Queer Mindful Self-Compassion 2025

Mindful Self-Compassion (MSC) is a deeply therapeutic, empirically supported, learning and skills training group designed to cultivate mindfulness and self-compassion skills. Based on groundbreaking research, this 8-week group involves practical mindfulness, nervous system regulation, embodied inquiry, and values based meaning-making skills, enabling participants to respond to difficult moments and motivate themselves with kindness, instead of harsh self-judgement and shame.

Adapted by-and-for the 2SLGBTQ+ community, this program integrates queer thought and lived experience throughout!

Book a Free Intake

"MSC for LGBTQ+ folks was a really dreamy course! It offered a uniquely soft and tender container in which to learn (and unlearn) some challenging, but beautiful practices…. In MSC for 2SLGBTQ+ folks, I felt that I could bring my full messy, hesitant, overwhelmed, stressed, queer and trans self so that I could really show up to grapple with the difficulties and joys of self compassion."

- D
"I truly loved this course. It has taught me so much about the benefits of being kinder to myself. It's hard for me to even express it in words, but I know it in my heart. My loved ones have also seen the benefits that this course has had on my wellbeing and mental health. I also truly appreciated the fact that this was a group for queers... practicing Mindfulness Self Compassion has allowed me to explore my needs better and believe in myself more than I have ever in my life. I just have so much gratitude for this experience."

- J
"Beautifully tailored to the unique challenges of being queer and trans, this course gifted me with valuable tools that I can draw on now and as I continue to grow. Mik is a skilled facilitator who is able to connect the MSC curriculum to the queer and trans lived experiences in an impactful way... 10/10 would recommend!"

- R

When:

Wednesdays, April 30th-June 18th 2025. 4:30-7:00 PST + one half-day silent retreat on June 1st from 10:00-2:00 PST.

Where:

Virtual over Zoom

Who:

Anyone who identifies as a member of the 2SLGBTQ+ Community

Expect 8 weeks of learning, mindfulness and self-compassion practice, opportunities for small and large group discussion, and multiple tools and practices that you can integrate into your life right away. We will work together to build a compassionate and present queer community space.

The Deets

Topics include:

Integrating mindfulness into daily life to open to the present moment
Practicing self-kindness (especially when it doesn't come naturally!)
Connecting to our essential interrelatedness so we know we aren't alone
Working with internalized queerphobia, racism, and misogyny through compassion instead of self-criticism
Living deeply, aligned with your values
Meeting difficult emotions like shame, anger, and anxiety
Navigating challenging relationships, caregiving fatigue, and conflict
Embracing your life!

Past participants describe this course as highly transformative with lasting impacts years later.

FAQ:

$650/person (which breaks down to about $27/hr).
In this economy!? Accessibility is important to me, so don’t hesitate to ask about sliding scale!
Yes! We have plenty of sliding scale spots, so if you think you might need one in order to attend the group, just let me know and we can figure out a price that works for you. I have so far never had to turn anyone away for lack of funds and hope to keep it this way!
You'll receive a receipt for Group Therapy or Group Services provided by a Registered Social Worker. These services can also be claimed as a 'medical expense' on income tax returns. If you are not sure if your insurance will cover this, your best bet is to call them first to confirm.
While MSC is therapeutic, it's not group therapy. You won't be expected to share personal details (though welcome to if moved to), and we avoid explicitly traumatic content. Consider it a deeply therapeutic learning and skills training group where you'll learn mindfulness, nervous system regulation, embodied inquiry, and values-based meaning-making skills, all integrated with queer theory in a 2SLGBTQ+-centred context.
While participants often build a deep feeling of connection to one another in the group, the primary relationship fostered in MSC is a compassionate self-to-self relationship - learning how to treat yourself with the kindness, care, love and understanding that you would a dear friend.
Don't worry, I promise it doesn't work like that! No previous mindfulness/meditation experience is required, and your restless, unfocused, ADHD, bouncing-off-the-walls-brain is fully welcome here.
While there's plenty of snake oil in wellness spaces these days (hello life coaching pyramid schemes!), MSC is empirically supported and science-based. There are 66 scholarly papers by Kristen Neff and colleagues showing positive impacts of MSC on psychological wellbeing. This research includes randomized control trials on the MSC course, finding consistent increases in mindfulness, self-compassion, social connection, life satisfaction, and happiness, with decreases in anxiety, stress, other-comparison, and avoidance.
There are a further way too many articles for me to count speaking to the positive impacts of self-compassion generally (in fact this is so robustly studied that this list stopped updating in 2022 because there was too much research to keep up with).
Queer-MSC follows the same structure and topics as the empirically tested MSC program, with content, focus, and language better geared towards our community.
This group is reserved for folks who are in the 2SLGBTQ+ community, however I will be offering a MSC group open to anyone in early 2026 - reach out to get on the waitlist!
It's me, Mik! I'm a white queer and trans settler of Hungarian descent living and working on xʷməθkʷəy̓əm, Sḵwx̱wú7mesh, and səlilwətaɬ territories (Vancouver). I'm a Registered Social Worker practicing as a counsellor offering 1:1 and group counselling. I also work as a Social Worker in community healthcare where I run groups for trans preteens and their parents.
I get really nerdy about the transformative power of MSC for the 2SLGBTQ+ community - there are a lot of things keeping us as a community stuck in chronic shame, perfectionism, people-pleasing, and harsh self-judgment, and often very distant from our bodies and the present moment and MSC is the most powerful thing I've found to shift this. I believe in this work because I've seen the outcomes professionally and personally.
1) Book an intake chat to ensure fit and discuss your goals
2) After the intake, e-transfer to finalize registration
3) Complete an intake form via JaneApp and receive handouts, resources and the Zoom link