Avri Spilka

02/12/2025

Hi everyone, I'm running workshops next year on CNMs, here is the info for the introductory workshop. Please feel free to share.

To register please email avri@avrispilka.co.za / whatsapp on 0725442348

'Consensual non-monogamies', an introduction - We will cover the basics - but this is not just an intro to poly 101. This workshop steps into a gap when it comes to thinking about the experience of non-normative intimacy. I offer a lens that is q***r, critical and psychoanalytic; and a guided exploration shaped by extensive immersion in the research and literature on CNMs and over two decades of professional and personal experience with a life ‘q***rly lived.

Who is this for:
* If you are curious about learning more about CNMs for personal, academic, or professional reasons
* Foundation workshop for those wanting to attend the workshop on working clinically and therapeutically with ‘consensual’ non-monogamies.

04/06/2025

01/06/2025

There's an interesting 'constellation' of body concerns that can (but not always) co-occur in people who are neurodivergent. Here is some info on Ehlers Danlos Syndrome which is a connective tissue disorder.

18/04/2025

30/03/2025

This is beautiful

In Japan where I live, abortion is viewed in a different way. Here many people believe the spirits of the unborn have countless opportunities to incarnate, and so if a mother chooses not to give birth it doesn't mean the spirit can't try again. The view that the unborn are spiritual beings that deserve our love and respect is shared, but women who have abortions are spiritual beings as well, and it is their right to choose.

Even knowing this, many women will feel guilt or regret for their decision. So, if you go to cemeteries near temples one often sees statues of Jizo Bodhisattvas with hats or scarves, some holding infants in their arms (like in this photo) symbolizing infants who died and/or unborn spirits aborted or miscarried.

Women and parents will come to grieve and pray, ask for forgiveness, wish for the future happiness and return of the unborn spirit that had wanted to incarnate.

I've heard some Westerners say that the Japanese use abortion as a form of birth control. I don't think that is true at all. Most that I know take pregancy very very seriously. To have an abortion is a tragedy. But it's also a part of the cosmic cycling of spirit from life to life. In Eastern spiritual traditions, death is viewed differently, not as final. And life is deeply cherished. To some Westerners this may seem paradoxical.

~Christopher Chase

Image: Jizo Bodhisattva statue (Protector Of Children And Travelers) https://tankenjapan.com/jizo-statues-in-japan-protectors-of-children-and-travelers/

The Way of Zen – Wisdom, Compassion & Mindfulness https://creativesystemsthinking.wordpress.com/2014/10/24/the-way-of-zen-wisdom-compassion-mindfulness/

15/03/2025

03/09/2024

This can be true of any diagnosis

15/09/2023

I know I did, as did most of the people I know.
What information would have made your life easier?
Fill in the missing pieces for yourself as a start with educational conversations about the body, s*x, s*xuality and conscious parenting: https://toolsforhavingthetalks.co.za/resources/


*xeducation
*xualityeducationsouthafrica
*xualityeducation