• Introduction to the course and what you can expect from this journey

• A personal lens on how masking can take shape across different areas of life

• Space to begin recognizing your own experiences

• Journaling Activity: “When did you first realize you were masking?”

• A grounded, easy-to-understand look at what masking is

• Insight into how identity and lived experience can shape masking patterns

• Exploration of the deeper reasons masking develops

• Worksheet Activity: Begin identifying signs you may be masking

• Explore the deeper emotional impact of long-term masking

• Recognize how masking can show up in your body and energy levels

• Examine the ways it can affect your identity and relationships

• Reflection Exercise: “Who am I when no one’s watching?”

• A realistic approach to unmasking as a gradual, personal process

• Begin building a sense of self-trust and internal safety

• Explore how to make intentional choices around when and where to unmask

• Downloadable Resource: Unmasking boundary-setting guide

• Explore ways to better support your sensory and emotional needs

• Develop communication approaches that feel more aligned with who you are

• Identify what safety looks like for you in people and environments

• Activity: Create your “Authenticity Affirmations” list

• Explore what it can look like to move through everyday life with more authenticity

• Navigate relationships and environments while staying grounded in who you are

• Prepare for and process potential misunderstandings or resistance

• Reconnect with and celebrate your identity and strengths

• Encouragement and reflections to support you beyond the course

• A simple, grounded introduction to how sensory processing works

• Insight into different ways sensory experiences can show up

• Explore how overwhelm can impact your body and mind

• Real-life examples to help you recognize your own patterns

• Activity: Sensory checklist to begin mapping your unique sensory profile

• Learn how to recognize early signs of sensory overwhelm

• Explore different types of triggers and how they may show up for you

• Begin noticing patterns in your sensory experiences over time

• Worksheet Activity: Sensory trigger diary template

• Explore different types of sensory supports and how they can be used

• Learn ways to soothe and regulate during moments of overwhelm

• Begin incorporating supportive sensory breaks into your daily life

• Activity: Build your personal sensory toolkit based on what works for you

• Explore how your environment shapes your sensory experience

• Discover ways to make everyday spaces feel more supportive

• Begin creating areas that promote comfort and regulation

• Downloadable Resource: Sensory-friendly space checklist

• Learn ways to express your sensory experiences to others

• Explore how to advocate for support across different environments

• Begin developing language that reflects your needs and boundaries

• Activity: Practice creating your own sensory needs statement

• Learn to recognize when your system may be reaching its limits

• Explore ways to build sustainable sensory support into your daily life

• Navigate the balance between your needs and everyday responsibilities

• Closing Reflection: Create your personalized sensory self-care action plan

• Explore workplace rights and protections for neurodivergent employees

• Learn different approaches to requesting support and accommodations

• Gain insight into workplace adjustments that may improve daily functioning

• Activity: Begin drafting your own accommodation request

• Learn to recognize different forms of workplace bias and exclusion

• Explore how race and neurodivergence can shape workplace experiences

• Develop strategies for navigating difficult workplace dynamics

• Reflection Activity: Journal about personal experiences with bias or misunderstanding

• Explore ways to communicate more clearly and confidently in the workplace

• Learn approaches to setting boundaries with coworkers and supervisors

• Develop tools for advocating for your needs with less guilt and self-doubt

• Activity: Practice self-advocacy and boundary-setting scripts

• Learn to recognize signs of neurodivergent burnout and chronic stress

• Explore supportive routines for navigating workplace demands

• Discover ways to regulate overwhelm throughout the workday

• Worksheet Activity: Create your personalized burnout prevention plan

• Explore ways to build healthier and more supportive workplace connections

• Learn how to identify allies, mentors, and safe professional relationships

• Navigate workplace social dynamics while staying grounded in your authenticity

• Activity: Map your workplace support system

• Explore ways to approach career growth and professional change with intention

• Learn how to balance authenticity with long-term career goals

• Develop strategies for navigating workplace obstacles and uncertainty

• Reflection Activity: Clarify your career vision and next steps

• Explore how neurodivergence and cultural experiences can shape relationships and social expectations

• Recognize common relationship patterns, challenges, and strengths

• Reflect on how past experiences may have influenced the way you connect with others

• Journaling Activity: Describe a relationship where you felt truly understood

• Explore different communication styles and how they can affect relationships

• Learn ways to communicate more clearly and intentionally with others

• Build greater awareness of your personal communication preferences and needs

• Activity: Practice expressing your needs in different social situations

• Worksheet Activity: Communication check-in to identify your preferred communication styles

• Explore what healthy boundaries can look like in different types of relationships

• Learn ways to communicate limits and navigate discomfort or pushback

• Build greater confidence in protecting your emotional and mental well-being

• Worksheet Activity: Practice navigating boundary-setting scenarios

• Reflection Activity: Recall a time you successfully set a boundary and what supported you in that moment

• Explore how family roles, expectations, and cultural experiences can shape relationships

• Learn strategies for managing conflict and creating emotional space when needed

• Reflect on the difference between supportive and challenging relationship dynamics

• Journaling Activity: Reflect on the kind of support you need right now and ways to begin building support if it’s currently missing

• Explore what supportive and neurodivergent-friendly friendships can look like

• Learn how to balance connection, energy levels, and social needs

• Reflect on the qualities that matter most to you in friendships

• Activity: Create your ideal friend profile

• Worksheet Activity: Friendship boundary checklist

• Explore ways to navigate dating and romantic relationships with greater self-awareness

• Learn how to communicate needs, boundaries, and consent more clearly

• Recognize the importance of safety, regulation, and self-care within relationships

• Reflection Activity: Define what a healthy romantic relationship looks like for you

• Explore the connection between neurodivergence and mental health experiences

• Learn about common emotional challenges, misconceptions, and patterns

• Build greater awareness of your current mental and emotional well-being

• Self-Assessment Activity: Reflect on your current mental health patterns and needs

• Journaling Activity: Describe what mental wellness means to you

• Explore how anxiety and depression can show up within neurodivergent experiences

• Learn about emotional regulation, stress patterns, and the mind-body connection

• Build greater awareness of personal triggers and coping patterns

• Activity: Anxiety and depression tracking journal

• Reflection Activity: Reflect on tools or strategies that have helped you through difficult moments

• Explore how burnout can uniquely impact autistic Black women

• Learn to recognize early warning signs and patterns of overwhelm

• Build greater awareness of what contributes to emotional and physical exhaustion

• Worksheet Activity: Personal burnout warning signs checklist

• Journaling Activity: Reflect on the practices and environments that help you recharge

• Explore different approaches to emotional regulation and stress management

• Learn sensory-friendly tools and supportive coping practices

• Begin building a self-care approach that feels realistic and sustainable for you

• Reflection Activity: Identify the routines, tools, or environments that support your well-being most

• Explore what supportive, culturally aware, and neurodivergent-affirming care can look like

• Learn ways to prepare for therapy, medical appointments, and support services

• Build greater confidence in communicating your mental health needs

• Worksheet Activity: Questions to help guide conversations with healthcare providers

• Strengthening social supports and community connections

• Developing long-term mental health plans

• Reflection: Your resilience story — times you overcame challenges

• Journaling prompt: Who are your key supports, and how can you nurture those connections?

• Explore how intersecting identities can shape lived experiences and self-perception

• Learn about the impact of systems, bias, and social expectations

• Build greater awareness of the different identities and experiences you carry

• Reflection Activity: Map and reflect on your intersecting identities

• Journaling Activity: Explore how your identities have influenced your experiences and relationships with the world around you

• Explore important rights and protections across different areas of life

• Learn about different forms of advocacy and how they can show up in everyday situations

• Identify your personal strengths, values, and areas for growth in self-advocacy

• Worksheet Activity: Reflect on your advocacy strengths and goals

• Activity: Set personal advocacy goals aligned with your needs and values

• Learn ways to communicate your needs with greater clarity and confidence

• Explore how to navigate difficult conversations, pushback, and misunderstanding

• Build stronger self-advocacy skills across personal and professional environments

• Activity: Practice advocacy conversations through guided role-play scenarios

• Reflection Activity: Reflect on a time you advocated for yourself and what supported you in that moment

• Explore ways to prepare for appointments, evaluations, and support meetings

• Learn about accessing accommodations, resources, and support services

• Build greater confidence in navigating systems that may feel overwhelming or inaccessible

• Resource List: Supportive providers, programs, and community resources

• Worksheet Activity: Checklist for preparing for healthcare or education appointments

• Explore the importance of supportive relationships and community connection

• Learn how advocacy and collective support can create meaningful change

• Reflect on the types of environments and people that feel safe and affirming to you

• Activity: Plan a community advocacy or support-centered project

• Journaling Activity: Reflect on the qualities you value most in allies and supportive relationships

• Explore ways to care for yourself while navigating advocacy and emotional labor

• Learn how to recognize and manage advocacy fatigue and overwhelm

• Reflect on your growth, progress, and long-term empowerment journey

• Reflection Activity: Explore what sustainable advocacy looks like for you

• Worksheet Activity: Create a personalized self-care plan for advocates

• Explore dyspraxia, motor coordination differences, and their connection to neurodivergence

• Learn about common movement, coordination, and body-awareness experiences

• Reflect on how your relationship with movement and coordination has shaped daily life

• Reflection Activity: Explore how your body feels during movement or coordination-based tasks

• Journaling Activity: Reflect on a time you felt disconnected from your body

• Explore the senses connected to body awareness, internal signals, and regulation

• Learn how these experiences can influence movement, emotions, and everyday functioning

• Build greater awareness of how your body communicates stress, comfort, and overwhelm

• Activity: Guided body scan and mindfulness exercise

• Worksheet Activity: Track body signals, patterns, and sensory experiences over time

• Explore supportive movement practices and adaptive approaches to coordination

• Learn ways to build motor skills with greater patience, safety, and self-compassion

• Reflect on the types of movement that feel calming, enjoyable, or regulating to you

• Reflection Activity: Identify movement activities that support your comfort and confidence

• Activity: Create a personalized movement and coordination support plan

• Explore mindfulness and grounding practices that support body awareness and regulation

• Learn techniques that may help with sensory overwhelm and nervous system support

• Build greater awareness of the connection between movement, presence, and emotional well-being

• Worksheet Activity: Self-care checklist for body awareness and movement support

• Journaling Activity: Reflect on how feeling connected to your body affects your mood, energy, and regulation

• Explore the different skills connected to executive functioning and daily life management

• Learn how executive functioning differences can show up inconsistently across tasks and environments

• Build greater awareness of your personal strengths, challenges, and patterns

• Reflection Activity: Reflect on when your brain feels most supported or most overwhelmed

• Journaling Activity: Explore a task that feels difficult or overwhelming and why it may affect you that way

• Explore how energy, focus, and productivity patterns can shift from day to day

• Learn to recognize triggers connected to procrastination, fatigue, and overwhelm

• Build greater awareness of your executive functioning strengths and challenges

• Worksheet Activity: Executive functioning triggers and strengths chart

• Activity: Track daily tasks, energy levels, and productivity patterns over time

• Explore supportive tools and systems for organization, planning, and daily functioning

• Learn ways to break overwhelming tasks into more manageable steps

• Build greater awareness of the strategies that best support your brain and routines

• Reflection Activity: Reflect on tools that have helped you in the past and new approaches you’d like to explore

• Activity: Build your personalized executive functioning support toolkit

• Explore how self-judgment and unrealistic expectations can impact neurodivergent well-being

• Learn ways to approach productivity, goals, and progress with greater self-compassion

• Build healthier expectations that align with your needs, capacity, and strengths

• Worksheet Activity: Self-compassion affirmations and supportive goal-setting exercises

• Journaling Activity: Write a compassionate letter to yourself about productivity, effort, and growth

• Explore how media, social conditioning, and stereotypes shape self-worth and relationship expectations

• Learn how neurodivergence can affect emotional processing and social experiences

• Recognize patterns of pedestalization, performance, and objectification

• Journaling Activity: Reflect on times you felt rewarded for being who others wanted instead of your authentic self

• Explore emotional, physical, and financial boundaries in relationships

• Learn to recognize discomfort, intuition, and signs that someone may be crossing your limits

• Reflect on experiences of being misunderstood, objectified, or treated as a performance instead of a person

• Activity: Create a personal boundary map with non-negotiables and flexible boundaries

• Explore how objectification, manipulation, and control can appear in relationships and social dynamics

• Learn how neurodivergence may affect recognizing or responding to unhealthy behavior

• Build awareness of patterns like gaslighting, emotional control, and exploitation

• Reflect on ways to protect your identity, boundaries, and self-worth in difficult situations

• Activity: Practice identifying red flags and drafting empowered responses through case study exercises

• Explore healing after invalidation, exploitation, or unhealthy relationship dynamics

• Learn ways to rebuild self-worth outside of external validation

• Discover emotional regulation and grounding practices supportive of neurodivergent needs

• Reflect on the connection between self-respect, boundaries, and emotional safety

• Exercise: Guided journaling and reflection — “What I deserve vs. what I’ve been settling for”

• Explore what healthy, respectful, and emotionally safe relationships can look like

• Learn to recognize the difference between genuine care and performative interest or access

• Build confidence in communicating needs, boundaries, and desires more clearly

• Reflect on how your lived experiences shape the type of connection and support you truly need

• Exercise: Create your personal relationship blueprint, including values, boundaries, and relationship red flags

Sustaining your growth and confidence in all areas of life.

• Lessons:

  • Owning your narrative — no apologies for your boundaries

  • Refusing to celebrate people who don’t deserve it

  • Celebrating your individuality and neurodivergent strengths

  • Cultivating resilience, self-compassion, and agency

Exercise: Affirmation journal + vision board of life and relationships you deserve

• Explore the connection between autism, chronic pain, nervous system dysregulation, and long-term stress

• Learn about sensory processing, survival mode, and common co-occurring physical conditions

• Reflect on how masking, burnout, and chronic stress can impact the body over time

• Activity: Body History Reflection

• Explore interoception and how autistic people may experience body signals differently

• Learn about delayed recognition of pain, discomfort, hunger, fatigue, and emotional distress

• Reflect on sensory amplification, underrecognition, and disconnect from bodily needs

• Discover how emotional and physical experiences can overlap within the nervous system

• Activity: Interoception Tracking Worksheet

• Explore common physical health conditions that can co-occur with autism and impact daily life

• Learn about hypermobility, dyspraxia, fatigue, migraines, gastrointestinal issues, and nervous system dysregulation

• Reflect on patterns within your body, energy levels, movement, and physical health experiences

• Activity: Symptom and body pattern mapping exercise

• Explore the connection between autistic burnout, chronic stress, and physical exhaustion

• Learn how masking, overwhelm, and nervous system overload can affect the body over time

• Reflect on shutdowns, fatigue cycles, and the importance of rest and regulation

• Discover supportive recovery and nervous system care strategies

• Activity: Create a personalized burnout recovery plan

• Explore medical gaslighting, dismissal, and healthcare inequities affecting autistic people

• Learn ways to communicate symptoms more clearly and prepare for medical appointments

• Reflect on the importance of self-advocacy, support systems, and trusting your lived experiences

• Build confidence navigating healthcare spaces more effectively

• Activity: Create your personal healthcare advocacy toolkit

• Explore long-term wellness through energy awareness, pacing, and nervous system support

• Learn sensory-friendly practices and routines that support recovery and regulation

• Reflect on rebuilding trust with your body while creating sustainable habits and boundaries

• Build a personalized approach to long-term care and well-being

• Activity: Create your personal wellness blueprint

• Explore the emotional transition that can happen after burnout and chronic survival states

• Learn about the “now what?” phase many autistic adults experience during recovery

• Reflect on grief, lost time, identity shifts, and rebuilding purpose after exhaustion

• Build language for experiences that often feel isolating or difficult to explain

• Explore how masking and burnout can impact identity, self-expression, and personal goals

• Reflect on the difference between authentic traits and survival-based behaviors

• Learn why disconnection from past dreams, interests, or versions of yourself can be a normal part of recovery

• Begin rebuilding a sense of self rooted in authenticity rather than performance

• Explore a healthier relationship with energy, capacity, and long-term sustainability after burnout

• Learn to recognize early signs of overwhelm and emotional exhaustion before reaching crisis points

• Build greater awareness of pacing, rest, and realistic goal-setting in daily life and future planning

• Reflect on the difference between productivity-driven living and energy-conscious living

• Explore how traditional ideas of success and productivity can contribute to burnout and self-pressure

• Learn to redefine ambition, purpose, and achievement in more sustainable and affirming ways

• Reflect on the difference between visible success and fulfillment that genuinely supports your well-being

• Build greater awareness of how to pursue goals without abandoning your needs or identity

• Explore the complicated relationship between burnout, joy, and personal interests

• Learn why special interests may feel muted, overwhelming, or emotionally difficult to reconnect with after burnout

• Build a safer, more compassionate approach to curiosity, creativity, and engagement

• Reflect on how shame, fear, or pressure may have impacted your connection to the things you love

Exercises:

• low-pressure curiosity exploration

• structured “interest sampling”

• Explore ways to turn interests, passions, and natural strengths into meaningful opportunities

• Learn how autistic traits can become valuable assets in the right environments and communities

• Build greater clarity around purpose, direction, and sustainable personal growth

• Reflect on the connection between curiosity, skills, values, and long-term fulfillment

• Explore goal-setting approaches that support flexibility, sustainability, and nervous system health

• Learn how rigid expectations, shame, and pressure can contribute to repeated burnout cycles

• Build greater awareness of capacity-based planning, rest, and adaptable timelines

• Reflect on how to pursue growth without tying your worth to constant productivity

• Explore how environment, routine, and lifestyle can impact long-term well-being and recovery

• Learn ways to create work, living, and social structures that feel more supportive and sustainable

• Build greater awareness of sensory needs, emotional safety, and recovery-focused routines

• Reflect on the importance of building goals around stability rather than chronic survival

• Explore gentle, sustainable ways to begin moving toward a more aligned and meaningful life

• Learn how to approach change through low-pressure experimentation instead of perfectionism or urgency

• Build confidence through small steps, curiosity, and realistic momentum

• Reflect on what it means to pursue purpose without abandoning your nervous system needs

• Explore femininity beyond stereotypes and performance

• Learn how emotional expression, receptivity, self-care, and intuition can show up in different ways

• Reflect on the pressure to perform hyper-feminine ideals for acceptance

• Activity: Identify your natural feminine qualities

• Journaling Prompt: Release the belief that you must perform femininity to “qualify”

• Explore how survival roles, generational expectations, and cultural history shaped Black femininity

• Reflect on strength, self-sufficiency, and emotional pressure placed on Black women across generations

• Activity: Explore themes from bell hooks on Black womanhood, love, and societal expectations

• Explore how misogynoir uniquely impacts Black women and self-perception

• Learn about stereotypes such as the “Strong Black Woman,” “Angry Black Woman,” Jezebel, and caretaker archetypes

• Reflect on how pressure, fetishization, and social expectations can affect softness, safety, and self-expression

• Activity: Reflect on stereotypes or expectations that have shaped how you present yourself to others

• Explore how media, film, music, and social platforms have shaped perceptions of Black femininity

• Learn about stereotypes rooted in early Hollywood, minstrel imagery, and modern media portrayals

• Reflect on how expectations around aggression, resilience, and hypersexuality influence public reactions and self-image

• Activity: Reflect on how media has influenced your view of yourself or other Black women

• Explore how stereotypes and social expectations can shape self-image and emotional safety

• Reflect on internalized strength, discomfort with softness, and fear around vulnerability

• Learn how femininity and vulnerability can change the way Black women are perceived and treated

• Activity: Reflect on when softness first felt unsafe and the reactions you received when showing vulnerability

• Explore why changes in identity, confidence, and self-expression can create strong reactions from others

• Learn how people may respond when you no longer fit the role they benefited from or expected

• Reflect on backlash, criticism, fascination, or hostility without internalizing shame

• Activity: Reflect on how reclaiming your femininity has changed the way others respond to you

• Explore the relationship between femininity, visibility, and safety for Black women

• Learn how softness, boundaries, and situational awareness can coexist without constant hypervigilance

• Reflect on survival behaviors, emotional protection, and self-preservation strategies

• Activity: Reflect on where you first learned hardness as a survival tool

• Explore the fear that softness means weakness or vulnerability to exploitation

• Learn how assertiveness, emotional boundaries, and femininity can coexist

• Reflect on nurturing yourself instead of existing only in service to others

• Discover how softness can be intentional, protected, and self-defined rather than helpless

• Activity: Reflect on what reclaiming your femininity looks like for you

• Explore body image, sensuality, and femininity through a self-defined lens

• Learn how hypersexualization, body shame, colorism, and Eurocentric beauty standards can affect self-perception

• Reflect on reconnecting with your body in ways that feel safe, affirming, and authentic

• Activity: Reflect on what helps you feel most comfortable, confident, and connected to your body

• Explore how autistic women are often judged against neurotypical expectations of femininity

• Reflect on labels like “too blunt,” “too serious,” or “not ladylike” and how they shape self-image

• Learn how femininity can exist alongside autistic traits, interests, and communication styles

• Activities: Reflect on traits not considered “traditionally feminine” and explore whether feminine vs. masculine traits are truly gender-specific

• Explore femininity as something personal, flexible, and self-defined rather than performative

• Reflect on how you naturally express yourself through style, affection, communication, and presence

• Learn to build routines and environments that feel grounding, soft, and authentic to you

• Activity: Create a femininity mood board (optional) and write your own personal definition of femininity