• Skip to primary navigation
  • Skip to main content

Campaign for Southern EqualityCampaign for Southern Equality Logo

Every day that we live with injustice is one day too long

  • Our Work
    • Legal Equality Program
    • Community Health Program
    • Southern Equality Fund
    • Southern Equality Research & Policy Center
    • Southern Equality Studios
    • Healing and Resilience
    • Shop CSE
    • Volunteer
  • Emergency Help
    • Emergency Help
    • Report An Incident
  • Resources
    • Legal Resources
    • Trans in the South
    • Know Your Rights
    • Grassroots Resources
  • Covid-19 Funding
  • Donate
  • About
    • About CSE
    • Our Team
    • Board of Directors
    • Advisory Board
    • Financials
    • Jobs at CSE
    • Contact
  • Our Work
    • Legal Equality Program
    • Community Health Program
    • Southern Equality Fund
    • Southern Equality Research & Policy Center
    • Southern Equality Studios
    • Healing and Resilience
    • Shop CSE
    • Volunteer
  • Covid-19 Funding
    • Get Funding: COVID-19 Rapid Response Grant Program
    • Grassroots Webinars
  • Emergency Help
    • Emergency Help
    • Report An Incident
  • Resources
    • Trans in the South
    • Legal Resources
    • Know Your Rights
  • Take Action
  • News
  • Events
Donate

Healing and Resilience

Navigate This Page:

➡️ Introduction and Background
➡️ CSE’s Healing Work
➡️ Tips and Strategies
➡️ Indigenous Wisdom from the Mountains
➡️ Other Highlights

Undergirding every area of our work at the Campaign for Southern Equality is a recognition that pushing forward on lived and legal equality for LGBTQ Southerners has an impact on activists’ fundamental health and wellness. Through our Healing & Resilience program, we focus on equipping the CSE community – including staff, partners, and advocates – with the necessary tools to care for ourselves and one another, while doing the work to secure justice and equality for LGBTQ Southerners. 

Introduction & Background

While working to build a South where LGBTQ people are equal in every sphere of life, The Campaign for Southern Equality (CSE) is also including healing, wellness and resilience work as a part of that vision. CSE’s commitment to healing justice includes a multi-year plan that supports the socioemotional capacity of staff, partner organizations and community members. There are three prongs to this work:

Staff Support

Over the past three years CSE’s Director of Healing & Resilience, Holiday Simmons, has worked with the CSE staff to strengthen our internal team. This has included an in-depth practice of somatics, quarterly group somatic workshops, optional 1:1 coaching, resource sharing, and as-needed staff socioemotional support.

Activist, Advocate, and Practitioner Support

We have also deployed our Healing & Resilience work to provide wellness-focused aftercare spaces for advocates following public testimony on anti-LGBTQ bills, hosted virtual and online trainings, launched the Southern LGBTQI Practitioners Circle, and supported young leaders on the development of resilience-building strategies.

Healing and Resilience Apprentice

In 2021 we hosted the inaugural Healing & Resilience Apprentice, a collaboration between CSE, Southern Soul Wellness, and Gender Benders. The apprenticeship included 20 total hours of somatic instruction, facilitation of the Southern LGBTQI Practitioners Circle, and oversight of the distribution of $10,000 in Southern Equality Fund grants to Southern LGBTQ wellness practitioners.

Focus on CSE’s Healing & Resilience Work

In this blog post Holiday Simmons provides an introduction to Healing & Resilience work, charts an organizational road to wellness, and recaps the first year of work with the Campaign for Southern Equality team.

Learn More

Tips and Strategies for Healing and Resilience

Strategies for Getting Grounded and Staying Principled in Uncertain Times

In this webinar, hosted in March 2020 just as the COVID-19 pandemic began in the United States, Holiday Simmons shares tips and strategies for reducing panic and stagnation, and increasing compassion and community.

Learn More

Stretches and Cranial Massages for Stress Relief and Centering

In this webinar, hosted in April 2020, Holiday Simmons teaches introductory cranial massages that can be done on yourself or someone else, including children. These practices have been known to calm the nervous system, relieve tension and headaches, and support vitality.

Learn More

Indigenous Wisdom from the Mountains

In 2020 the Campaign for Southern Equality was honored to be in relationship with members of the Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians on the Qualla Boundary of Cherokee, North Carolina.

‘The Front Porch’ Webinar – Indigenous Wisdom from the Mountains

In the early days of the COVID-19 pandemic, Holiday Simmons moderated a panel featuring members of the Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians from the Qualla Boundary in Cherokee, North Carolina. The panelists shared their thoughts, experiences, and practices on social, emotional, and resource management during the pandemic. 

Learn More

Video Series from CSE Staff Visit to Cherokee, NC

In October 2020, staffers from the Campaign for Southern Equality traveled to the Qualla Boundary of Cherokee, North Carolina to meet with members of the Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians. Throughout a full day of programming, CSE staff members listened to powerful presentations from Indigenous people in Western North Carolina about what matters most to them. This video series captures snippets of what we learned.

Learn More

Other Highlights from the Program

‘What to the ____ is the 4th of July?’ Interview Series

In an homage to the epic and groundbreaking Frederick Douglass speech, “What To the Slave is the 4th of July,” CSE staffers interviewed community members for short conversational interviews with our supporters on the question of “What to the _______ Is the Fourth of July?” filling in the blank with, for example, “Black person,” or “Indigenous person,” or “lesbian,” or the “person with a disability,” etc.

Watch

Interviews with Black Lives Matter SEF Grant Recipients

In June 2020 CSE hosted a special #BlackLivesMatter grant round for Black LGBTQ Southerners doing righteous work in their communities, supported by a generous donation from East Fork Pottery. Grantees included groups that do birthwork and doula services, media arts and filmmaking for Black trans people, a GED program for trans people and sex workers, support groups, and rural drop-in centers. Our staff did a series of interviews with recipients.

Learn More

‘Queering Disability Justice’ Series

Sunday, July 26 marked the 30th anniversary of the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA), and July is also Disability Pride Month. At the Campaign for Southern Equality, we marked the important anniversary with a series of interviews with LGBTQ Southerners who also live with and are impacted by disability.

Learn More

Stay Informed

Sign up to receive news and updates from CSE.

  • This field is for validation purposes and should be left unchanged.

Quick Links

  • Trans in the South
  • Southern Equality Fund
  • Take Action
  • Shop CSE
  • About

Connect With Us!

Every day that we live with injustice is one day too long.

P.O. Box 364
Asheville, NC 28802

828.242.1559

© 2022 Campaign for Southern Equality. Site by Status Forward.