the
rosewood sessions

Recovering the Art of Meaningful Relationships

THE WYCKOFF COMMUNITY HOUSE
RIDGEWOOD, QUEENS, NYC

Sessions

Opening Session: March 2, 2025

Witnessing

March 9, 2025

Documenting Injustice, Turning Towards Each Other, and Finding "Truth"

with Monika Son, Ph.D. and Ryan Kautz

Join us for dialogue, storytelling, practice, and conversation on the theme of “Witnessing.” Human-rights documentarian Ryan Kautz joins Zen Chaplain, psychologist, and embodied justice facilitator, Monika Son, for an exploration of how we can show up, turn towards one another, and discern “truth” in these times of increasing chaos and polarization.

Monika L. Son, Ph.D. (she/her), is a consultant, certified Embodied Leadership Coach and trauma informed facilitator. As a trained psychologist and expert facilitator with a twenty-year career in teaching on issues of access, opportunity and justice, she is skilled at supporting and building containers that examine issues around identity, oppression, power and privilege. In that time, Dr. Son has found that embodied, contemplative based skills and practices are what seed and ground sustainable transformative change. Her deep passion is to support change leaders who choose to bring fierce loving radical love and compassion to the spaces they impact. Ultimately, her joy is to cultivate healing and facilitate the increasing presence of light in humanity.

Monika is a student in the Buddhist Soto Zen lineage and chaplain in training, and holds a practice of meditation, yoga and somatic practices for more than a decade. She is daughter of Dominican immigrants, a parent of two mixed raced boys, and enjoys planting, gardens and dancing bachata and travel adventures with her husband John.

Ryan Kautz, (he/him), is a documentary filmmaker in charge of directing and editing video productions at WITNESS. Ryan’s experience teaching participatory media and video advocacy internationally includes training activists across Africa, Asia, and the Balkans, supporting them in telling their own stories in the fight for human rights. Ryan’s continued work with NGOs and communities runs a spectrum of thematic areas including gender-based violence, forced evictions, extraordinary renditions and torture. His photography has been published and appeared in major publications including the New York Times and Forbes Magazine.

Ryan studied filmmaking at the School of Visual Arts in New York City where he graduated with the school’s top honor in documentary film. He has worked on multiple documentary projects throughout the Himalayas on contemporary Tibetan culture and religion, in addition to working for the online magazine Flo and various websites documenting Hip Hop and Punk culture in NYC.

About the Sessions & Podcast

Monthly on Sundays | 6-8pm ET

These curated sessions are held on the beautiful grounds of our community house, The Wyckoff. Our two featured guests will engage in conversation and then lead the group in intentional reflection and practice.

This portion of the event will be recorded as part of our podcast series, The Rosewood Sessions, which we hope will not only reach, but inspire other communities to gather creatively and intentionally.

Following the conversation, we will serve a light meal and offer more time for relational connections among our guests to emerge.

The Future is Relational

Relational disconnection is threatening our collective social fabric: worldwide we are witnessing trends of greater inequality, polarization, authoritarianism, and othering. And some, like us, say that the crises of our time—social, ecological, and spiritual—are fundamentally relational in nature.

We’re interested in recovering the art of meaningful connection. Our sessions are designed to pair organizers, activists, artists, healers, and community leaders for an evening of exchange through storytelling, reflection, and practice, in service of fostering meaningful and mutual connection.

Our hope is that these intimate sessions and community dinners will help us build relationships with other local, NYC-based kin, and inspire us to seek out and build bridges in our own backyards.

Your Hosts

The Rosewood Sessions & Podcast

O.B. MacDougall (they/he) is a multi-disciplinary artist, strength/movement coach and musician. Their work primarily focuses on how to tap the relationship between movement, creativity, and community to open towards more intuitive rooted spaces of connection. They perform and tour with Brooklyn based bands, Monica Bang, Ok Cuddle, and Girly Boy, and run an intimate concert series throughout New York City called the Sweet Sounds Sessions.

Brooke D. Lavelle, Ph.D. (she/her) is the Co-Founder of Courage of Care, a non-profit focused nurturing a field of culture-change workers, or “relational facilitators”, in the art of transformative gathering and community building. She is the Editor-in-Chief of The Arrow Journal, a publication and podcast series that explores the relationship between politics, contemplative practice, and activism. She is also the Co-Director of The Wyckoff community house and urban garden, with her beloved partner, Jesse.

Details

Tickets to the event are offered at a sliding scale. Resources support our speakers, the podcast production, and our event dinners.

If you’d like to offer more support, please consider making a donation here on our site, or donate directly to our speakers at the event.

the rosewood sessions