Soteria: The Power of Human Connection

Learning from Pathways Vermont’s Soteria House

Register Here!

Soteria is a residential home-like environment for supporting people experiencing extreme states / psychosis. In this workshop, we’ll cover the history of Soteria and its place in the larger history of mental health reform movements dating back to the 1950s. We will discuss modern updates to the original Soteria and how we have integrated new schools of thought and practice into a program that also conforms to the expectations of licensing and funding while maintaining the critical elements of the original model.

We will also focus on the power of human connection in non-coercive settings. This workshop invites us all to meet people in exciting and rewarding ways. At Pathways Vermont, we want to explore genuine, dynamic relationships that are healing for all of us.

Participants will explore:

• Methods of reducing the impact of power dynamics in relationships
• Effective engagement with extreme states
• Communicating with people who are communicating differently
• Maintaining boundaries that allow shared experience and connection
• How to harness the power of lived experience
• Collaborative engagement
• Restoring dignity to crisis

Audience: 

• Service providers working in a residential program
• Service providers/agencies wanting to start a residential program (perhaps similar to Soteria)
• Service providers and community members who want to provide better support to folks experiencing extreme states / psychosis
• Family and friends of people experiencing extreme states / psychosis
• People with lived experience of extreme states / psychosis