HYWF Collective | Black-Led Peer Support, Recovery & Liberation

Who We Are

Founded in 2017.
Built for the long haul.

Founded by myisha t. hill as Check Your Privilege — and now rooted as Heal Your Way Forward Collective — this community has always been dedicated to the deep, sustained work of healing ourselves from systems of oppression. We integrate neuroscience, mindful self-compassion, and healing justice to help white folx and bodies of culture build the nervous system capacity needed for accountable, long-term liberation work.

We understand that healing oppression is somatic, not just ideological. We reject urgency culture and performative activism. Instead, we trade urgency for momentum — using nervous system regulation, meditation, movement, and community care to break cycles of white fragility, saviorism, and burnout before they begin.

You can't mobilize for liberation from a dysregulated nervous system. This is where we begin.

Our Practice

Educating ourselves toward liberation — centering Black liberation as the pathway forward
Honoring our interconnected ancestors — naming the truth of the land we occupy and practicing land back
Centering the voices of bodies of culture — amplifying those most impacted by systems of harm
Dismantling oppression within ourselves — unlearning what we've been conditioned to believe
Building beloved community — through mindfulness and self-compassion
Using Direct Compassionate Communication — as the pathway to deepening authentic relationships
Creating bridges to healing — through art and movement as transformational practices

Become a Member — $22/mo

Our Programming

Two pathways.
One collective commitment.

HYWF Collective's programming centers the Collective membership and the Direct Compassionate Communication framework — two interconnected pathways for healing, practice, and liberation.

01Community

The HYWF Collective Membership

A hybrid community collectively guiding one another on a journey of individual and collective healing. Action-oriented and practice-based — our Guides provide daily prompts, group sharing, and accountability so you are actually implementing what you're learning.

Weekly Community Direct Compassionate Communication Classes
Monthly Liberation Sessions with myisha t. hill, Channdika Thayer, and other Guides
All-Community Book Club
Access to The Lounge — our private, intentional container for connection
Access to the Liberation Library
Hybrid events — in person and online
Weekly Substack dispatches: reflections, prompts, and calls to action
Bodies of Culture — a private space outside the white gaze for Black, Indigenous, and People of Color, including Gardening and other subgroups

Join the Collective — $22/mo

02Framework

Direct Compassionate Communication

DCC builds on the foundation of Nonviolent Communication (NVC) with a more embodied, heart-forward commitment to showing up in truth and tenderness. It is not a system or a technique to control outcomes. It is a way of being. A practice. A remembering.

Group practice sessions — roleplay, scenario practice, intentional dialogue
DCC for Teams — organizational transformation sprints and ERG sessions
Leadership support and coaching for shared humanity workplaces
Transformative and restorative justice integration
Decolonized NVC lens informed by Meenadchi

Registration Coming Soon

Membership

Honor your healing.
Join us today.

This isn't just a membership — it's a movement toward change. Grounded community, not perfection. Regular gatherings that hold space for grief, joy, conflict, and rest.

✦ Now More Accessible ✦The HYWF Collective

Full Collective Access

$22

/ month

Open to all co-conspirators committed to liberation and healing work.

Access to the HYWF Collective Community
Weekly Community DCC Classes
Monthly Liberation Sessions with myisha t. hill, Channdika Thayer, and other Guides
All-Community Book Club
Access to the Liberation Library
Hybrid events — in person and online
Weekly Substack dispatches and member resources
Exclusive content and actionable resources from myisha t. hill

Membership Is Open

Bodies of Culture

Collective + Private Space

$22

/ month

For historically marginalized communities and organizations who have faced systemic inequality.

Everything in The HYWF Collective
Bodies of Culture — a private space outside the white gaze for Black, Indigenous, and People of Color
Gardening and other affinity subgroups
Weekly Substack dispatches and member resources

Membership Is Open

Pay what you can — memberships accepted as low as $1. We offer unlimited scholarships and never turn anyone away for lack of funds. Apply here.

The Framework

Direct Compassionate
Communication

DCC is deeply aligned with Nonviolent Communication (NVC) — developed by Marshall Rosenberg — building on its foundation with a more embodied, heart-forward commitment. It centers honest expression and empathetic listening, weaving in transformative and restorative justice practices and the liberatory lens of Decolonized NVC by Meenadchi.

In the midst of transformative justice processes, dialogue can be tender, raw, and charged with deep personal and systemic truth. DCC gives us a way to move through these moments with both clarity and care — honest without being harsh, present without needing to fix.

DCC is not a system, a hierarchy, or a technique to control outcomes. It is a way of being. A practice. A remembering.

"We're not trying to 'win' communication — we're trying to be human together. And from that space, healing becomes possible."

Registration Coming SoonBring DCC to Your Team Become a Member

Direct

Invites us to be brave enough to name what's real — to say the hard things with clarity and integrity, and to receive truth without defensiveness.

Compassionate

Rooted in empathy and a deep respect for the humanity in ourselves and each other. No one is left outside the circle of care.

Communication

Strengthens our collective resilience through real-life practice — roleplay, scenario practice, and intentional dialogue that moves through tension toward transformation.

Relational

Encourages openness, curiosity, care, and repair — allowing us all to take ownership of our part in building beloved community.

Stay Connected

Heal Your Way Forward
on Substack

Our Substack is where the liberation journey lives between gatherings — reflections, resources, body literacy, nervous system regulation, and calls to action from myisha t. hill and the Collective.

Subscribe to support the work and get full access to member-exclusive content, long-form essays, and dispatches that go deeper than anywhere else.

Subscribe on Substack

📬

healyourwayforward
.substack.com

Support the work. Get full access.

Long-form reflections and liberation essays
Body literacy and nervous system content
Paid subscriber-exclusive dispatches
Calls to action and community resources
Updates from myisha and the Collective

Subscribe & Support the Work

Our Team

Meet your Community Guides

myisha t. hill

Founder · Healer, Writer, Possibilitarian

myisha is the founder and heart of Heal Your Way Forward Collective — a writer, life coach, healer, and activist guiding others in healing their relationships to systems of oppression. Her work integrates neuroscience, ancestral wisdom, and healing justice. She is the author of Heal Your Way Forward and creator of the Direct Compassionate Communication framework.

Aiko Smith

Mindfulness Meditation Facilitator

A Black and Japanese American woman born in Okinawa and raised in Los Angeles. Aiko is a mother of three, mindfulness teacher, writer, speaker, and consultant trained by UCLA's Mindfulness Awareness Research Center. She has devoted her life to teaching humans how to mindfully confront suffering as part of dismantling oppressive systems.

Mitzi Magdaleno

DCC Guide · Creative Entrepreneur

A creative entrepreneur, multi-medium artist, and business coach who spent 15 years in the Bay Area focusing on youth, women, and staff empowerment at organizations like the YMCA and Mission Girls. Mitzi became a committed co-conspirator with HYWF in 2019, supporting people through human-centered, creative tools for healing.

Jen Gergen

DCC Guide · NVC Practitioner

Beginning her NVC journey in 2008 training with founder Marshall Rosenberg, Jen has been dedicated to the practice, facilitation, and education of NVC since. She collaborates with the HYWF Collective to build fortitude and resiliency in liberation movements through authentic, compassionate communication.

Channdika Thayer

Liberation Guide · Collective Facilitator

Channdika brings her wisdom and lived experience to the Collective as a liberation guide and Monthly Liberation Session facilitator alongside myisha t. hill. Her presence holds space for the full humanity of everyone in the room — grounding the work in authenticity, care, and collective accountability.

Dr. Yulinda Renee Rahman

Healing Justice Guide

Dr. Yulinda Renee Rahman brings a depth of scholarly and embodied wisdom to the HYWF Collective. Her expertise grounds the Collective's healing justice framework, weaving together academic rigor, lived experience, and a commitment to liberation-centered care for the whole community.

Become a Member — $22/mo

Connect with our Guides inside the Collective community

Community Voices

What members are saying

"myisha leads with empathetic accountability, creating a supportive and generative space for navigating whiteness."

— Whitney

"HYWF supports me in showing up as my whole authentic self with self-empathy, planting seeds that lead toward collective liberation."

— Angie H.

"My relationships have transformed as a result of being, healing, and practicing in community."

— Sarah L.

"HYWF is a community where I feel accepted, I feel accountable, and creates the space to share and learn."

— Lori B.

"HYWF does an AMAZING job at holding space for everyone AND calling people in. Great opportunity to hear different perspectives."

— Jessie B.

"myisha's commitment to this work and to honoring everyone's humanity is something everyone can learn from."

— Rochael A.

Become a Member — $22/mo

Access & Equity

No one turned away
for lack of funds.

We believe access to the work of liberation should be for all. We follow the Green Bottle Method — a sliding scale developed by Alexis J. Cunningfolk — and invite white bodies to give at or above their means so others can join free.

We accept memberships as low as $1 and offer unlimited scholarships. No one is ever turned away for inability to pay. Mutual aid is woven into everything we do.

Apply for a Scholarship

Reparations in Action

When you engage with Black-led spaces, you're not just supporting a cause — you're contributing to the healing and restoration of a community that has been systematically oppressed. This is more than education. It's a radical shift toward healing.

Unlimited scholarships available. Pay what you can — we accept as little as $1.

Donate to the Collective

The Book

Amazon Books-A-Million Bookshop.org ✦ Buy a Signed Copy

Heal Your Way Forward

The Co-Conspirator's Guide to an Antiracist Future

This isn't just a book. It's a guide, a mirror, and a call-in for white and white-identifying folks who are ready to move beyond performative allyship and into co-conspiratorship rooted in radical accountability, deep compassion, and collective healing.

Written by myisha t. hill — activist, author, and founder of Check Your Privilege — this book meets you where you are and challenges you to grow, feel, reflect, and act with integrity.

Why your white tears aren't the end — but could be the beginning
How to listen without defensiveness and act without centering yourself
What to do when you ghost the work (yes, again)
How to stay in right relationship even when it gets messy
What it takes to create a reparative, antiracist future

"This book shows anyone interested in human liberation the way to heal, to hope, and to become true advocates and co-conspirators — not just for justice and change, but for the future of who we are as humans."

— Anna Paquin, Actress and Producer

Learn More & Buy the Book

Frequently Asked

Questions, answered with care.

Quick answers about our Black-led peer support work, membership pricing, Direct Compassionate Communication, and how reparations show up in everything we do.

What does “Black-led peer support, recovery & liberation” actually mean?

We're a Black-led collective founded by myisha t. hill where peers — not experts on a pedestal — guide one another in healing from systems of oppression. Recovery here means recovering from white supremacy culture, urgency, burnout, and disconnection. Liberation is the long-haul work we practice together through nervous system regulation, healing justice, and beloved community.

Who is HYWF Collective for?

Anyone committed to liberation and healing work — white folx and white-identifying co-conspirators ready to move past performative allyship, and Bodies of Culture (Black, Indigenous, and People of Color) who want a private space outside the white gaze. We hold both, intentionally.

How much does membership cost? Are scholarships available?

Membership is $22/month — and we accept memberships as low as $1. We offer unlimited scholarships and never turn anyone away for lack of funds. Pay what you can; give more if you can. The work is for everyone committed to liberation.

What is Direct Compassionate Communication (DCC)?

DCC builds on Nonviolent Communication (NVC) with a more embodied, heart-forward practice — informed by transformative justice and Decolonized NVC by Meenadchi. It's not a script or a technique to control outcomes. It's a way of being together that's honest without being harsh, and present without needing to fix.

How is DCC different from regular NVC?

DCC keeps NVC's foundation of honest expression and empathetic listening, then adds somatic awareness, a liberation lens, and restorative justice integration. It centers the truth that healing oppression is somatic, not just ideological — so we practice with our bodies, not just our words.

What do I actually get inside the Collective?

Weekly Community DCC classes, monthly Liberation Sessions with myisha t. hill and Channdika Thayer, an all-community book club, the Liberation Library, hybrid in-person and online events, weekly Substack dispatches, and access to The Lounge — our private container for grounded community connection.

How is this “reparations in action”?

When you pay membership or donate, you're directly funding a Black-led space and the labor of Black, Indigenous, and People of Color educators and healers. We invite white members to give at or above their means so others can attend free. Reparations here aren't symbolic — they're material redistribution woven into how the Collective runs.

How do I support the work if I can't join right now?

Subscribe to our Substack, donate to Forward Futures, buy the book, or share our work with someone ready to do their own healing. Every action funds Black-led liberation work.

Become a Member — $22/mo

Show up in your humanity.
Lead with empathy.

Founded in 2017.
Built for the long haul.

Care is practice. Not a game.