Grief Tending

Grief is not a problem to be solved or a wound to be hidden away—it is a living part of us that asks to be tended, much like a garden that needs regular care. When we neglect it, grief hardens in the body and spirit, cutting us off from vitality and connection. In many cultures, grief has always been a communal act, shared through ritual, song, movement, and witness. Yet in our modern world, we are often left to carry it alone, in silence. These monthly gatherings return grief to the village—creating a space where we can honor it together, in rhythm and in relationship, so that it can transform rather than stagnate. In this tending, we open the soil of our hearts, making room for what’s next to take root and grow.

Each month we will gather in a circle to tend grief through ritual, guided by the medicine of trauma-informed expressive arts, drama/trauma therapy, and the ancient practice of keening. While the container remains constant—safe, grounded, and rooted in care—the focus may shift each month, drawing on seasonal themes, archetypes, or shared collective experiences. In this uncertain time, when so much is ending and reshaping, we will practice acknowledging and honoring our personal and collective losses so that we can imagine, together, the next best thing. Through voice, movement, and shared presence, we create a living altar of remembrance and renewal—making space for what still longs to live in us and what is yet to be born.

📍Event Details

• Saturday, December 20, from 4 to 6 pm
• Saturday, January 17, from 4-6 pm
• Saturday, February 7, from 4-6 pm
• Thursday, March 5, from 5-7 pm

Join us for one or all.

$10 per circle. Limited space.

December

As the final new moon of the year arrives, December offers us a sacred pause—a time to look back at all we have carried, lost, and learned. In this grief-tending circle, we will lay the year to rest with intention, honoring both its gifts and its hardships. Guided by trauma-informed expressive arts, drama therapy, keening, and ritual, we will create space to acknowledge what has shaped us, release what no longer needs to come forward, and plant quiet seeds for the year ahead. Together, we will close this chapter in community, offering our grief to the dark stillness of winter, trusting that in this fertile ground, new life is already stirring. We will also make space for any grief or trauma—personal or collective—that may not fit this month’s theme, honoring the losses that arise in our lives and in the wider world.

Additional Details:

Registration required. Registration closes 24 hours prior to the event.

The registration fee is non-refundable unless the event is canceled by the facilitator.

Parking Information

Shakti in the Mountains Website

✨ Led by Janna Browning

Janna Browning, MA, PRDT is a seasoned Trauma-Informed Drama Therapist, Expressive Arts Practitioner, Director, and Facilitator with Healing the Wounds of History (HWH) and Co-Founder of Integrative StoryWorks (ISW). She received her BFA in Acting from Emerson College in Boston and her MA in Counseling Psychology with an emphasis in Drama Therapy from the California Institute of Integral Studies in San Francisco.

In California, she worked with Armand Volkas in Healing the Wounds of History, which uses expressive arts therapy to bring together groups who share a legacy of historical trauma. Her work with HWH includes groundbreaking projects uniting Armenians and Turks to address the shared legacy of the Armenian Genocide, as well as facilitating dialogue and healing around the historical traumas of Palestinians and Israelis, the conflict in Northern Ireland, and the deep racial wounds of the United States.

Janna has also worked with Community Performance International, a company specializing in community building across lines of difference, using the stories of a community in large-scale theatre performances. She helped develop Community Story Performances in towns across the South and created programming for schools. In 2011, she co-founded the StoryTown Program in Jonesborough, TN, which continues to this day.

As a grief practitioner, Janna brings her trauma-informed drama therapy expertise into the realm of community grief-tending—facilitating monthly grief rituals, keening circles, and embodied expressive arts processes to help individuals and communities honor loss, release what can no longer be carried, and make space for renewal. Her grief work draws from ancestral Celtic traditions, trauma-informed expressive arts, and ritual-based collective healing practices.

She is co-founder of Integrative StoryWorks, a company that uses personal stories to heal individual and collective wounds, as well as StoryWander Travel, which offers escorted, story-based small group travel experiences.