Teaching
“IT’S AN INCREDIBLE GIFT TO CRAFT AN ENVIRONMENT WHERE PEOPLE CAN HEAL THEMSELVES.”
As a teacher, I am to balance empathetic facilitation with structure. I create a safe container through clear and honest communication, providing step by step tools that are accessible and empowering.
I have led Expressive Arts workshops, Performance Art intensives, therapeutic support groups, movement-based practices, writing workshops, peer-to-peer counseling courses, and parent support groups. I am passionate about the transformation of creativity.
Survivor Creative Writing Group with Rythea Lee
January 5- February 2nd
5 Sunday Nights from 6-8 EST on Zoom
This creative writing Zoom group is for survivors of childhood sexual abuse. I offer this in a world where our voices are often disbelieved, suppressed, dismissed, and ignored. Here, your voice, feelings, and stories are encouraged to spill onto the page- in the company of others who are holding a sacred, creative space. I will support you to find your writing voice, and channel your pain and victories into art-making. Writing can be transformational when we are giving permission to say the ugly thing, to not hold back, to speak the unspeakable, to take credit, and to feel our unbroken spirits at the core of it all.
I have been a trauma therapist working with survivors for 28 years. I am also an artist who has found empowerment and deep healing by using creativity to heal my trauma. I am so excited to be together, to spread our wings in the presence of our collective courage. There will be guidelines and confidentiaty in place, and clarity of facilitation in keeping clear time structures, sharing our work, and giving feedback.
Click this link to fill out application
Price:
$350 for 5 evenings ($50 a class)
Payment plans are possible, see application.
*There are two BIPOC Reparations Scholarship spots available, please let me know you are applying for that on the application.
My BIPOC Scholarship is a way for me to acknowledge the structures of privilege that undermine the wellness and healing of Black people, Indigenous people, and people of colour.
NON-COERCIVE, COLLABORATIVE PARENTING SUPPORT GROUP With rythea lee
This virtual support group just ended.
Please get on Rythea’s email list to keep informed about next support group!
This is an eight-week support group for parents who are firmly on the path of non-authoritarian, collaborative parenting. It's ok if you are in deep struggle with this path! We just ask that you already have a grip on the basics and have been at this for a period of time.
This group will offer specific practices and information on this philosophy, and give parents a chance to explore their own blocks, confusion, excitement, wins, and stuck places. There will be time to self-reflect through journal writing, sharing, and hearing others who are engaged deeply with their children on this parenting path.
We will also introduce a form called Peer Counseling, where parents learn to be supports for each other, listen, tune into their feelings, and work on the triggers that cause suffering. This is a chance to meet other like-minded people, to come out of isolation, and to dive deeper into your inner healing world.
About Rythea:
I have been an all-in non-coercive, conscious parent for 7 years. I have been a trauma therapist for 28 years! My daughter is 12 years old and has been on the journey with me and my partner in developing collaborative, mutually respectful, play-based ways of relating and being close. It has felt scary, unknown, and often lonely to treat my child as an equal, to see her as someone whose opinions, desires, and needs are equal to mine, to empower her voice, her knowing, and her choices. BUT the joy, love, and closeness I have with my daughter is unmistakable. My partner and I have been able to help her work through divorce trauma while staying connected to her family, her creativity, her friends, her feelings(!), and her wonderful essential self. Parenting has only gotten better, more fun, and easier through this collaborative, relationship-focused approach. And it has been transformative for our family.
How we will support you:
This support group will give attention to your stuck places, deep questions, problems, feelings, and the isolation that comes with trying to change your mindset as a parent. We will also celebrate your wins, your courage, and the amazing fact that you are willing to grow. Also, and this is HUGE: we are excited to connect you with other parents who are on this healing path and trying to be closer with their children in a new way! This support group is designed to create a community that can support and encourage each other through time!
I am committed to providing equity in relation to my services and the needs of parents whose identities or financial reality puts them in a marginalized systemic situation. This is why I have set up options for BIPOC parents and low income parents who otherwise could not take this course. See options on registration form.
Click here to explore resources for non-coercive, collaborative parenting.
Cancellation and Refund Policy: Once you pay your deposit, there are no refunds, although you can put your payment towards the next group we offer of this kind if you give us 2 weeks notice. This does not apply to missed classes during the course you pay for. Missed classes will not be refunded and cannot be made up. I do record the sessions and send out recordings of each group.
Testimonials from participants of recent support groups with Rythea:
“Connecting with other parents helps me "keep the faith" that our children matter and love is real! We can love our children unconditionally and be great parents. We can mess up, apologize, repair, and keep trying! Our children are amazing.”
“Parenting in America is such an isolating experience, even among friend groups it feels like you can’t say (or have to say) certain things. Just curating a space where we can share and hold each other was healing and helpful.”
“Finding Rythea has literally been life changing! I am so thankful I was able to be a part of this group and took so much away.”
“So glad I did this group! The take-aways are hard to explain, but my soul has been fed by it.”
“Rythea did a wonderful job balancing compassion and empathy for parents in the group, while also holding us accountable for our behavior as parents. Rythea holds the space with so much curiosity and enthusiasm, it is easy to bring more openness and joy to this intense work!”
"Having this support has been huge for me. Non-coercive, collaborative parenting is working to bring me into flow and into the most special closeness with my two kids. Nothing is more important or more enriching in life, and Rythea is such a warm, open, funny, relatable and wonderful guide. Her philosophy is total and it has helped my little family be its best. I am eternally grateful!"
"I am so grateful for this support with non-coercive parenting . It was so helpful to learn that so many other parents are struggling with the same things. Coming together once a week was a beautiful ritual to create for ourselves and our children. I am very grateful. It is hard for me to show up, I am glad I did!" 💚💚💚
"Parenting is isolating. Parenting is Lonely. It's a minefield of triggers and dark holes. This group simultaneously allows that to be ok and disproves it. Thank you Rythea for creating a safe place for parents to struggle."
"This group was worth the time. you remember that it's ok to not be perfect and you gain the strength to shift your mindset."
"Rythea Lee and the non-coercive parenting support group was a wonderful experience. I learned that many of us feel the same pang in our hearts when hearing traditional parenting advice, and she has provided a safe place to talk about those issues generally, and to be able to get into specific situations. Other parents sharing vulnerably, what they were going through on their journey, helped me feel less alone in this immensely rewarding, but society-defying road to long-term connection with our children. What a gift."
“A+ for Rythea (and assistant Maggie) you're both wonderful. I really appreciate how you can make space for literally anything that comes up. You really hear people and don't try to manage them. You validate their experience on a human/universal level, and then respond with actual guts and have some sort of a relatable answer and way of weaving in a story that demonstrates practical steps (always in a humorous or disarming way). You really know your shit, and you're not afraid to call out what you see but you do it with such acceptance and compassion of the person. Thank you!”
“Parenting is one of the most isolating parts of life. Being able to go on a journey with other parents trying to love our kids better is really a bright spot in a sometimes dark and lonely world.”
“I am so happy to see my kiddo want to spend time with me as we've gotten to know each other. Knowing she trusts that I will take care of her emotionally and physically is terrifying and I'm so happy that's where we are.”
“This parent support group has been so wonderful. In just six weeks I have seen so much change in myself and my relationship with my children. I highly recommend.”
“Rythea is amazing. This group switches gears from behavior modification to acknowledging the triggers and trauma we are projecting at our kids. In doing this it has created such connection and transparency with our kids; really allowing us to see them for who they are and what they need.”
“I can't think of any advice, any blurb or pump up poster that helped me get my parenting in line with where I wanted it to be before this. I will never be perfect but I will never be the way I used to be either. I would recommend this to anyone.”
“Rythea is an enthusiastic and perceptive guide to no-coercive conscious parenting. You learn just as much about yourself as your child and you meet a group of supportive parents who are going through diverse but relatable experiences. A real community. If you are interested in no-coercive, conscious parenting - i.e. tired of the same old toxic results from authoritarian parenting which seems to put more and more distance between you and your child - this is a great starting point! Thank you Rythea!”
“Having a group of other parents to learn and grow with as I work to improve my relationship with my child has been incredible. Rythea is warm, genuine, and a brilliant facilitator who created a safe space from the first session, with a diverse group coming from many different experiences as parents.”
“The structure was phenomenal - the grounding meditation, the freewriting, the peer counseling, and sharing with the group, the size of the group so that we could all feel like we got to talk with the whole group and also had these meaningful connections with individuals via the peer counseling. All really facilitated deftly with questions when folks needed to go deeper. I know some folks mentioned wishing it were longer but it was a super powerful use of 75 minutes.”