Embodied Boundaries and Consent for Touch - For You & Your Patient 

November 30 to December  01   - 14 hours

Touch is an instinctive, natural language that we can all speak and understand. It’s essential for stimulating our nervous system and promoting healthy physical development.

It is also critical for our mental and social development. We will explore and work with the beneficial effects of conscious touch and the resultant natural release of the feel good hormone oxytocin to bring you to a place of peace, empowerment, growth and self-connection.

As touch professionals we should be experts in negotiating boundaries and consent around touch. As human beings we have needs and desires in many areas. We are however, often "programmed" so that we are not able to own these needs and desires. Often being told that we don’t deserve or not even allowed them.

Many of us have learnt to disconnect from our needs and desires, getting to a place where we no longer know what what we truly want. As a result, we often develop unconscious strategies for getting these needs met and, as they are not conscious, they can be manipulations. This lack of clarity in understanding and owning what we really want can result in difficult dynamics in our relationships not only with others but also ourselves and the world around us.

When we are clear what our boundaries are we can start to move into conscious consent. This clarity allows for clean interactions between us and our patients and helps us communicate effectively with our colleagues, patients and peers.

We will start with the topics of voice and speaking your truth, and then we’ll go on to consider assertiveness. Power dynamics, personal space, culture, marginalization, intention, humor, and forgiveness in setting and maintaining boundaries. Finally we will consider how trauma can alter a person’s ability to hold clear boundaries, or give real consent, and we will learn some quick and effective tools to model and encourage embodied consent with our patients.

This course offers a foundational part of how we can uphold our professional capacity when working with touch. It is relevant to any health professionals who touch their patients or clients.

Email ailsakeppie@gmail.com for info or to register.