Healing, accountability, and safety, cultivated in community
In Search of Peace is a project of the In Search of Peace Fund, a community-based initiative supporting non-carceral responses to sexual harm and other relational violence in Central Virginia and beyond.
Rooted in restorative & transformative justice
I'm a community justice practitioner rooted in restorative, transformative, and other (re)emergent justice traditions. I am a survivor of childhood sexual abuse and of the criminal and civil legal system's response to that harm.
My practice is shaped by abolitionist and Black liberatory traditions that call us to imagine safety without punishment, and to remember that harm and healing live within our relational fields — the webs of connection we are each a part of. It is guided by a commitment to naming and shifting power dynamics, so healing can happen without reproducing domination.
I honor the deep influence of Indigenous circle practices and peacemaking traditions. I do not claim those lineages as my own; I learn from teachers who carry them and seek to practice with respect, credit, and consent.
I believe there is nothing that can be done to us — or that we can do to others — that should jeopardize our fundamental human needs for dignity, safety, and belonging.
Where this practice comes from
This work is learned in relationship — through training, apprenticeship, study, and years of practice. The threads below name the main ones.
Trained in and practicing the Hidden Water approach to restorative circles for those affected by childhood sexual abuse. Years of keeping circles in Central Virginia — and training new keepers so the work outgrows any one person.
Facilitation of restorative processes and community accountability, in study and practice with the movement lineages of generationFIVE, Creative Interventions, the Ahimsa Collective, and Community Justice Initiatives.
Circles of support and accountability — walking with people through accountability, reentry from incarceration, and the long work of rebuilding a life in community.
Somatic healing lineages that foreground embodied listening, including the Trager® Approach, and trauma-informed stabilization practices that attend to nervous systems, not just words.
Practices of decolonizing Nonviolent Communication — needs-based dialogue that stays honest about power.
Ongoing partnership and relationship-building across Central Virginia — with advocates, schools, faith communities, recovery spaces, and public agencies — toward communities that can prevent and respond to harm themselves.
How this work holds itself
Consent & Dignity
Participation is voluntary, and boundaries matter.
Confidentiality by Agreement
Explicit, mutual, and revisited as we go.
Pace & Safety
We move at the speed of trust.
Trauma-Aware & Embodied
Attending to nervous systems, not just words.
Non-Carceral Orientation
Outside punishment systems, oriented toward care.
Power Dynamics
Harm often reflects and amplifies differences in power. We name those dynamics openly and design processes that prevent domination, coercion, or silencing.
Relational Honesty
Truth without pressure to reconcile or forgive.
Relational Contexts
Harm happens in webs of relationship, so healing belongs there too.
Relational Healing
Grounded in the possibility of repair and dignity for all.
Rooted in Central Virginia
I live in Nelson County and practice throughout Central Virginia — traveling across the state and beyond when invited — and I support folks virtually around the world. Meeting online is often the first and safest place to start, and follow-ups can happen virtually or in person depending on wants and needs.
Offered by donation
You're invited to contribute if that feels possible, but no one is turned away for lack of funds. Accessibility includes material access — care should not depend on your income, housing stability, health, or capacity to work. If making a donation would create strain, please know that your participation is still fully welcome.
This practice is supported by the In Search of Peace Fund, which gathers community resources so that peer support and justice work can remain donation-based — rooted in solidarity, not scarcity — and accessible to all who seek it.