RACISM IN REAL TIME
Workshops
Many people are beginning to reflect more deeply on race and racism, yet often feel unsure how to talk about it or what to do with the emotions that arise from fear and discomfort to shame, guilt, or confusion.
This course is designed to support you in navigating these experiences, helping you develop the awareness, language, and confidence to engage in conversations about race more openly and safely. It is particularly valuable for those working with others such as therapists, educators, or professionals who want to better support both white and BIPOC individuals.
In small, facilitated groups, you will explore your personal relationship with race, practice meaningful dialogue, and learn how to respond in real-time situations. The course begins with separate groups to allow for deeper reflection within your own context.
Racism is not only a historical issue but a present, lived experience that affects both individuals and society. It creates emotional and physical impacts that can remain unspoken and unresolved. This course takes a holistic, embodied approach, working with both the psychological and physical dimensions of racial wounding as they arise in the group.
Through this process, the aim is to foster greater understanding, compassion, and connection within yourself and with others and to begin reshaping the patterns that sustain racial harm.
Working through racism
Conversations about the experience within the Racism in Real Time workshops.
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With Lizzie and John
“The main function of racism is separating people out, but more importantly it’s separating your body your heart and your head, racism thrives in the head, if you’re allowed to come in to your body, racism then loses its potency, but as white folks its kinda scary to come into your body in that kinda way… particularly in British society it’s kinda taboo”
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With Katy Taylor and Alice Nicholas
“I used to feel frozen and paralysed about getting it wrong, but I don’t feel that anymore, that’s what you taught me that we will get it wrong again and again and again and again… I feel so liberated by that.. its taught me, trying to get it right, that’s not the issue, … my whiteness and white supremacy is in the fibers of my being… I can’t avoid that but what I can choose is how I address it and what I do about it."
"It’s taught me to be less judgemental, because before I started training, I was an activist, I’ve seen the way you work with black and brown people on their internalised racism, and you’re so gentle, I haven’t seen that before, I’ve seen other therapists who work with this but they’re so harsh - you’re so gentle.. that’s something I hopefully will take with me."
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With Jay Stewart
“It was truly amazing to see, we couldn’t communicate with each other (White and BIPOC) because there was something going on that was unnamed and Charmaine came and named it. Charmaine divided the group (initially). It was just something that had never been done before, and being direct, not wishy washy, but gentle as well, and this had a huge effect on our group because, when we came back together white and BIPOC we felt unified and a base to build from which was something we never had before because everyone was afraid to speak .. but we came back strong… and this is where we are now.”
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Charmaine McCaulay is a trauma-informed body psychotherapist who considers the client to be addressed as a whole person. She facilitates Racism in Real Time workshops.
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Lizzie Cummings is a drama and movement therapist who has worked in schools, mental health settings, and private practice for 19 years.
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John Wilson specializes in online counselling which has developed into offering online CPD for practitioners via onlinevents.
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Ayanda Dlamini and Lexie Noel
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With Ben Stewart
Racism in real time:
An Audio Introduction
In this episode, Charmaine introduces her “Racism in Real Time” workshops, explaining that many anti-racism spaces focus too much on discussion and not enough on real emotional processing. She describes how both white participants and people of color often leave these spaces feeling overwhelmed, silenced, or unsure how to handle their reactions. The workshop aims to create a safe, shared environment where participants can explore the immediate, bodily experience of racism—such as shame, anger, and hurt—and begin to process it collectively and compassionately.
In this episode, the conversation deepens into how racism is experienced in the body, especially through powerful emotions like shame and guilt. Charmaine explains how these feelings can cause people to physically shut down—restricting breath, creating tension, and leading to withdrawal or collapse. She highlights that real change comes from learning to stay present with these uncomfortable sensations, gradually building the capacity to tolerate them without shutting down, which is essential for more honest and transformative engagement with racism.
In this episode, the conversation explores how shame often pushes people into intellectualizing instead of feeling, especially in discussions about racism. Charmaine highlights how this dynamic shows up strongly in psychotherapy training, where both students and trainers lack the tools to process racial discomfort. She shares how people of color in these spaces face pressure to conform to white norms in order to be accepted or succeed, leading to exhaustion and disconnection from their authentic selves. The episode emphasizes how these systems quietly reinforce racism and why creating spaces to process these experiences is essential for real change.
In this episode, the focus shifts to the risks of unprocessed racism within therapy spaces. Charmaine highlights how many therapists—both white and people of color—are trained without ever addressing race or their own internal biases, leaving them unequipped to support clients dealing with racism. She shares how race is often ignored in clinical settings, even when it’s clearly relevant, and how people of color are pressured to adjust their behavior to fit white expectations. The conversation expands this dynamic beyond therapy to everyday interactions, showing how subtle judgments and power dynamics shape outcomes, often in ways that go unspoken but deeply felt.
In this episode, the conversation explores racism as a form of deep, intergenerational trauma that is carried in the body across all groups. Charmaine explains that many white people also carry historical trauma, which contributes to unconscious patterns of “othering” and disconnection. She argues that racism persists not just through overt acts, but through normalized, often invisible ways of devaluing others—sometimes without guilt or awareness. The episode highlights how these ingrained patterns are sustained by society and why real change requires confronting them in the present moment, not just intellectually but experientially.
In this episode, the conversation focuses on the subtle, often non-verbal nature of modern racism through microaggressions. Charmaine explains how these moments are deeply felt in the body—causing confusion, shame, and disorientation—yet are difficult to prove or articulate, often leading people of color to question their own experiences. She emphasizes how this lack of validation creates a sense of isolation and “losing clarity.” The episode highlights the importance of collective spaces where these experiences can be acknowledged and processed, helping to bridge the divide that racism maintains by keeping people disconnected from themselves and each other.
In this episode, the focus turns to internalized racism within communities of color. Charmaine discusses how dominant white standards of beauty and value become ingrained, shaping how brown and black individuals see themselves and each other. This can lead to self-judgment, shaming, and even division within communities (such as colorism). She emphasizes that this deep, transgenerational wounding needs space to be acknowledged and processed, as healing also requires confronting the harm that exists internally, not just externally.
In this final episode, the conversation reflects on how deeply internalized racism shapes identity, self-image, and even physical expression. Through personal stories, Charmaine and Sana explore how ideals rooted in whiteness—such as beauty standards and behavior—become ingrained from childhood and persist unconsciously into adulthood. They highlight how people of color may alter themselves to fit into white spaces, often at the cost of authenticity and comfort. The episode closes by reinforcing the importance of reconnecting with the body and lived experience as a path toward awareness and healing, and invites listeners to engage with this work more deeply.