Theory of Healing
Though this is a self-guided platform, you are healing in community with other survivors. We invite you to be in community by saying yes to your own journey and bear witness to the journey of other survivors who are also navigating the site.
Physical separation does not limit our ability to be in community. We believe that empathy: the ability to understand and share the feelings of another is an act of compassion and the way we hold community.
About Survivor’s Sanctuary
Survivor’s Sanctuary is an invitation to choose healing. This fully self-guided platform invites survivors to browse and engage 36 different healing lessons at their own pace. Lessons are broken down into 3 distinct entry points to healing via the mind, body and an integration of mind and body. Healing lessons are offered in 5-minute, 15-minute, and 25+ minute engagements allowing you to work at your own pace. You can lean in to lessons that you are drawn to or try them all. Lessons can be saved for future use, repeated, and added to your list of healing action steps.
How we heal
The healing lessons offered through this platform are geared toward post-traumatic growth. Post-traumatic growth is defined as the positive psychological change that is experienced as a result of the struggle with highly challenging life circumstances” (Calhoun and Tedeschi, 1996). Through the three approaches, each lesson is intended to support survivors in educating them on the nature of what they are experiencing; building emotional regulation; increasing confidence; and redefining their personal narrative.
Post Traumatic Growth:
Post-traumatic growth is defined as the positive psychological gains one makes by intentionally grappling with challenging life circumstances. Post-traumatic growth looks like:
- The ability recognize that you have choice in how you heal, how you define your story
- The increased ability to care
- The ability to create on purpose
- The ability access and cultivate calm in one’s body
- The ability to make healthy and meaningful connections with others
Approaches
The lessons are broken into three distinct approaches
Based on best practices for resolving complex trauma. Whether or not you have a formal diagnosis, we believe that all survivors of sexual violence can benefit from targeted interventions in these three areas. No one vertical can bring about complete change, they are intended to be integrated. We invite you to consider these approaches as tools that you can integrate into your journey of healing.
The lessons found in the Mind, Body, and Integrative sections
Are designed to give survivors choice and agency in how they engage their healing. We understand that both choice and agency are just two of the things that are stripped from survivors, thus we seek to restore some of those qualities through the ‘me too.’ Survivor Healing Journey. Survivors are invited to browse and engage lessons at their own pace. You can lean in to lessons that you are drawn to, or try them all. Lessons are broken down into 5-minute, 15-minute, and 25+ minute engagements so that you can work at your own pace. You can lean in to lessons that you are drawn to or try them all. Lessons can be saved for future use, repeated, and added to your list of healing accomplishments.
Our theory of healing
What we believe
Me too. International believes that healing is an action word. It does not speak to a plateau point but rather an ongoing process grounding and reconnecting to one’s body, one’s sense of self power; one’s relationship to others and reconnecting with one’s past and future. Thus, healing is intentional, iterative, and intergenerational. Our theory of healing centers growth, post-trauma and the choice to heal.
Healing is a choice. That choice is activated when we say yes to ourselves. Healing is happening right now. The fact that you are here. You are with us. For survivors, healing is the way we give ourselves permission to begin anew. For some survivors, healing is already happening. You have chosen to take intentional steps to heal on purpose.
For others, the choice to heal has felt more elusive because the ‘what’ and ‘how’ of healing are unclear. Our healing starts with us but it does not end there. Survivors heal most effectively with others. When we prioritize our needs and our healing, we make space for us to show up and heal in community. Survivors survive with one another not alone.
Empathy is the vehicle that allows survivors to heal in community. Starting with empathy for oneself and one’s own story, empathy can then be offered to other survivors. The personal journey of healing is a gift to one’s self that takes courage and community. Empathy acts as a means of connecting us to the stories, feelings and experiences of fellow survivors.
Empathy is the tool that empowers and reminds survivors that they are not alone in this healing journey. It is the capacity to see ourselves in another. It is the invitation to share ourselves with someone who knows and understands our story. We survive with you, not separate from you.
We choose to heal in order to reclaim our power – individually and collectively – and as an act of resistance to state violence and patriarchy. The me too. International framework posits that courageous individuals make courageous communities. We apply that same understanding to healing – healed people build healed communities.
Healed communities are better positioned to resist and usher in the radical change necessary to end sexual violence. There is power in our individual healing and that power can be catalyzed to activate community healing. Whether or not you identify as a survivor, there is room for you here as someone who has been impacted by sexual violence.
Me too. International believes that healing is an action word. It does not speak to a plateau point but rather an ongoing process grounding and reconnecting to one’s body, one’s sense of self power; one’s relationship to others and reconnecting with one’s past and future. Thus, healing is intentional, iterative, and intergenerational. Our theory of healing centers growth, post-trauma and the choice to heal.
Healing is a choice. That choice is activated when we say yes to ourselves. Healing is happening right now. The fact that you are here. You are with us. For survivors, healing is the way we give ourselves permission to begin anew. For some survivors, healing is already happening. You have chosen to take intentional steps to heal on purpose.
For others, the choice to heal has felt more elusive because the ‘what’ and ‘how’ of healing are unclear. Our healing starts with us but it does not end there. Survivors heal most effectively with others. When we prioritize our needs and our healing, we make space for us to show up and heal in community. Survivors survive with one another not alone.
Empathy is the vehicle that allows survivors to heal in community. Starting with empathy for oneself and one’s own story, empathy can then be offered to other survivors. The personal journey of healing is a gift to one’s self that takes courage and community. Empathy acts as a means of connecting us to the stories, feelings and experiences of fellow survivors.
Empathy is the tool that empowers and reminds survivors that they are not alone in this healing journey. It is the capacity to see ourselves in another. It is the invitation to share ourselves with someone who knows and understands our story. We survive with you, not separate from you.
We choose to heal in order to reclaim our power – individually and collectively – and as an act of resistance to state violence and patriarchy. The me too. International framework posits that courageous individuals make courageous communities. We apply that same understanding to healing – healed people build healed communities.
Healed communities are better positioned to resist and usher in the radical change necessary to end sexual violence. There is power in our individual healing and that power can be catalyzed to activate community healing. Whether or not you identify as a survivor, there is room for you here as someone who has been impacted by sexual violence.
