*Access to the recoding from the 5/27 panel event*

An opportunity for folks with lived experience of psychosis, altered or extreme states, hearing voices, bipolar, etc. to share their experiences of navigating unshared reality experiences.

If you cannot access this training due to financial barriers, please e-mail support@projectlets.org for access.

Panelists:

Nadia Mbonde is a Mad Black mother, scholar, mental health doula, and multimedia artist in Brooklyn, New York. Nadia translates her lived experience through her doctoral research on racial disparities in perinatal mental health at NYU in the Department of Anthropology as well as through dance, film, photography, and digital art. Through her art, activism, and scholarship, Nadia ultimately seeks to integrate Mad liberation and reproductive justice for birthing people and their families to thrive.

Vesper Moore is an Indigenous political activist, leader, organizer, public speaker, and educator in the psychiatric survivor and disability rights movements. Vesper concentrates on building social movements and public knowledge to facilitate and sustain systems change. They have supported the development of mental health peer-run organizations in different parts of the world. Vesper has brought the perspectives of mad, labeled "mentally ill", neurodivergent, disabled people, and survivors to national and international spaces with their advocacy. Vesper works with both the United States government and the United Nations in shaping strategies around trauma, intersectionality, and disability rights. They have been at the forefront of legislative reform to shift the societal paradigm surrounding mental health.

Ryn Laurel is a queer, mad witch and herbalist living in so-called Cleveland, OH. They work within the realms of magic and mental health, seeking to create remedies and offerings to support emotional wellbeing and promote a spiritual connection with the natural world. As a recent graduate of the Wild Current Advanced Clinical Skills program, Ryn supports their clients with clinical and intuitive tools. Find Ryn at @laureltreehealingarts on IG to follow their healing journey.

Thabiso Mthimkhulu (who is known as Thokoza Ndlondlo) is an inyanga — traditional healer, diviner, and medicine maker — born and raised in Swaziland (who migrated to the US in 2020). He was raised in a family of healers who hold a great body of knowledge and wisdom of traditional Bantu herbal and ancestral medicine. Thokoza Ndlondlo experienced his calling illness, known as ukuthwasa, as a young child — seeing spirits, hearing voices, time traveling, having visions, and prophetizing about the future. His access to other realities and ancestral realms was affirmed within his cultural worldview, where his family and community recognized his calling as an inyanga— to continue practicing and carrying out this lineage of important healing medicine. Thabiso completed his multi-year initiation process in Barberton, South Africa.