Global Girls, Inc. encourages young girls to do their own racial healing through emotional wellness workshops
Global Girls, Inc. used a portion of their Healing Illinois funds to bring three emotional wellness workshops to girls in Southern Illinois. By teaching the girls how to develop their internal mindset and sense of strength, Global Girls encouraged self-empowerment in the face of challenges and enabled the girls to facilitate their own racial healing.
Click here for Part 1 of the Global Girls story, focused on the organization's work and the Chicago "Glow Up Summit."
BRINGING EMOTIONAL WELLNESS TO GIRLS IN SOUTHERN ILLINOIS
Global Girls is a nonprofit that empowers youth through dance, theatre and wellness. They are headquartered in Avalon Park, Chicago, but the Healing Illinois grant allowed them to bring their emotional wellness workshops to three locations in Southern Illinois: Cairo, Carbondale, and East Saint Louis.
For Executive Director Marvinetta Woodley-Penn, emotional wellness looks like teaching youth how to use their "superpowers" of choice, words, inner thoughts, and time management to face any obstacle in their path.
She gives the girls tangible tools they can take with them and apply to their own life, no matter what their personal situation is.
In Southern Illinois, the girls are dealing with the compound effects of discrimination and poverty. But Marvinetta shares that the workshop and its teachings have universal appeal and that the girls respond similarly wherever she does her teaching. "In Cairo, where there is poverty on top of poverty. East Saint Louis, where there's even more poverty, people start feeling like, 'I can do something,'" she shares.
RACIAL HEALING THROUGH AN INTERNAL LOCUS OF CONTROL
Marvinetta notes that her approach may be old school, but she believes in starting with emotional healing on the individual level.
"In order for us to really heal, we've got to start with ourselves," she shares. "If you pay too much attention to the world around you, you will indeed go crazy. So we've got to understand that our locus of control starts with us."
The handout she used for the workshops is called "Joy on the Journey," and includes helpful advice for young people, such as "Take the risk of loving and watch love flow to you," "If you think change is hard, it is. If you think it's easy, it is," and "What have others learned from what you do?"
Marvinetta's workshop is often the first time the girls have been exposed to this kind of mindset work. It is meant to give them the power to make the difference within their own thought patterns and their own lives, and by extension, within their communities.
OVERCOMING SETBACKS WITH POSITIVE WORDS AND HARD WORK
Marvinetta teaches the girls to operate from a positive place and to be willing to work hard. Instead of dwelling on what others say and do and how we react, Marvinetta suggests focusing on the "can" rather than the "can't." She finds that this resonates with the girls and leaves them feeling good about themselves and what they can achieve.
"They're looking for a different approach because the other approach is not empowering," Marvinetta shares. "It is like, OK, if I say somebody else is privileged, then that means I'm underprivileged. If I say that somebody else is well resourced, then that means that I am under resourced. And our words have such power."
Not only do the words matter, but also the actions that follow. Marvinetta believes that hard work is necessary to get you where you want to go:
"Now, my skin may look a little different. But to me, I don't see it as a challenge, I see it as an advantage because it teaches me that I have to work hard. I have to fall in love with hard work. And guess what? Genius comes from hard work. You change the world through hard work, not from running away from work."
TAKING PRIDE IN THE BLACK COMMUNITY
The Global Girls emotional wellness workshops also deal with issues of discrimination - just from a different perspective that decentralizes race in the conversation in favor of taking an attitude of accountability and opportunity.
"...We teach them not to look at their color, not to lean on how somebody else treats them, but to lean on your inner resources. So that no matter how anyone else treats you or what they say about you, you get in the room, and you prove to them who you are," Marvinetta says. "The most important thing is to get a seat at the table."
Then, once you're at the table, the work can begin. Marvinetta is in favor of teaching the kids about what they can do to uplift each other and how the Black community can grow and build through their own actions.
"Let's get about the business of building our community. Not making any excuses, just results. And then people will be able to look at us and say, 'Woah, what beautiful community is that over there?'"
"Guess what? My community. My community is just as wonderful, just as beautiful, just as healthy, just as prominent, just as well-resourced as any other community out there."
While these workshops are geared toward Black girls (and sometimes boys), she feels these tips can work for any human being interested in doing emotional wellness work.
"I don't care what your skin color is. Everybody goes through some kind of struggle," she says. "And when you learn that your struggle is the way, whatever you're struggling with becomes the way to victory, and you embrace that - you win. Every time."
LEARN MORE ABOUT GLOBAL GIRLS, INC AND HEALING ILLINOIS
Those interested in learning more about Global Girls, Inc. and emotional wellness can visit the following resources:
Global Girls, Inc is one of 184 grantees who received Healing Illinois funds for 2023-2024. You can view more sub-grantee stories on the Healing Illinois website and Healing Illinois Instagram page, as well as view past and upcoming Healing Illinois events.
All photos courtesy of Global Girls, Inc.
