Tenderness
A Student Mental Health Conference on Community, Self-Care, and Resiliency
Spring 2026
About the Conference
The Cabrillo College Student Health Services is excited to announce the 5th annual Mental Health Conference. This is a FREE conference that is open to the community at large.
Join us for Tenderness, an empowering conference at Cabrillo College that focuses on building stronger, more resilient communities through self-care practices and shared experiences. This interactive event brings together students, faculty, and community members to explore the essential themes of wellness, mental health, and personal growth.
Who is invited?
Students, Campus Professionals, Community Members, You!
Details
Wednesday, May 6th | 5:30 pm to 7:30 pm | Watsonville
Thursday, May 7th | 11 am to 3 pm | Aptos
Leading up to the Conference
All Spring 2026 Health Services will be hosting Bridging, a series of well-being activities to cultivate and grow wellness on campus.
Presenters
Meena Srinivasan
Carla H. Brown
Carla H. Brown is a Laughter Professional, Emotional Resiliency Coach, and GriefYoga® Teacher helping communities transform stress, grief, and overwhelm into resilience and joy. A two-time American and 2023 World Laughter Champion, she brings 17+ years of experience blending laughter, breathwork, and somatic practices to support emotional well-being, connection, and embodied aliveness in communities worldwide.
Jazz Lei Amora
Sacred Musician bridging spirit and heart into healing sonic scapes. Jazz was born in Halifax, Nova Scotia. As the daughter of Filipino immigrants, she was surrounded by their creativity and native music. These formative years engrained in her an irrevocable fascination for music and the arts. As a multi instrumentalist, she is able to fuse music from across genres of soul, R&B, devotional mantra music and medicine music. Jazz has created a unique sound that evokes a sacred, timeless ancience. Her session will begin with mindfulness and meditation/light breathwork and continue with the sound bath. Including sound immersion using perfectly tuned instruments like a gong, crystal singing bowls, harp and chimes.
Bridging | Spring 2026
Spring Well-being Activities
This spring, Cabrillo College Student Health Services is cultivating a season of wellbeing. We will be offering a variety of activities designed to nurture balance, resilience, and connection across campus. From mindfulness workshops and movement sessions to peer-led conversations and creative expression events, each experience invites students and employees to plant seeds of self-care and community.
As the semester unfolds, these moments of learning and reflection will serve as a bridge, connecting personal growth with collective support, leading up to our 5th Annual Student Mental Health Conference on May 6th & 7th. Together, we’ll celebrate how tending to our wellbeing helps us grow, bloom, and thrive, both individually and as a campus community.
Arts & Crafts
Film Screening + Discussion
Nature Walk
Mental Health First Aid Training
Stretching + Breathwork
Sound Bath
Fun & Games
Healing through Painting
Singing Heals Song Circle
Conference Schedule
Wednesday, May 6th
- 5:30 pmCheck-in + Connect
Nourishment and connection activity
Location: Room A160
- 6:15 pmSound Bath
- 7:30 pmClosing
Thursday, May 7th
- 10:30 amCheck-in
Check-in begins, arrive, settle and connect.
- 11:00 amLaughing Yoga Session
Reclaiming Joy: Laughter, Self-Compassion & Embodied Resilience
For those feeling the heaviness of the moment—personal stress as well as concerns about the deep unrest surfacing through national and world events—you are not alone. In this experiential session, we’ll gently release some of that mental and emotional weight through Laughter Yoga, GriefYoga®, joyful embodiment, and self-compassion practices that help the body process stress and reconnect to a grounded sense of aliveness.
Anchored in the neuroscience of connection and emotional regulation, we’ll explore how joy and shared laughter can shift our physiology—activating positive chemistry in the brain, reducing stress hormones, and strengthening our natural resilience. This session invites participants to meet their difficult emotions with compassion while also reconnecting to joy and community. By bonding through positivity rather than stress, participants experience how humans are naturally wired for connection, leaving with practical tools to support emotional well-being in daily life.
Facilitator:
Carla H. Brown | Joyful Coaching and Training
Location: HORT 5005
- 12:00 pmLunch
Location: HORT 5005
- 1:00 pmAn Interactive Workshop with Meena Srinivasan
Healing Burnout with a Wise and Tender Heart
Burnout has become a defining experience of our time. For many students, faculty, and community members, especially in community college settings where people are balancing work, family responsibilities, and school, the pressures can feel relentless.
In this interactive workshop, contemplative educator and author Meena Srinivasan offers a grounded and hopeful approach to understanding and healing burnout. Rather than offering quick fixes, this session acknowledges the systemic realities that contribute to burnout while helping participants reconnect with their own agency and inner resources.
Drawing on research in burnout and self-compassion, participants will explore the three core drivers of burnout, lack of community, emotional exhaustion, and loss of efficacy, and learn practical strategies that support resilience and well-being.
Through reflection, small group conversation, and practical exercises, attendees will leave with concrete tools they can begin using immediately to support themselves and those around them.
Learning Objectives:
Participants will walk away with:
• A clearer understanding of what burnout is and what causes it
• Practical self-compassion strategies that build resilience
• A personal commitment to one concrete practice that supports well-being
• A renewed sense of agency, hope, and possibilityThis workshop is designed to be highly interactive and accessible to a diverse audience of students, educators, and community members.
Length:
90-120 min
Location: HORT 5005
- 3:00 pmClosing
Conference Ends