Description
The role of “father” — or second parent — is not dependent on gender. Any person who steps into a child’s life as a primary provider, protector, or play-partner embodies this archetypal role. In childhood, this role carries three essential functions: protection, provision, and play. When these are present, children develop confidence, a sense of safety, and the inner permission to explore and delight in the world. When they are missing or distorted, the impact travels with us into adulthood, shaping the way we relate to ourselves, others, and life itself.
The Broken Father Field is a term that describes what happens when a father uses his negative ideas about his child or children to stabilize his own nervous system, keeping himself safe from his unhealed trauma, shame, or overwhelm. Instead of receiving protection, provision, and play, the child becomes responsible for the parent’s emotional balance — often because the child has internalized the father’s unconscious contracts to use the child, such as “I, the father, will believe my kid is weak and incompetent in order not to feel my own shame.” These broken fields can entangle our internal play circuitry with fear, rage, compulsive seeking, or avoidance, leaving us without the inner experience of vitality and supportive strength that a father is meant to bring.
In this course, we will explore the neuroscience of fathering, including the remarkable differences in how children’s brains respond to paternal play, presence, and engagement. We will work with Sarah Peyton’s healing modalities of unconscious contracts, time travel, and resonance to unwind the father’s trauma from our own, releasing what was never ours to carry. Together, we will:
- Identify the patterns of the Broken Father Field and how they show up in our work, relationships, and inner world
- Release unconscious contracts that we inherited from our fathers’ wounds and the ways they saw us
- Time-travel into our fathers’ histories to create compassionate separation between their suffering and our own identities
- Meet the father’s critical inner voice and understand how its echoes have shaped our self-concept
- Restore the essential functions of protection, provision, and play within our adult selves
This course will support both clients and practitioners in recognizing how the Broken Father Field appears in relational and helping contexts. Participants will develop greater clarity around when others are responding to them through these broken patterns and will gain tools to remain grounded, warm, and self-connected in the face of these dynamics.
The work we do together will be deep, spacious, and transformative. Expect to come away with a renewed sense of inner support, a clearer relationship with the paternal line, and a more embodied experience of safety, resource, and joyful play. Together, we will begin restoring what the essential father role makes possible: steadiness, aliveness, and the unwavering sense that we are worth protecting and providing for.
Where?
The course will meet via zoom. We welcome participants from all time zones who wish to learn asynchronously for some or all of the sessions. Recordings and visuals will be made available to those who are registered for the live program (typically available within 72 hours of the live session).
When?
Starts: February 10, 2026
Ends: March 24, 2026
7 weeks, no skips
Day of Week: Tuesday
Time: 10:30 AM – 11:55 AM Pacific Time
Click Here to convert to your time zone
What To Expect
This course is taught by both Sarah Peyton and Jaya Manske.
What You'll Learn
Week 1 – February 10, 2026 – Protecting, Providing, and Play: How Fathers Change Their Kids’ Brains
Week 2 – February 17, 2026 – How Fathers Use Their Children to Stabilize Themselves
Week 3 – February 24, 2026 – Carrying the Father’s Trauma: Releasing Our Own Contracts of Loyalty
Week 4 – March 3, 2026 – Father’s Windows of Welcome: Widening the Windows of Welcome of the Dads Inside Us
Week 5 – March 10, 2026 – Restoring the Flow of Worth: The Father’s Line – taught by Jaya Manske
Week 6 – March 17, 2026 – Recognizing and Releasing the Default Mode Network: The Father’s Critical Inner Voice
Week 7 – March 24, 2026 – Releasing the Links Between Play and Violence
Who is This Course For?
This course is open to anyone, from beginners to experienced practitioners, who wants to understand how fathering patterns shape confidence, play, authority, and inner support. It is especially supportive for:
- People who notice an inner critical voice, pressure to perform, or difficulty resting into joy or play
- Those who sense unresolved dynamics with fathers, step-parents, or other paternal figures affecting their adult lives
- Practitioners, therapists, and spaceholders who notice sudden shifts in themselves or clients — such as loss of ground, rigidity, collapse, or aggression — when paternal dynamics are activated
- Anyone interested in unwinding inherited contracts around worth, competence, protection, and provision This course supports both personal healing and professional practice.
Participants will gain clarity about when Broken Father Field dynamics are present, and develop the capacity to remain grounded, warm, and self-connected — even when these patterns arise in relational or helping contexts.
This Course Includes Resonant Assistant Support
Assistant support is available during classes. There are three ways this happens:
- In groups of three with one assistant and two participants, so that participants can practice the breakout exercises with support.
- In small groups, with 1 assistant and 3+ participants, with work with one participant occurring by lottery, and the remaining participants observing.
- Depending on assistant availability, the third option is 1-1 support to receive resonant processes like time travel and unconscious contracts for material that comes up during class.
Cost
$270 Early Bird
$300 Regular Price
Scholarship Information
Partial scholarships may be available for this course. For more information, please write to help@sarahpeyton.com after February 3, 2026.
Please Note:
- Your tuition payment is non-refundable (but it is transferable).
- This course will be recorded for those who want to learn asynchronously for some or all sessions.
- This work is not therapy and is not a substitute for therapy. If you have a sense that you would be destabilized by yourself or others speaking about difficult events, then this course may not be for you. While we hope that the processes and information that we share can be of use in your journey, we do not have the resources to support extreme psychological difficulties.
