“Racial trauma is not just emotional. It dysregulates your nervous system. It mimics PTSD,” explains LaVitta Williams.
In the heart of the Pacific Northwest – where towering evergreens, winding rivers, and snow-kissed peaks offer both beauty and solitude – Williams is cultivating something rare: a space where Black women can reconnect with nature, community, and themselves. As a behavioral health counselor and social work graduate student, and founder of Black Women Hike Spokane, Williams is reshaping what healing looks like.
But this isn’t just a hiking group. It’s a radical reimagining of mental wellness – one that pushes back against the individualism and Eurocentrism that dominate Western models of therapy. “Wellness, for us, is not a solo journey,” Williams says. “We heal in community.”
Decolonizing Wellness
Williams’ work is rooted in the understanding that Westernized therapy was never built with Black bodies, minds, or experiences in mind. “People hold trauma physically,” she says. She continues to share that before we can ‘reframe thoughts, we have to move, release, and reconnect with our bodies.”
This critique of popular models like cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT) isn’t theoretical–it comes from experience. “CBT focuses on changing your thoughts to change your behavior. But for many of us, healing doesn’t start in the mind–it starts in the body.”
Raised between Spokane and Senegal, Williams brings a transcontinental perspective. She describes traditional West African healing as deeply communal: rooted in storytelling, spirituality, movement, and mutual care. “Individuality doesn’t promote healing – especially in communities of color. We need spaces where we can be seen without having to justify why we’re showing up the way we’re showing up.”
The Land Remembers
While the outdoors is often framed as a site of healing, for Black Americans, nature can be fraught with inherited fear. “There’s intergenerational trauma connected to the land,” Williams explains. From slave patrols to sharecropping to modern environmental racism, Black people’s relationship to nature has been systematically distorted.
“A lot of Black folks say they’re afraid to hike,” she shares. “They don’t always know why, but that fear has been passed down. It’s tied to what our ancestors endured.”
Even a peaceful trail can trigger deep discomfort: Will I be stared at? Will I be safe? Will someone call the police because I ‘look suspicious’? These aren’t hypotheticals–they’re historical patterns playing out in real time.
Black Women Hike Spokane offers a counter-narrative. It’s a space for Black women to be outdoors on their own terms – to move, rest, and exist without the burden of explaining their presence. Healing on the trail is about more than breathwork and boots – it’s about reclaiming psychological safety and collective belonging.
Movement as Medicine
Williams’ approach to wellness is deeply somatic and culturally grounded. She integrates the science of movement with the lived realities of Black communities:
- Trauma lives in the body: Whether it’s systemic stress or racial microaggressions, the body stores these tensions. Movement–walking, stretching, hiking–helps release it.
- Activating the vagus nerve: Gentle, rhythmic movement soothes the nervous system, shifting the body out of fight-or-flight mode.
- Endorphins and serotonin: Physical activity boosts these natural mood regulators, improving emotional resilience.
- Sunlight and cortisol regulation: Outdoor exposure lowers stress hormones and boosts vitamin D – critical in combating seasonal depression, especially in sun-limited regions like the Inland Northwest.
Still, Williams acknowledges the barriers. “Even I struggle in winter,” she says. “It’s hard to move when it’s gray and cold.” Her advice? Start small. Ten minutes outside. A walk around the block. A kitchen dance session. “If it feels like a chore, you’re less likely to stick with it. Find what brings you joy – even if it’s quiet, even if it’s just for you.”
Healing Isn’t a Hashtag
Wellness isn’t one-size-fits-all. And it definitely isn’t a social media trend. “A lot of wellness content isn’t created with us in mind,” Williams says. “We have to listen to our bodies – not the algorithm.”
She encourages people to define healing on their own terms. Whether that means hiking every weekend or stretching before bed, it’s valid. “You don’t have to perform wellness. You just have to live it.”
Black Women Hike Spokane’s Next Chapter
After early pushback – including safety concerns from those resistant to the group’s mission – Williams restructured Black Women Hike Spokane to protect its members. Today, participants register privately, and hike locations are shared confidentially.
Her long-term vision? Turning the initiative into a nonprofit that removes barriers – financial, emotional and systemic – to nature-based healing. That includes:
- Providing quality gear like hiking boots, hydration packs, and outdoor apparel
- Covering park entry fees and offering annual passes
- Hosting safety and navigation workshops
- Organizing restorative retreats centered around Black women’s wellness
- Partnering with schools and community organizations for greater access
Williams asserts that you don’t need to perform healing – you need to live it. And sometimes the most radical thing you can do for your wellness is to step away from the noise and listen to yourself. “We have to reject the ‘strong Black woman’ narrative and start centering care, softness, and support for ourselves.”
The solution is a clear mandate to decolonize wellness. We have to start with understanding that colonization taught us to see whiteness as the standard – the algorithm that subconsciously defines our actions. So when Black people create space for themselves, it’s seen as exclusionary, or even a threat, instead of restorative and necessary. “Representation alone can be healing,” she says. At its heart, Black Women Hike Spokane is not only about healing on the trail – it’s about rewriting the narrative around who belongs there.
Threaded through every step she takes is a truth that refuses to be silenced: we don’t need permission to heal. And we never did.