With Ji-Youn Kim and Cicely Belle Blain
Anger is a powerful force, and an appropriate and necessary response to injustice, violence, and harm. But anger is often associated with overwhelm, a lack of control and violence.
We may recognize the importance of honouring anger, but the questions still linger… How do we process and leverage anger without it consuming us or without shutting down? How do we process anger in non-violent ways and mobilize it as a transformative power?
When we mostly see anger expression that is explosive and perpetuates harm, we are taught to fear anger. We are afraid of causing harm or being harmed. In response, we may also learn to suppress our anger, which then can manifest in other disruptive ways.
We often ask ourselves…
Why do I have so much shame around anger?
How do I express my anger without triggering others?
How do I witness someone’s anger without trying to fix them?
Why can’t I access my anger?
The answer? Practicing a more empowering and transformative relationship with anger in the pursuit of collective liberation.
Processing Rage, the course!
Processing Rage is an experiential and relational course centered around the practice of processing and directing anger in tactful and liberatory ways. Learning how to emote anger with intention and structure can be helpful in releasing that energy so that we can respond to situations from a more grounded and choiceful place.
Why this course is different
1. Anger as a tactful, embodied skill.
In Processing Rage, we approach anger processing as a skill (or rather, a series of skills) that can be learned and practiced. We take the time to not only understand the importance, socialization, and power dynamics of anger, but we also focus on how to process and leverage anger in a strategic manner, depending on the priorities of each context.
This involves skill-building around identifying the priorities of our anger in each context, emoting and expressing anger non-violently, and communicating our needs and boundaries in ways that maintain connection. This course will help you shift not only how you think about anger, but also how you experience anger in the felt sense, in your body, through somatic practice.
2. Anger rooted in liberatory love
Processing Rage is also rooted in the beliefs that anger is rooted in liberatory love for the collective, and so doing anger differently is a politicized, transformative justice practice. When we practice intentional and tactful anger, we can navigate conflict, boundaries, and rupture in more loving and less harmful and hurtful ways. To co-create non-violent, more liberatory worlds, we must embody non-violent, more liberatory ways of relating — with ourselves, our emotional experiences, and our communities.
Meet the facilitators
Processing Rage began as a collaboration between these two in 2019 to combine social justice and counselling psychology.
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(they/she)
Ji-Youn Kim 김지연 is a queer, currently non-disabled Corean femme, immigrant and settler, joy-seeker, liberatory dreamer, psych survivor, justice-oriented therapist-ish and ongoing creation of community.
They work in private/alternative practice in relationships with predominantly Sick & Disabled QTBIPOC client community members with the orientation of therapy-ish as a space to practice embodied liberatory practices. She also facilitates teachings around anti-carceral mental health care for fellow mental health practitioners through guest teaching, programs, and workshops.
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(they/them)
Cicely Belle Blain is a Black/mixed, queer femme from London, UK, now based in Vancouver. They are noted for founding Black Lives Matter Vancouver and subsequently being listed as one Vancouver's 50 most powerful people by Vancouver Magazine in 2018 and again in 2020, BC Business's 30 under 30 and one of Refinery29's Powerhouses.
Cicely Belle is the CEO of Bakau Consulting, the Editorial Director of Ripple of Change Magazine, and the author of Burning Sugar (Arsenal Pulp Press, 2020). Burning Sugar was shortlisted for the 2021 Pat Lowther Memorial Award, and longlisted for the Gerald Lampert Memorial Award. They also instruct Executive Leadership at Simon Fraser University and serve on the board of the Tegan and Sara Foundation.
THE CURRICULUM
THE CURRICULUM
MODULE 1
Emotions & Anger 101
Our different relationships with different emotions
The difference between emotions and feelings
What happens when you don’t feel & express yourself ie. emotionally constipated??
The purpose and importance of anger
The difference between anger and rage
MODULE 2
The Politics of Anger
The socialization process of anger
The history of hysteria and the pathologization of anger
Intersectional analysis of race, gender, and anger
Gender, sexuality, and the politics of desirability
Policing of rightful rage
MODULE 3
Practicing Personal Agency
Personal agency as transformative justice practice
3 guidelines that differentiate violent and non-violent anger
Violence in the context of power
Scripts for consensual and structured anger expression
Psychoeducation around emotional regulation including trauma response
MODULE 4
Non-Violent Emotional Expression
The difference between feeling and expression
The 3 ranges of emotional regulation
Emotional expression through the body
Examples of non-violent anger expression
Somatic practices for emotional expression and resourcing
MODULE 5
Healing-Centered Movements & Safe(r) Spaces
Constantly angry? Emotional boundaries and sustainable anger when everything is f*cked.
Anger through rupture and repair, as transformative justice practice
Somatic safety: feeling safe (enough) in an unsafe world
Cultivating moments of joy and ease as embodied liberatory practice
MODULE 6
Ancestral Healing & Culturally-Rooted Practice
Rage as anger that has aged and collectivized
Somatics and ancestral healing beyond Western counselling psychology
Intergenerational trauma to intergenerational rage to intergenerational mobilizing
How did our ancestors process and mobilize their rage?
We have two enrollment options
The Community Practice
A 6-week, experiential, cohort-based course composed of asynchronous content, live group calls, guided somatic exercises, and discussion with fellow participants.
This offering is designed for folks who experience cognition-based knowledges as insufficient and are looking for more interactive components, somatic tools, and relational learning to embody course materials.
The Independent Study
A self-paced course composed of the same 6 weeks of asynchronous content of pre-recorded videos, text materials, and further resources, but without the guided somatic exercises and interactive pieces.
This offering is designed for folks who want to explore different frameworks of understanding and processing anger at their own pace, without the commitment of live calls or a discussion forum.
What’s included
6 weeks of content
Both enrollment options cover the same asynchronous content organized into 6 modules in 6 weeks, which is composed of pre-recorded videos and text materials.
Lifetime access
Both enrollment options will receive lifetime access to the asynchronous content, including any updates that are made in the future!
Guided somatic exercises
The Community Practice includes guided somatic exercises, in both audio and written format, that help integrate each week’s learnings and reflections through/in the body, which cultivates somatic shifts in the felt sense.
4 live calls with facilitators
The Community Practice includes Zoom calls on weeks 1, 3, 5 and 6 to help debrief and practice some of the course content in community and will also serve as a space for Q&A. They will be recorded for those who aren’t able to attend live.
Community discussion space
The Community Practice participants will have access to an optional Slack channel to connect and share extra resources with one another. Everyone in CP and IS will share reflections on Jamboard.
Resources & readings
We will share psycho-ed materials created by Ji-Youn as well as curated resources on other approaches to politicized anger expression by other brilliant practitioners.
The Community Practice
Course starts April 1, 2024. All prices are in CAD.
$799 Upfront
Payment Plan: $270/mo for 3 months
The Independent Study
Course starts April 1, 2024. All prices are in CAD.
$349 Upfront
Payment Plan: $120/mo for 3 months
For payment plan, please email us at hello@processingrage.com.
Registration for both offerings ends March 24, 2024.
FAQs
Got questions that aren’t covered below? Email us at hello@processingrage.com.
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This course is for people who want to cultivate a different relationship with anger and recognize that anger is political in how it is socialized, experienced, perceived, and mobilized.
It is for folks who:
feel shame or fear around your own anger and find yourself suppressing it
feel overwhelmed by the immensity of your anger
feel triggered by others’ anger expression, even when it’s not harmful, and want to respond differently.
experience reactive anger expression creating rupture in relationships and want to learn how to mobilize it for connection and change
This course is for folks who don’t subscribe to individualized and pathologizing approaches to “anger management” or “anger control” and are curious about processing anger as a liberatory mobilizer.
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This course is not for folks who solely want to approach anger as individual and interpersonal, and not political or collective.
On the other hand, it may also be less helpful for folks who are already comfortable and familiar with their rage and anger expression.
This course is not therapy or a replacement for therapy and should not be treated as such.
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In short, no. This course is open to any and everyone who feels like it will be of value to them, since there are many aspects to the course, no matter where you’re at with your relationship with anger.
We do recommend that participants have a passion for and basic understandings of social justice values by way of formal education, community education, self-learning and/or lived experience.
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The asynchronous content is hosted on Thinkific, an e-learning platform. For the Community Practice Course, participants will be invited to join a private (and optional) Slack channel and attend live sessions via Zoom. We also make use of Google Jamboard.
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Forever! Or for as long as the internet is a thing.
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The live sessions for the Community Practice are on:
Week 1 - Sat. April 6, 2024, 10AM PT / 1PM ET
Week 3 - Sat. April 20, 2024, 10AM PM / 1 PM ET
Week 5 - Sat. May 4, 2024, 10AM PT / 1PM ET
Week 6 - Wed. May 8, 2024, 10:30 AM PT / 1:30PM ET
Each session is 1.5hrs long and they will be recorded for folks who can not attend live. However, since live sessions are one of the core relational components of the course, participants must attend 2 out of the 4 sessions live. Email us if you want to register for the Community Practice but attending live does not work for you.
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If the payment plan option is still a financial strain, we have six spots for scholarships for the Community Practice course (not.for the Independent Study). Priority goes to BIPOC and/or sick & disabled folks but all are welcome to apply.
Please fill out this Google form to apply. Applications close on March 15, 2024.
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Yes! A big part of Processing Rage is about how to navigate anger in strategic ways for change, much of which can be applied to workplaces and organizations. Ji-Youn has facilitated workshops on this topic for large non-profit organizations and Bakau’s very own Facilitation Certificate Program. You can also check out their chapter, Anger at Work: Processing Rage in Liberating Ways in Bakau’s e-book, What We've Learned: A Year Fighting White Supremacy in a Pandemic (2021).
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If you would like to pay by payment plan, indicate as so in the form when you click “Add to cart”. Then, check out using the code PAYMENTPLAN which will make the product "free."
You will receive the first and following invoices via Stripe to the email that you indicated in billing at checkout. Earlybird discount will be automatically applied if you check out during earlybird period.
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Yes! We highly encourage you to talk to your employer about covering the cost of this course as professional development. You can share this post as well as this letter to your employer. For registration, invoicing, and extra details, email us at hello@processingrage.com.
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Folks who register for the Community Practice Course can get a full refund until the end of Week 2. Folks who register for the Independent Study Course can get a full refund before the start date. Contact us for a refund.