and contemplative traditions.
• The Ground of Grief – Somatic Literacy – Reading the body’s signals and restoring connection to its wisdom through Felt Sense Dynamics™ and an understanding of Bodiedism™.
• The Currents of Grief – Inner Multiplicity– A somatic, parts-based approach to inner multiplicity in grief, integrating compassion, narrative flexibility, and archetypal inquiry.
• The Hearth of Grief – Relational Ecology – Understanding grief as a web of interpersonal, ancestral, and ecological relationships, and tending it through community ritual. Explores grief’s interpersonal, ancestral, and ecological entanglements, drawing on systems thinking, ancestral wisdom, and collective ritual. This includes grief as assemblage, drawing from the work of Andrew McCleaf, which views grief as entangled across time, matter, memory, and meaning.

TARGET AUDIENCE

Therapists, coaches, somatic practitioners, spiritual directors, hospice workers, community healers, educators, and others supporting loss and transition.
Scope: This is a non-clinical program; participants practice within their existing scope.

🌿LEARNING OBJECTIVES🌿

By the end of the training, participants will be able to:

• Differentiate grief from trauma in somatic, cultural, and neurological terms.
• Apply trauma-aware, culturally responsive approaches to grief support.
• Use Felt Sense Dynamics™ to map and track grief’s physical presence.
• Integrate Bodiedism™ into understanding how cultural body biases impact grief expression.
• Facilitate Inner Council Sanctum™ sessions for grief integration.
• Guide collective, ancestral, and ecological grief rituals.
• Maintain ethical boundaries, energetic hygiene, and personal sustainability.

🌿PROGRAM🌿

DAY 1 – THE FIELD OF GRIEF: SPACIOUS PRESENCE

When the Sacred Feels Absent

We arrive in the shared field, grounding ourselves in safety and consent.

THEME

• Establishing the capacity to witness grief.

TOPICS

• Learning to rest in the Field: developing an inner seat of witnessing presence.
• A cultural exploration of nondual practices across wisdom traditions
• Deep dive into the Grief–Trauma distinction and the cultural costs of pathologizing sorrow.
• Humanizing grief: types, models, and myths in grief
• Mapping the many forms of grief—acute, ambiguous, disenfranchised, cumulative, collective.

PRACTICES

• Guided “Rest in the Field” meditation.
• Cross-cultural grief story circle.
• Creative integration through journaling, image-making, or movement.

DAY 2 – THE GROUND OF GRIEF: SOMATIC LITERACY

When Emotions Are Forbidden

We inhabit the body as the primary site where grief lives, speaks, and transforms.

THEME

• Attuning to and responding to the body’s language in grief.

TOPICS

• Nervous system regulation in grief facilitation.
• Felt Sense Dynamics™: a grief-centered framework for somatic mapping.
• Introduction to Bodiedism™: exploring how cultural bias toward appearance over embodied wisdom shapes grief expression and suppression
• Trauma-informed pacing and sensory safety.

PRACTICES

• Partner body-mapping exercise.
• Breath, movement, and grounding rituals.
• Adapting somatic work for different abilities and neurotypes.

DAY 3 – THE CURRENTS OF GRIEF: INNER COUNCIL SANCTUM™

When Self-Attack Dominates

We acknowledge the inner multiplicity of grief—the different voices, needs, and identities that surface in loss.

THEME

• Welcoming inner multiplicity in grief

TOPICS

• Mapping “grief selves” and inner constellations.

• Dialogue-based practices for coherence and compassion between inner parts.
• Narrative flexibility: allowing stories of loss to evolve without forcing resolution.
• Adaptations for different developmental stages and communication styles.

PRACTICES

• Inner Council Sanctum™ role-play.
• Small-group “council meetings” for parts dialogue.
• Creative writing and narrative expression.

DAY 4 – THE HEARTH OF GRIEF: RELATIONAL ECOLOGY

When the World Feels Hostile

We widen the frame to include the webs of relationship—human and more-than-human—that shape grief.

THEME

• Tending grief as relational, ancestral, and ecological.

TOPICS

• Grief as assemblage: exploring how relationships, environments, and history interweave in mourning.
• Mapping relational, ancestral, and ecological grief.
• Collective grief rituals across cultures.
• Addressing systemic oppression and inequities in grief spaces.

PRACTICES

• Constellation mapping of personal and collective losses.
• Group altar-building and storytelling, and shared mourning practices.
• Designing inclusive community and ancestral grief rituals.

DAY 5 – INTEGRATION & PRACTITIONER EMBODIMENT
When We Doubt Our Capacity

We weave the threads of the week into an ethical, sustainable practice.

THEME

• Integrating the week’s teachings into embodied, ethical grief practice.

TOPICS

• Cultural humility and scope of practice.
• Practitioner self-attunement, boundaries, and energetic hygiene.
• Adapting the Living Grief™ model for individual, group, and community contexts.

PRACTICES

• Student-designed grief ritual or case presentation.
• Final group integration council.
• Certification ceremony.

GUIDING PRINCIPLES

• Non-linear & Emergent – The schedule serves the group’s unfolding process.
• Safety & Consent – All practices are invitational; participants honor their own pace.
• Inclusivity – Every body, identity, neurotype, and cultural expression of grief is welcome.
• Whole-Person Approach – Practical, economic, and social realities are addressed alongside spiritual, somatic, and relational dimensions.
• Plain-Language Accessibility – All frameworks include clear, non-jargon translations for diverse cultural and professional contexts.

🌿DELIVERY FORMAT🌿

• Location: Retreat settings in California, Southeast Asia, or approved venues.
• Format: 5 consecutive days, ~8 hours/day (with optional morning grounding practices not counted toward hours).
• Methodology: Talks, discussions, experiential practice, creative integration, ritual, and group work.

       🌿PROGRAM DEVELOPER🌿

 Naomi Sanderovsky, Ph. D.

Professor of Death & Dying | Certified Grief Educator | Trauma-Informed Coach
Ph.D. in Philosophy & Religion | Nondual Integration Specialist | Somatic Facilitator
Founder of Luma Via Retreats & Certification Programs | 20+ years in grief education, intercultural studies, and embodied healing practices

🌿ACCOMMODATION🌿

Shared Room / Treedome / Shared Tiny Home – $2,499
• Shared bunk room (2 people)
• Private treedome or shared tiny home (private rooms)
• All vegan meals, full training + certification

Private Room – $2,999
• Private indoor room
• All vegan meals, full training + certification