Why the Wheel of Consent® belongs in every therapist and educator’s toolkit
I’ve done a lot of professional training over the years, in counselling, creative arts therapies, coaching and somatic sex education. I’ve studied ethics in detail. I’ve learned the theory, passed the assessments, practiced the protocols and sought supervision for ethical dilemmas. But nothing has shaped how I show up with others in my work in real-time, in relationship, and with deeply embodied integrity quite like the Wheel of Consent®. And no training has embedded that framework more powerfully than Like A Pro®.
This November 2025, I’ll be assisting the Like A Pro® training in Meanjin/Brisbane, and I want to share a little of why this work feels so essential, not only in my own practice, but in the wider conversation about what it means to work ethically, relationally, and consentfully with others.
More than just a cool or useful idea
The Wheel of Consent®, developed by Dr. Betty Martin, is a deceptively simple map, but what it reveals is deep, layered, and often transformative. It’s not just about boundaries and agreements. It’s about how we give and receive. How we navigate power. How we access choice. And how we communicate what’s true for us in the body.
In my own professional development, and now in my upcoming PhD research, I keep returning to the question: What does it mean to practice consent not just as a cognitive idea, but as a felt, lived, relational skill?
Because understanding ethics is one thing, but living them, in the room, with your clients, students, or communities, is another.
What is Like A Pro®?
Like A Pro® is a 5-day professional training in the Wheel of Consent® taught by School of Consent Faculty. It is designed for people who work closely with others, whether through touch, words, education, or care. The training begins with you: your body, your boundaries, your patterns of giving and receiving. From there, it gradually builds toward how these insights can be applied in your work with clients, students, or communities.
The extended format allows time to slow down, notice, and integrate the somatic learning, rather than rushing to intellectual understanding. Through experiential exercises and structured practices, participants learn how to bring ethical, empowering, and consent-based relating into their professional lives, not just in theory, but in embodied, relational practice.
In this short video, I sit down with fellow certified Wheel of Consent® facilitator Susan Stark to share my journey with the Wheel. I speak about how this practice has deeply influenced me personally and professionally, shaped the way I show up in the world, and inspired the focus of my current academic research.
We touch on what makes this work so unique, and why I’m honoured to be assisting at the Like a Pro® training in Meanjin/Brisbane this November.
Vanessa Vance shares how the Wheel of Consent has shaped her personal and professional journey, and how it informs her upcoming PhD research into embodied consent and relational learning.
Who is Like A Pro® for?
Like A Pro® doesn’t just teach you about the Wheel. It gives you structured, embodied methods for integrating it into how you work, how you lead, and how you connect. Some areas covered include:
Embodied ethics: Learn to move beyond theoretical ethics by practicing real-time, embodied awareness of power, choice, and responsibility.
Stronger boundaries: Gain practical tools for navigating your own and others’ boundaries with clarity and care.
Clearer communication: Develop skills to support others in expressing their yes, no, and maybe and refine how you make requests and set limits.
Trauma-informed empowerment: Create safer, more empowering environments by centring agency, mutuality, and consent.
Practical tools you can use: Walk away with accessible practices you can immediately apply in therapy, education, or group work.
This training is for anyone who works with people and wants to bring more clarity, choice, and ethical care to what they do. That might mean:
Practitioners who offer one-way or two-way touch
Bodyworkers, coaches, or counsellors
Facilitators, educators, or group leaders
Professionals in health, human services, or community-based care
You don’t need to be a touch professional to benefit. You just need to be someone who wants to align your work with the values of respect, transparency, empowerment, and integrity in a way that’s felt, not just said.
A personal invitation
If this work speaks to you, even if you’re not quite sure why yet, I encourage you to explore it further.
You’re welcome to reach out if you want to talk about what the training involves, or whether it feels like a fit. I’m happy to share more about my experience, and what it’s been like to bring this work into both my practice and research.
Ethics aren’t something we just know. They’re something we practice, over and over, with care. This training is one of the best places I know to do that.
There are only two Like A Pro® trainings in Australasia in 2025.
Naarm/Melbourne October 22-26
Meanjin/Brisbane November 5-9
Both will be lead by School of Consent Faculty, Stella Topaz and Marcia Bacynski. I am assisting in Meanjin/Brisbane with Susan Stark and Tia Cloher.
Partial scholarships are available for those who are part of or working with marginalised communities.
For more info and applications: schoolofconsent.org/like-a-pro
I'm always happy to have a conversation.
If you're curious about the training or wondering whether it's the right next step for your professional growth, feel free to reach out. If Like A Pro® doesn’t feel right for you this time but you are interested in finding out more about the Wheel of Consent® feel free to send me a message or sign up to my newsletter. I will be offering other kinds of workshops on the Wheel of Consent® soon.