Healing Circle Work explores journey of life

IT MAY be said that we all wear our life’s journey on our face, but for participants in the IWC’s Healing Circle Work program this is taken to a new level of personal empowerment.

Healing Circle Work, is embedded within ancient First Nation’s peoples’ cultures. But both Indigenous and non-Indigenous people who participate do experience transformation. It is delivered by the Aboriginal Community-Controlled Organisation IWC.

The latest Healing Circle sessions have just closed off, with the participants moving forward significantly, with positive outlooks for their future. As part of the journey, delivered in six group sessions, they each shared the pathways and choices they had previously made, and in one activity the participants painted that journey on each other’s faces.

“The Healing Circle members have been learning, ‘I am not a victim. I am not a survivor. I just Am. I am a Spiritual BEING, who possesses a Soul and lives in a physical body,” said IWC Director and Chaplain and ThetaHealing Practitioner, Cheri Yingaa Yavu-Kama-Harathunian, who is also an Aboriginal Elder.

“This single activity of painting their life journey was a turning point for members of the group. They were enabled to share their experiences with others, as they moved around in their community that day.”

Aunty Cheri said that in this most recent delivery of Healing Circle Work, two of the participants were now in paid employment and one is a volunteer. All have taken a life-changing personal journey and have learned keys that now empowers them to leave their past behind.

“The participants have attended a series of weekly sessions in which they explored their personal lives, and the many barriers that they discovered they had created and which seprived them of living a happy, healthy and proactive life.”

The Healing Circle Work is part of the IWC’s holistic model of whole-of-person care. It includes access to other medical, health, community and family programs and services.

Healing Circle Work has been embraced by the Bundaberg community, with the first sessions rolled out by IWC in 2015 to victims of the devastating 2010/11 and 2013 floods.

“At that time participants were still living with the trauma and this was holding them back. It was also deeply impacting upon their health and wellness and wellbeing. The Healing Circle Work was thankfully supported and funded by Bundaberg Regional Council. Both Indigenous and non-Indigenous people were committed to attend the sessions, and they themselves experienced transformation in different areas of their lives which impacted on their whole life for their highest good,” said Aunty Cheri.

IWC is now offering more sessions to the community.

“It is open to both men and women, and we can provide mixed or single-gender groups,” said Aunty Cheri.

For details, contact IWC on 1300 492 492 or email email hidden; JavaScript is required