Decolonising Therapy: Applying Theory to Practice

Decolonial and anti-oppressive theory is useless if we don't know what to do with it, if we're not clear where to start or what meaningful action looks like. As inaction perpetuates oppression and complicity, which harms us, our peers and our clients, finding tanglible ways of being different in the world becomes an urgent and worthwhile endeavour. Many of us navigate a profession that still expects us to be apolitical, risk-averse and to hide our values from those we support. This is coupled with a high degree of isolation and not having enough role models who take action around us and hold us compassionately accountable.

Our training session is situated within this context and was created from a need to share and work through the contradictions, complexities and emotional turmoil of doing this work in everyday practice (whether privately or in services). We welcome those who are willing to do things differently and to share that journey with others in a supportive community. This session for qualified and trainee counsellors and psychotherapists (including white allies) and will be delivered virtually via Zoom.

A summary of the content we will be covering is as follows:

• Understanding colonialism beyond the transatlantic slave trade
• Colonial behaviours in therapeutic practice and the effect they have on our clients and on ourselves
• Core competencies for anti-oppressive practice
• Group-based scenarios on allyship, solidarity and repair
• Examples of liberatory therapeutic interventions
• Black Psychotherapy's service perspective and the challenges we face as we work anti-oppressively (and what we're doing to overcome them!)

We welcome your questions, comments and rage in what we hope will be a useful and radical space. If you would like to inform us of any access needs you're welcome to reach out to us before the session.

With care,

Black Psychotherapy Team

Trainer - Kim Loliya

Kim is a trauma psychotherapist and Director of Black Psychotherapy, a mental health service providing decolonial, intersectional and anti-oppressive therapy to Black and racially minoritised communities, alongside justice and liberation-centred supervision, training and consultancy, to professionals across the health and social care sector. Black Psychotherapy operates clinics virtually and in community settings to end mental health stigma and address cultural barriers to seeking support. The team’s dedication to delivering excellent standards of care led to being nominated for Best Mental Health Service of The Year in 2024. Outside of Kim’s role within the service, they research, dream and write about Afrofuturism, ecologies of liberation and the use of speculative practices for collective resistance. Kim's recently released podcast, 'My Mother's Trauma', offers a politicised perspective on how to break the cycle of intergenerational and ancestral trauma within Global Majority cultures.