Grief Work
In the west, we’ve lost touch with grief. We don’t allow ourselves to feel it, we don’t give it the attention it needs, and often we don’t know how to support those in grief. We are missing a warm and compassionate village.Visit the pages below to learn more about grief and view upcoming events.
Next Event
Relating to Grief - An Authentic Relating Workshop
Tue, June 9th - 6-9pm CST
Facilitated by Nils Voulfson
Location: South Austin (address provided upon signup)
Somatic Practice Group
Beginning Summer 2026
Somatic work can be described as connecting to the felt sense of the body and in this group, we’ll be exploring this felt sense in a relational way.Getting in touch with the body asks us to slow down, and informs us of a very basic layer of our being.We’ll explore practices such as authentic relating, movement, bodywork, and meditation and develop specific skills along the way to use the felt sense for more self connection and agency in everyday life!In these workshops expect to learn about:“50:50 Awareness” to balance self connection and connection with others
Activation and Deactivation: how can we notice when we are getting activated and going up into the mind and learn to resource and ground ourselves back down into the body?
Felt Sense of Safety to understand: “what really makes us feel safe?”
Activation vs Triggers: what’s bringing up sensation and emotion and what’s bringing me out of the present into a past experience?
Sensation, Emotion, Story: what’s actually happening in my body? How do I experience feelings in my body? And what are my stories about others or myself? Seeing our stories vs reality more clearly
Play and the Animal Body: “when animals feel safe, they play!” Explorations into play, joy and aliveness through present moment embodied experience.
Bodywork
Offering coming soon.
About Grief
Some of us may experience grief as a melancholy or numb feeling that permeates our lives when we’re not distracting ourselves or chasing the next high. Others may experience it as an intense tornado of emotion that only a few are let in on.In these often lonely experiences of grief, we miss something so important - we miss that grief is life force.Grief is vital energy moving us towards aliveness, integration, truth, wholeness, care and love with immense passion of heart.We miss that grief was never meant to be experienced alone.
This great longing we have to be held, supported, and witnessed in our grief is our birthright.
Francis Weller on Grief
“There is something feral about grief, something essentially outside the ordained and sanctioned behaviors of our culture.
Because of that, grief is necessary to the vitality of the soul. Contrary to our fears, grief is suffused with life force. It is riddled with energy.An acknowledgment of the erotic coupling with another soul, whether human, animal, plant, or ecosystem. It is not a state of deadness or emotional flatness.
Grief is alive, wild, untamed. It cannot be domesticated. It resists the demands to remain passive and still.
We move in jangled, unsettled and riotous ways when grief takes hold of us. It is truly an emotion that rises from the soul.”
Resources
In addition to the events found on the event page, here are some resources to help tend your grief.
Music
Zarad Tebe by Peia
Thank You Love by Mitsch Kohn, Netanel Goldberg, Truth of Now
I Let Myself Cry
Letting Go
Ho’oponopono by The Emmitt Sisters
Wails (Songs for Grief) Album by Alexandra Blakey
Articles
Embracing Grief by Sobonfu Some
Video
Francis Weller on The Five Gates Of Grief
Books
The Wild Edge of Sorrow by Francis Weller
Prayers Honoring Grief by Pixie Lighthouse
Nils Voulfson
Nils is a bodyworker, writer, dancer, facilitator, and community organizer based in Austin.He holds space where the group field is created in the moment by all participants, and his leadership style is highly relational. Read more of Nils' somewhat coherent thoughts on relationship on his blog.Nils offers guidance and insight for those seeking a more connected, wholehearted way of relating to themselves and others.
Bodywork
Through curiosity and attuned touch Nils guides the receiver into a state of present awareness, where they can open up to the bliss and relaxation available to them, while making space to feel any emotions along the way.Nils' bodywork sessions are often described as deeply relaxing and rejuvenating.See the bodywork page to learn more.
Nils also offers guided audio/video self-massage meditations on the members page. The subscription is 10$/month with one new video per month.
“The places I want to go, only softness can take me.”
Grief
From a young age, Nils was been in touch with many forms of personal and collective grief, which led him to dive into the grief tending lineages of Sobonfu Somé, Martín Prechtel, and Francis Weller.In 2025 Nils trained in grief work with Josh Fox and Siobhan Asgharzadeh and has been offering grief rituals and support groups since.
Somatics
Nils draws on his experience with somatic approaches such as Sensorimotor Psychotherapy and Somatic Experiencing to bring deeper connection to the body in this tender terrain of grief.
Community
While a lot can transform in 1:1 sessions, Nils’ work is grounded in systems theory and the understanding that deeper change happens in the context of larger, vital relationships of community, village, and culture.
Contact
You're welcome to reach out if you have any questions or curiosities!
Social Media
Follow Nils on social media:
What does it mean to be in relationship?
What does it mean to be in relationship?To be in relationship with myself?What does it mean to relate with myself as a person?How does this change the way I meet others?What is it to live in the real world?To be here, with it all.To sense into my bodyTo notice my mindAnd all the other phenomenaWhat’s real?What’s worth anything?What’s significant?What’s essence?What’s actually happening?actually happeningTo come into relationship with emotionTo relax, and feel what’s hereOften not aloneMind follows breathAnd often doesn’tScared shitlessAnd so capableIn the bodyTogetherHere nowRepetitionHow can I come more fully into this reality?How can I come more fully into relationship with myself?How can I embrace the relationality that’s always happening, that’s always present…How can I more fully be in my body?