The Trauma-Informed Lawyer

Resmaa Menakem, MSW, LICSW, SEP, is a healer, therapist, author, and racialized trauma specialist whose work focuses on trauma, body-centered psychotherapy, communal healing, and cultural transformation.

He is the author of the New York Times bestseller My Grandmother's Hands: Racialized Trauma and the Pathway to Mending Our Hearts and Bodies and The Quaking of America: An Embodied Guide to Navigating Our Nation's Upheaval and Racial Reckoning.

Resmaa is the founder of Justice Leadership Solutions and the Cultural Somatics Institute, and the originator and leading advocate of Somatic Abolitionism—an embodied approach to antiracist practice and culture building.

His work invites us to examine how racialized trauma lives in the body and how healing requires individual and communal practice.Resmaa's professional biography and the description of his work are supported by his official website and publisher biography. 

Explore Resmaa's work: www.resmaa.com 

Books by Resmaa Menakem

Racialized Trauma and the Pathway to Mending Our Hearts and Bodies

Resmaa's New York Times bestselling book explores racialized trauma, the body, and pathways toward healing. 

https://resmaa-com.myshopify.com/products/my-grandmothers-hands-signed-hardcover

An Embodied Guide to Navigating Our Nation's Upheaval and Racial Reckoning

A book about racial reckoning, upheaval, and embodied approaches to collective transformation.

https://resmaa-com.myshopify.com/products/quaking-of-america-book-plus-practicebook-combo-bundle-of-2

Why Your Partner Sometimes Drives You Crazy—and What You Can Do About It

A guide to navigating conflict and relationships with compassion and personal responsibility.

https://resmaa-com.myshopify.com/products/monsters-in-love-why-your-partner-sometimes-drives-you-crazy-and-what-you-can-do-about-it

A picture book connected to Resmaa's work on racialized trauma and intergenerational experience.

Resmaa's official website and Central Recovery Press provide information about his books and learning resources.

https://resmaa-com.myshopify.com/products/the-stories-from-my-grandmother-s-hands

Key themes from the conversation

• Extraction, extermination, and extinction: Resmaa's framework for examining how colonial structures operate, as discussed in your conversation.
• Trauma zombies: Exploring the effects of unresolved trauma on our bodies and behaviors.
• Proximity to whiteness: Examining the dynamics of belonging, survival, and racialized cultural experience.
• Bodies of culture: Understanding how cultural experience and racialized trauma are carried in the body.
• Truth and reconciliation: Facing historical and ongoing harm and considering the work of meaningful reconciliation.
• Kinship care: The role of relationship, community, and collective responsibility in healing.
• Tending to our wounds: Attending to the wounds we carry as part of individual and collective transformation.
• The road to liberation: The embodied and relational work of moving toward liberation.

You can learn more about Myrna and her work at: www.myrnamccallum.ca

River Shannon is a lawyer, a Soto Zen priest, and a deeply committed member of the queer and trans community she serves.

River is the Manager of Legal Services at QMUNITY, where she provides legal support to queer, trans, and Two-Spirit people across British Columbia. QMUNITY’s Legal Clinic offers free, low-barrier legal services and support around issues including human rights, employment, housing and tenancy, family law, name changes, and gender-marker changes.

But River’s work is about much more than the law.

As a trans lawyer serving her own community, she understands something that can be difficult to capture in a legal file: what it means to enter a legal system carrying your identity, your history, your vulnerability, and sometimes your fear of being misunderstood. Her work creates a different possibility—one in which legal advocacy can also be an act of recognition, dignity, relationship, and care.

River is also a Soto Zen priest in the lineage of Shunryu Suzuki Roshi. She received priest ordination in October 2023 from Myoshin Kate McCandless, a guiding teacher of Mountain Rain Zen Community in Vancouver. Her writing explores the intersection of Zen practice, transition, identity, impermanence, compassion, and what it means to live as a whole person.

That combination of lawyer, trans woman, community advocate, and Zen practitioner makes River’s perspective particularly powerful. There is a thread running through all of this work: how do we meet people where they are, with compassion, and help create the conditions for them to become more fully themselves?

In this conversation, we talk about law and community, trans identity and belonging, the importance of being seen by the people who serve us, and what it means to practice law with humility, care, compassion, and love. River’s work reminds us that legal practice does not have to be separate from humanity. Sometimes, the most transformative legal work begins simply with saying: I see you. I understand you. You don’t have to go through this on your own. 

QMUNITY’s Legal Clinic provides free, low-barrier legal services to 2SLGBTQIA+ individuals and families throughout British Columbia. The clinic offers consultations, referrals, and limited representation in areas including:

Human rights

Employment

Tenancy and housing

Family law

Name changes and gender-marker updates

Other legal issues affecting queer, trans, and Two-Spirit communities

QMUNITY also offers Trans ID Clinics to support people navigating legal name changes and gender-marker changes.

Learn more: QMUNITY Legal Clinic

QMUNITY: QMUNITY — Queer, Trans and Two-Spirit Resource Centre

Trans and gender-diverse people continue to experience significant legal and social inequities in Canada.

The 2021 Canadian Census was the first national census to collect gender identity separately from sex assigned at birth. Among people aged 15 and older living in private households, 100,815 people identified as transgender or non-binary—about 0.33% of the population. Statistics Canada and the federal government note that this may be an underestimate because some people may not have felt comfortable disclosing their gender identity. (Canada)

Legal problems are also disproportionately common. A Canadian Justice Department review of research on trans people's legal needs found that 71% of trans respondents in one Ontario study had experienced at least one legal problem in the previous three years, compared with 48% of the general population. These problems included discrimination, employment, housing, healthcare, police interactions, family matters, immigration, and other areas of law. (Ministère de la Justice)

And while Canada has made important legal advances—including explicit human-rights protections based on gender identity—legal protection does not necessarily mean equal access to justice or equal treatment within legal systems. (Canada)

QMUNITY Legal Clinic

QMUNITY Programs & Services

Government of Canada — Facts, Stats and Impact: 2SLGBTQI+ Communities

Statistics Canada — Socioeconomic Outcomes of Transgender and Non-Binary People in Canada

Department of Justice Canada — Legal Problems Experienced by Trans People

River's work raises an important question for all of us working in law:

What would happen if we understood legal practice not simply as a profession, but as a relationship of care and responsibility to the communities we serve?

You can learn more about Myrna and her work at: www.myrnamccallum.ca

In this episode, Leonie and I explore:

Leonie Smith is a first-generation Canadian of Jamaican heritage and a certified Nonviolent Communication trainer through the Center for Nonviolent Communication (CNVC). She's the founder of three organizations: The Thoughtful Workplace, a coaching and consultancy practice building people-centred work cultures; People of Colour for Nonviolent Communication (POC4NVC), a network for Black, Indigenous, and People of Colour connected to principles of nonviolence; and Necessary Trouble Collective (NTC), which supports movement and activist communities in finding harmonious, sustainable ways of working toward shared purpose. With over two decades of senior management experience across communications, fundraising, and human resources in the nonprofit sector, Leonie brings a deep, practiced understanding of how systems either support or undermine the people inside them.

Connect with Leonie:

You can also view her talk in our video library from our 2026 JAT Summit titled, Speaking Hope: A NVC Approach: https://myrnamccallum.ca/video-library/ 

You can learn more about Myrna and her work at: www.myrnamccallum.ca

In this episode Esther Armah and Myrna discuss her Emotional Justice framework.  In this conversation, they get into the courage that racial healing actually requires, and who it asks the most of. Esther is a journalist, playwright, and global emotional justice advocate joining us from Accra, Ghana. 

Drawing on her encounters with Winnie Mandela, Archbishop Desmond Tutu, and Nchiki Biko — the widow of Steve Biko who famously refused to forgive the officers who murdered her husband at the TRC — Esther unpacks why reconciliation is not liberation language, why Nelson Mandela's message of forgiveness placed an impossible emotional burden on Black people, and what the emotional work of white people actually looks like. Myrna brings her own reckoning: years of fawning for white audiences, softening the language of colonial trauma, and what it finally cost her to name it.

This is Part 1. Esther will be back.

Esther Armah is a Ghanaian-British journalist, playwright, radio host, and creator of the Emotional Justice framework. She is the author of Emotional Justice: A Roadmap for Racial Healing. She joins this episode from Accra, Ghana.

IN THIS EPISODE

— How Esther's mother's broken silence about the 1966 Ghana coup gave birth to Emotional Justice — and the insight that "you cannot PhD your way out of untreated trauma"

— What Winnie Mandela told Esther before she interviewed Desmond Tutu: listen to the women first

— Nchiki Biko's refusal to forgive at the TRC, the murder of Steve Biko, and why her "no" cracked open a new understanding of racialized forgiveness

— Why reconciliation bypasses justice and repair — and how Canada's TRC has replicated the same harm as South Africa's

— Nelson Mandela's forgiveness narrative: a political act of its time, and why it seeded a dangerous legacy

— The emotional work that belongs to white people — Intimate Reckoning, Emotional Patriarchy, and the difference between proximity to power and actual allyship

— The language of whiteness: how all of us are taught to center whiteness, and the emotional work of letting it go

— Myrna's own reckoning: years of fawning for white audiences and what it took to name it

— The three Cs — Courage, Comfort, and Convenience — and how we each choose to contribute to or resist systems of harm

— Why you cannot self-care your way towards liberation, and what communal care actually requires

— Isolation vs. solitude — why hiding can be part of healing, and why isolation is the death of liberation

— Wellness in the Face of Warfare: what it means to choose wellness when your health is considered a threat to whiteness

QUOTES

"You cannot PhD your way out of untreated trauma. There is no amount of education that will replace the emotional work we all have to do." — Esther Armah

"Reconciliation is not liberation language. It is conciliatory language designed to sustain how whiteness comforts and soothes itself." — Esther Armah

"In Canada, your superpower is to mask your violence in polite neutrality and somehow describe it as no longer violence. We see that — because that's part of British whiteness." — Esther Armah

PEOPLE MENTIONED

— Winnie Mandela — South African anti-apartheid activist

— Archbishop Desmond Tutu — South African human rights leader

— Nchiki Biko — widow of Steve Biko; her refusal to forgive at the TRC was pivotal to Esther's framework

— Nelson Mandela — discussed in relation to racialized forgiveness

— Resmaa Menakem — referenced by Myrna on having skin in the game

— Kwame Nkrumah — first independent president of Ghana; quoted on political and economic liberation

RESOURCES

Emotional Justice: A Roadmap for Racial Healing by Esther Armah - You can buy it here: https://www.amazon.ca/Emotional-Justice-Roadmap-Racial-Healing/dp/1523003367

estherarmah.com 

https://www.theaiej.com/

myrnamccallum.co

You can learn more about Myrna and her work at: www.myrnamccallum.ca

In this powerful and unflinching conversation, Dr. Samah Jabr explains the psychological realities of Palestinian life under occupation in Gaza. We move beyond headlines to examine the lived experience of genocide, collective trauma, and the systematic use of brutality, torture, and humiliation as tools of control.

Dr. Jabr offers a deeply grounded analysis of colonial trauma—how it embeds itself not only in individuals, but in families, communities, and generations. Together, we unpack the psychological impact of ongoing violence, the erosion of dignity, and the ways in which survival itself becomes an act of resistance.

Yet this conversation is not only about harm—it is also about healing. We explore community as medicine, the role of collective care, and the power of solidarity across movements. Drawing on liberation psychology, Dr. Jabr reframes mental health beyond individual pathology, calling us toward a more political, relational, and justice-oriented understanding of healing. At its core, this episode is an invitation to witness, to feel, and to consider what revolutionary love looks like in the face of trauma.

Resources & Further Reading:

You can learn more about Dr. Jabr here: https://drsamahjabr.com/

Behind the Frontlines: Tales of Resistance and Resilience in Palestine by Dr. Samah Jabr

Content Note:

You can learn more about Myrna and her work at: www.myrnamccallum.ca

In this episode, I’m joined by my team—Ally and Mariana—for a candid debrief after our recent conference. We take you behind the scenes of what it really took to bring this gathering to life.

We share:

This conversation is honest, reflective, and rooted in what it means to do this kind of work in real time—not just when things go right, but when they’re complex, emotional, and evolving.

If you’ve ever wondered what happens after the event ends, this is that conversation.

The closing Maori prayer of protection was given by Tere Davis who is the Chairperson of Hei Tatau Pounamu, a tikanga‑based restorative justice trust in Auckland. 

You can learn more about Myrna and her work at: www.myrnamccallum.ca

In this deeply honest, vulnerable,  courageous and inter-generational conversation, I am joined by Leslie Priscilla of Latinx Parenting, my daughter Ally Hrbacek, Mariana Trujillo-Lezama, and her mother Claudia Lezama. Together, we explore a powerful and necessary truth: there is no healing or justice without the liberation of children.

We name something many struggle to say out loud—children are often mistreated in ways that have been normalized. Through control, punishment, dismissal, and the assumption of adult authority, harm is perpetuated in everyday parenting practices. Leslie calls this what it is: adult supremacy, and challenges us to radically rethink how we relate to children.

This conversation moves beyond blame and into awareness.

Across generations, we reflect on the parenting we received, the patterns we’ve inherited, and the courage it takes to interrupt cycles of harm. We speak to the tension of loving our children deeply while also confronting the ways we may unknowingly replicate what hurt us.

We also hold a profound truth: children are not just beings we raise—they are teachers, mirrors, and healers.

They reveal where we are still wounded. They invite us to reconnect with our own inner children. And they call us into the work of healing—not just individually, but across generations. In this episode, we explore: the normalization of harm in parenting; power, control, and adult supremacy; what it means to truly love and respect children;  children as teachers and guides in our healing; the necessity of re-parenting ourselves; and why the liberation of children is essential to any vision of justice or healing.

This is not a conversation about perfect parenting. It is a conversation about truth, accountability, and transformation. Because how we treat children shapes not only families— but the world we are creating.

---

Leslie Priscilla is a parent coach, educator, and the founder of Latinx Parenting, a bilingual movement rooted in children’s rights, social and racial justice, nonviolence, and intergenerational healing. Her work focuses on:

She has worked with thousands of parents, educators, and professionals through workshops, trainings, and community-based programming.

Leslie’s highly anticipated book, Chancla: Healing Our Families, Ourselves, and Our Culture through Nonviolent Parenting, is available for pre-order and will be released on August 18, 2026. In Chancla, Leslie:

Blending storytelling, history, and practical tools, this book is a guide for anyone seeking to break cycles and create homes grounded in love, safety, and respect.

Connect with Leslie

Website: Latinx Parenting

Instagram: @LatinxParenting

Instagram (Leslie): @comadre.wellness

Leslie will also be presenting at the Justice as Trauma Summit in Vancouver from April 7-9. Learn more here: www.myrnamccallum.co/jat2026

You can learn more about Myrna and her work at: www.myrnamccallum.ca

In this intimate and wide-ranging conversation, Myrna sits down with her best friend Shain Jackson for a soulful exploration of love, art, healing, spirituality, and relationship—with all the honesty, laughter, and tenderness that only a lifelong friendship allows.

Together, they reflect on how love shapes who we become, how trauma informs our relationships, and how learning to listen—to ourselves, to spirit, and to one another—is an ongoing practice. This episode weaves personal stories with deeper teachings about healing, creativity, and the role of art as a living, breathing expression of spiritual connection.

Shain shares the vision behind his Story Booth Project, an initiative dedicated to creating physical recording spaces where Indigenous people can safely share and preserve their stories, teachings, and lived experiences for future generations. Rooted in respect, sovereignty, and cultural continuity, the project is both an act of preservation and a form of resistance.

The conversation also touches on Shain’s entrepreneurial and community-building work through Spirit Works, as well as his nonprofit Golden Eagle Rising, which centers Indigenous resurgence, creativity, and community care.

At its heart, this episode is about love as a teacher—love in friendship, love in art, love in healing, and love as a spiritual force that guides us home to ourselves.

This is a conversation for anyone navigating growth, grief, creativity, relationships, and the sacred work of becoming.

To see Shain's work: www.spiritworks.ca and www.goldeneaglerising.org  

You can learn more about Myrna and her work at: www.myrnamccallum.ca

In this powerful episode of The Trauma-Informed Lawyer Podcast, Myrna welcomes James, the somatic practitioner behind Soma Reset Toronto and the viral TikTok account Nervous System Care Toronto, where he has become a trusted voice on trauma, embodiment, and nervous system regulation.

James has a unique ability to translate complex somatic principles into simple, humane, tangible practices. His work resonates because it is grounded in the body, not theory — and because he speaks from a place of humility, lived experience, and deep compassion for the human condition.

Together, Myrna and James explore what it means to reconnect with the body after trauma and stress, why healing requires slowness, and how nervous system care is actually a path toward personal liberation.

In This Episode, We Explore:

✨ What a dysregulated nervous system looks and feels like

James breaks down the signs we often overlook — the ways our bodies communicate distress long before our minds catch up.

✨ Why regulation is relational

We heal through connection, attunement, and being witnessed. James explains how co-regulation shapes safety and eventually leads to self-regulation.

✨ Trauma as a bodily imprint, not a story

They discuss why insight alone doesn’t shift survival responses, and how somatic practices create change that talking cannot reach.

✨ The importance of slowness in healing

James shares why slow work is not “less work” — it’s nervous-system-friendly work. The body moves at the pace of safety, not urgency.

✨ How simple, consistent practices reshape the system

James offers examples of easy, daily nervous system resets that help build resilience and reduce chronic activation.

✨ Why somatic work is exploding online

From TikTok trends to collective burnout, they touch on why so many people are increasingly turning toward body-based healing.

About James (Soma Reset Toronto)

James is a somatic practitioner and educator based in Toronto. Through his practice, Soma Reset, and his fast-growing TikTok presence under Nervous System Care Toronto, he offers accessible teachings on nervous system regulation, trauma physiology, and embodied healing. His content has helped millions understand their patterns, reconnect with their bodies, and explore somatic work in a grounded, non-performative way.

Key Takeaways

Healing happens in the body first, story second.

Regulation is built in connection, not isolation.

The nervous system responds to consistency more than intensity.

Slow is safe. Slow is sustainable. Slow is healing.

Somatic work is not a trend — it is a remembering.

Connect with James

Soma Reset Toronto : https://somabody.com/pages/somareset
TikTok: @nervoussystemcaretoronto
Instagram: @somabody_

You can learn more about Myrna and her work at: www.myrnamccallum.ca

Season 4 of The Trauma-Informed Lawyer Podcast launches with an invitation — and a challenge — to everyone working in law and leadership. In this episode, Myrna shares insights from her talk to judges on how trauma, culture, and integrity intersect in the pursuit of justice.

She reframes the trauma-informed movement as just the starting point. True transformation happens when we move beyond awareness to embodiment — when we center humanity, integrity, and relational accountability in every interaction and decision.

Themes explored:

Why trauma-informed practice is the bare minimum standard in today’s justice systems

How cultural responsiveness deepens empathy and understanding in judicial decision-making

What it means to embody integrity in leadership roles

Practical strategies for judges and legal professionals to bring humanity into their work

The importance of self-awareness and wellness as justice tools

Mentioned in this episode:

Myrna’s training and speaking work with the judiciary

Trauma-informed principles in judicial reasoning

The call for systems change rooted in relational accountability

Connect with Myrna:
website: www.myrnamccallum.co IG @thetraumainformedlawyer TT: traumainformedlawyer LI: thetraumainformedlawyer

You can learn more about Myrna and her work at: www.myrnamccallum.ca