Join us on Zoom for Synergi’s monthly Peer Networking Support Space

Held online every second Tuesday in the month, we host a free supportive space for people with lived experience of racism, working or volunteering in user-led peer groups or campaigning capacities. These groups or campaigns should be at the intersection of racial justice and mental health, distress and/or trauma. If you’re not sure if you meet the criteria, please do get in touch.

Facilitated by Jess (she/they), Synergi Project Manager and Alaina (she/her), Synergi Project Co-ordinator, we invite Black People and people of colour to join us for these sessions. We want to enable compassionate peer support and networking opportunities, to build community and connect with others doing work in this area. Sharing with others is a way to build resource and collective power to make change. We know that staff at Synergi are not the experts, and that it is together as a network that we hold far greater information and wisdom.

Though the topics of conversation will be led by the group, we expect some of the areas below to come up:

• Help and direction from peers to resources to support how your group or campaign is run e.g. setting up policies and procedures;
• Thoughts around the pros and cons of being an un-constituted group;
• Sharing our experiences and helpful coping tips when doing racial justice work in a hostile environment;
• The pros and cons of having lived experience of the issues we work with;
• Sharing ideas to overcome the challenges of sustainability and creating care within the work;
• How we practice abolitionist mental health care in our communities;
• How the hardship of the work can be offset with joy.

This group will be 120 minutes long, with a break roughly halfway through. Maximum capacity for each group is set at 20 people. We may hold smaller breakout rooms if it seems supportive.

To keep the space feeling comfy enough to discuss big topics, please have a look at our online events procedure. We’ll also return to our community intentions at the beginning of each group. If people breach this agreement, we will remove them, so as to maintain as safe a space as possible.

We know the work is tough and lateness can be a reflection of this, however to keep the facilitators and members feeling grounded in the session, 10 minutes after the group begins at 13.00, the group will be closed to latecomers.

We will check in regularly about how the space is feeling. We welcome feedback, and really want to make this a space that is co-created and works for our community.

You can book a place up to a day before the event.

Please follow this link to register so we can send you the Zoom link. Information gathered from this registration form will be handled in line with NSUN’s privacy policy.

If you have any questions, or would like to touch base before joining us, please email synergi.info@nsun.org.uk