Out of the Box Counselling & Collaborations

06/24/2025

Pride month wouldn’t be possible without the legacies of Indigenous Two-Spirit, Indigiq***r and LGBTQ+ ancestors around the world having gone before us. We celebrate our diverse ways of knowing and being because we understand that there is wear and tear to our identities being politicized. Two-Spirit, Indigiq***r, and LGBTQ+ experiences are political. Being Indigenous, Two-Spirit or q***r is political in systems and structures that have tried to erase these identities and histories from our collective memory and from the land. We know that the struggle to dismantle systems of oppression like racism, homophobia, biphobia, and transphobia are part of the wider challenge to dismantle colonization and domination. We celebrate the strength and courage of our communities as we carve out space to resist, survive and thrive in the wear and tear of being politicized. We celebrate of who we were, who we are and who we are going to be.

So from both of us, to all of you we wish you all a Happy Indigenous History Month and Pride Month!

[ID:] Slide 1: A large hand drum painted with a hawk that has the two spirit black and white feathers on its right wing, sits on the grass between two feet. There is a black box with white letters that says Happy Indigenous History & Pride Month with the Two-Spirit Progress Flag is stretched along the bottom of the page.
Slide 2: has a photo of Monica (short brown hair, hazel eyes and black coat) and Krystal (medium length dark brown hair, brown eyes and brown coat) smiling at the camera against a background of 6 framed of Indigenous and Palestinian art. The Two Spirit Progress Flag is stretched along the bottom.

06/17/2025

Thanks so much to the Glow Centre for inviting us to table at the Q***r Life Fair at the University of Waterloo today! Such good vibes and donuts! Drop by if you’re in the area before 3pm.

[ID] picture of my white hand holding a sprinkle covered donut. In the background you can see our table which has brochures, stickers, business cards, a letterboard and fidgets on it.

06/13/2025

We're excited to hear that another Disability Unleashed Performance night will be happening in Kitchener-Waterloo July 24th and Dec. 3, 2025! Applications are currently open for authors, artist, crafters, singers, dancers, poets, magicians, strongman acts, etc with apparent and non-apparent disabilities. Check out the video for more details!

Please contact CJ at cj@cjjanzen.com if you are interested in applying!

Do you have an Apparent or Non-Apparent disability and live near Cambridge, Ontario, Canada?! Well I'm asking you to APPLY to perform in one of my upcoming...

06/01/2025

We’re kicking off Indigenous Peoples Month & Pride with the Willow River Centre at the Kitchener Market. Come visit us! Fidget making supplies are available 😊

04/28/2025

New words like neurodiversity and neuro-conformity can help us describe our experiences and reframe them as difference rather than comparison. Understanding our ways of processing as differences can help us move towards a more compassionate way of thinking about of each other’s uniqueness.

A neurodiversity framework is choosing thread for weaving, knitting or crocheting. We don’t blame the orange thread for not being green; we simply use the orange thread in the places where orange is best featured.

We invite you to observe how often you are comparing your experience to others? How often are the people or environments in your life inviting comparison thinking? How can you validate your uniqueness? Just like the diversity of colour, we need many different types of people for strong, creative and loving community.

Read more about Neurodiversity and Neuro-conformity in our blog - link in bio



[ID]: Each slide has a cream background and two black dotted lines framing in two questions. The first slide reads: “How often do you compare yourself to other people? Do you notice any shifts when you consider that everyone has a different approach to life?“ The second slide reads: When you think about your professional or social spaces can you see ways they are encouraging neuro-conformity? Can you see or find examples of people celebrating neurodiversity?”. Below the text, scattered around the main image are three groups of yarn and tools in various colours. Centred is a hanging multi-coloured tapestry that has half circles in both top corners, a branch with leaves, and other shapes in various colours. At the bottom of the tapestry are two hands with blue sleeves weaving the tapestry threads together.

04/14/2025

Neuro-conformity is the huge amount of pressure all people experience to uphold neurotypical standards. It is also when we strive to do things in a way that reflects our perception of neurotypical standards. Neuro-conformity is one way that internalized ableism can really harm our view of ourselves and others. This pressure to conform is part of upholding colonialism.

Indigenous communities across Turtle Island and around the world share perspectives that challenge this way of understanding. As Dr. Ineese-Nash shares historically a learning and inclusive mindset in many Indigenous communities has allowed for people to work with their strengths and challenges. Further, everyone’s characteristics form and shape community as a whole.

For example, in colonial understandings, autism is a complex developmental condition with persistent “deficits” in social communication, restricted interests and repetitive behaviours (among others). Dr. Bruno shares that from a Cree perspective, Autistics have a different way of spiritually thinking and play a special role in community overall.

In what ways do these Indigenous perspectives on neurodiversity and disability impact the way that you think about yourself or other neurodivergent people in your life? In your community?

If you’d like to learn more check out our new blog and the links in our bio for more information on Dr. Ineese-Nash and Dr. Bruno’s work.

03/28/2025

It is common in conversations about neurodiversity for people to make a distinct binary between being neurodivergent and being neurotypical. This language can be helpful, at times, to understand the unique differences in our experiences.

This language can also lead to a lot of comparison. When we have binary frameworks like “neurodivergent” versus “neurotypical” it can lead to a lot of assumptions, misunderstandings and internalizing expectations that can be very harmful.

When the experience of being neurodivergent is presented as an opposite, it can lead us to conjure up ideas that neurotypical people are just getting through life with no struggle. Rather than identifying that neurotypical standards are created in our society and are a challenge, if not impossible, for everyone to maintain.

What would happen if we were to consider neuro-conformity instead of the binary “us” vs. “them” mentality of neurodivergent vs. neurotypical?

What becomes possible in our systems and communities if we examine the expectation to conform to certain standards instead of comparing ourselves to what we *think* other people are or are not capable of?

Learn more in our upcoming blog - link in bio

02/26/2025

Have you ever considered what you can learn from the stories that you don’t hear? The books we shared by Sami Schalk, Loam, Davis, and Daye Hunter offer one type of opportunity to hear perspectives often overlooked. Another amazing example of amplifying Black and Indigenous perspectives is the Proclaiming our Roots project based on the Haldimand Tract in so-called Waterloo Region. Spending time hearing and learning from Afro-Indigenous perspectives can help us all to speak truth to power.

The Proclaiming our Roots project is led by a team of African diaspora, Indigenous and allied community researchers, artists, and social service workers from Ontario and Nova Scotia. This team is working in community based research to share people’s lived experience stories that counter colonial forms of oppression, to heal and to speak truth to power. From their website they explain that:

“The Proclaiming Our Roots project is the culmination of the histories, stories and experiences of mixed Black and Indigenous Peoples on Turtle Island. This project aimed to create written, visual and narrative archives of the geographies, histories, and contemporary realities of Black-Indigenous Peoples. With over 400 years of African diasporic presence in Canada, relationships between Black and Indigenous Peoples offered a form of resistance against colonial oppression and afforded these communities an opportunity for survival.”

Listen to their digital stories on their YouTube channel for more transformative story telling - Link in bio.

02/19/2025

The level of local and global intensity in our political and social climate is a continuation of legacies of violent harm, resistance, cultural reclamation, and a manifestation of what some communities have always known. Questioning our current reality and learning from Black and Indigenous social models, leaders and communities feels all the more important. February is Black History Month, a time to celebrate Black excellence, past, present and future. It is also a time to level up our solidarity in action beyond the theme of the month so we can move towards meaningful, long-lasting change for a more equal and inclusive decolonized society. There have been so many examples of finding ways to exist in a system that does not uplift our wholeness, the books and authors in the following slides offer disability justice, liberation focused, intersectional perspectives that we could all learn from.

Here’s some questions to think about as you read these books and reflect through the month.

How will you be finding and practising solidarity for all of us?

What does Black futurism mean to you?

What Black legacy makes the most impact on you and how you approach solidarity work?

When you think about Black History Month do you spend more time on the violence experienced by Black communities? What would it be like to think about the non-Black societal systems that allow that violence to occur?

We invite you to think through the ways that you can learn, celebrate and show up for one another. We need each other now - our collective Liberation depends on it.

01/24/2025

Western ways of navigating darkness and difficult times can encourage us to avoid what is uncomfortable to stay productive. What happens though, when we stay curious about hardship in our own lives, in our local or global communities? Sometimes despair can feel like the easiest or only option, especially in our current context. Often when we understand something better, it becomes less confusing and we can see how we want to create meaningful change in our own lives and the wider world.

As we sit with the darker months of winter, there is a deeper invitation for all of us to get curious about what hardships actually feel like within us. What do these harder times need us to know to better navigate them?

Swipe for other questions to consider to help you get curious about this winter or life season.

Check out our blog Darkness Won’t Stay the Same Forever to learn more - link in bio

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[ID:] The first and last slide has a banner on the top and bottom of the page that have symbols for each season (read below for description of symbols). The middle four slides have the same template and show a blue square with a darker blue snowflake in the top left corner, a light blue and green square with a darker green vine in the top right corner, a yellow and blue square with a bright yellow spiralled sun in the bottom left corner and a red to orange square that has three autumn leaves in orange, mustard yellow and burgundy in the bottom right corner. In the center of each slide is a white circle with black words or questions surrounded by black arrows showing a cyclical motion

01/16/2025

On a global, community and seasonal level, the realities we face are the darkest and harshest that we can remember. When we are facing so much hardship in addition to the winter season, it can be hard to notice the ways that things are in fact changing in slow and steady ways. If we look closely, everything is shifting and changing all the time, the idea that winter or community struggles are fixed is an illusion we somehow have created. Patterns of nature can be a great way to connect to its this constantly changing reality. If your mind needs more evidence to believe this, go outside and check it out. Here’s some suggestions to go look for.

How do you notice the small and steady changes that sustain you through difficult periods.

Check out our blog for more on surviving these hard global, community and seasonally difficult times - link in bio



[ID:] at the bottom 2/3 of a dark blue slide has a photo or a branch covered in ice that is starting to melt in the forefront and a setting sun on a winter scene in the background. White letters at the top of the slide say the title. Below the title is a beige border around a white rectangle with black lettering featuring tips for looking at nature for signs of change.