Co-Sponsored Continuing Education Program
Ancestral Cultural Competence: A Soul-Based CE Journey for Therapists
with Katherine Saviskas
Cultural self-awareness and cultural humility require increasing cultural knowledge and understanding of our own heritages. For many, this deep work involves uncovering stories and understandings that are not currently known by their families and reflecting on our ancestral heritages. When therapists are able to know their own cultural selves, they are able to better identify dynamics that unfold with patients. This self-understand is associated with stronger working alliances with clients, more effective repairs from clinical ruptures, and higher rates of symptom improvement.
This continuing education curriculum will support participants with intentionally gaining new knowledge about their ancestors, ancestral cultures, and their own cultural identity in the service of liberatory clinical practice. We will utilize the lenses of decolonial studies, racial justice, and psychotherapy.
CE credits are awarded via APA certification. Please double check to ensure these credits are acceptable to your state licensing body.
Fall Workshops with Katherine
Each workshop will discuss clinical implications regarding the topic explored. For more information, visit Katherine’s workshop page.
BE MORE HUMAN
Wednesday 10/14/26, 5:30-6:30pm PST Online
This workshop looks at the role of the body in racism and colonization, reflecting on themes of occupation, abandonment and disconnection. We will reflect on humans’ relationship to nature and nature as our body. We will begin in the theoretical and end in the practical, identifying personal and clinical reasons for engaging with our bodies in new ways and concrete strategies for connecting to our bodies as a doorway to connecting with our ancestors. By the end of the workshop, participants will be able to identify at least one clinical implication for an improved embodied understanding of racism.
Number of CE credits: 1, Cost: $150
FEELING SAFE
Thursday 11/12/26, 5:30-6:30pm PST Online
As someone who has grown up in a cities and a suburban community, my own lack of a sense of safety in nature was preventing me from connecting with nature. This workshop explores the somatics and logistics of how we feel unsafe, working to create the safety doorway we need to experiencing nature, the outdoors, and the wildness of the earth. Together we also explore why connecting with the earth is involved with the journey of ancestral reconnection. By the end of the workshop, participants will be able to identify at least one clinical implication for an improved embodied understanding of the relationship between safety and nature.
Number of CE credits: 1, Cost: $150
THE IMPORTANCE OF DARKNESS
Tuesday 12/1/26, 5:30-6:30pm PST Online
This workshop looks at the psychological and spiritual importance of Darkness, the unknown and the unseen, and as something that colonization and capitalism tries to destroy. How are our relationships to Darkness and our own Darkness strained by present day manifestations of colonization and capitalism? What were our ancestors’ relationships to Darkness like? And how can changing our relationship to the unknown and the unseen open a path to ancestral reconnection? By the end of the workshop, participants will be able to identify at least one clinical implication when exploring darkness with clients.
Number of CE credits: 1, Cost: $150
YOUR ANCESTORS' SPIRITUALITIES
Monday 12/21/26, 4:00-5:00pm PST Online
What can be known about your ancestors’ spiritualities prior to the emergence of today’s major religions? How does expanding your understanding of elements of your ancestors’ pre-major-religion spiritualities address your present-day longings and needs? This workshop creates a moment for you on winter solstice to look at what you know about your ancestors' spiritualities, expand what you know about them, and try connecting with your ancestors’ spiritualities as a way of addressing your wounds and opening your heart to ancestral reconnection. By the end of the workshop, participants will be able to identify at least one clinical implication for an improved understanding ancestral spirituality.
Number of CE credits: 1, Cost: $150
Spring 2027 Courses with Katherine
GETTING TO KNOW YOUR ANCESTOR’S STORIES-Online
February/March 2027 (2/3, 10, 17, 24 & 3/3, 10)
Wednesdays, 5:30-7:30pm PST
We will research and gather our ancestors' stories, focusing on individual ancestors' lives and/or our ancestral folk tales, mythologies, and cultural stories. Stepping up as storytellers, we will practice telling these stories, to our family members, our friends, and each other. As the stories we tell shape who we are, this work reshapes our self-understandings and how we share who we are.
Number of CE credits: 12; Cost: $1500
Learning Objectives: Forthcoming
You must attend all sessions to receive CE credit.
FOLK ARTS OF YOUR ANCESTORS
In-Person 3-Day Retreat, New Orleans
April 9-11, 2026; 9:30am - 2:30pm with 1 hour lunch break
In this hands-on, in-person journey, we will research and practice doing the folk arts of our ancestors together in New Orleans. Diving into a study of our ancestors' visual arts and artisan crafts, we will learn what symbols were significant in our ancestors' lives and practice incorporating them into our own present lives, encountering which ways feel meaningful to us personally.
Number of CE credits: 12, Cost: $1800
Learning Objectives: Forthcoming
You must attend all sessions to receive CE credit.
Please Visit Katherine’s Course Page to Learn More About These Programs
Learn more about Katherine at Ancestral Reconnection Coaching & Classes
Meet Katherine Saviskas, M.Ed., M.A
Katherine (she/her) is a spiritual counselor, coach, educator, and PhD researcher whose work sits at the intersection of psychology, cultural identity, racial justice, and ancestral reconnection. She has more than 20 years of experience in anti-racism education and racial justice work, with a particular interest in how cultural and ancestral identity shapes the ways we understand ourselves and relate to others. She is especially interested in the ancestral reconnection journeys of therapists and the role of ancestral reconnection in psychological and societal decolonization.
Katherine creates learning spaces rooted in decolonial values and liberatory pedagogies, where participants can engage their lived experiences and individual curiosities about their ancestral heritages. Her courses and workshops integrate anti-racist education with embodied practices—including breathwork, meditation, and attention to the nervous system—to support reflection, connection, and transformative learning.
Katherine holds a Master’s in East West Psychology and a certificate in Spiritual Counseling from the California Institute of Integral Studies (CIIS), a coaching certification from Wisdom of the Whole, and a Master’s in Urban Education from Temple University. She is currently pursuing a PhD in East West Psychology at CIIS.
Samavaya Psychology is approved by the American Psychological Association to sponsor continuing education for psychologists. Samavaya Psychology maintains responsibility for this program and its content. There is no conflict of interest or commercial support for any programs or instructors.Please see this webpage’s FAQ for information about our attendance, refund, and cancellation policies. 