Joy is an Act of Resistance.
BLACK GIRLS FLOW
BLACK GIRLS FLOW (BGF) is a Chicago based organization dedicated to diversifying the Flow Arts Community and educating Black women on the wellness benefits of flow and adult play. We promote mindfulness, meditation, and movement and host monthly meetups in parks throughout the Chicagoland area.
Check out the Gallery to see a photo recap of our events and monthly meetups. If you’re in the Chicagoland area and want to vibe with us in person, please follow our page on Instagram to receive the most recent updates.
Unlock Your Flow
The term “flow state,” coined by positive psychologist, Mihály Csíkszentmihályi, is the state of complete concentration and immersion with a task. You become so engulfed in an activity that everything else fades away. People may experience increased resilience, decreased stress, feelings of happiness, and mental clarity.
Flow Arts is a form of movement art, usually involving a prop, where practitioners try to achieve a state of flow by pairing prop manipulation with a variety of dance and movement art disciplines. Some popular flow art props include hula hoops, silk fans/flags, poi, dragon staff, levitation wands, and fire fans.
Our Purpose
BLACK GIRLS FLOW combats the negative effects of chronic stress by introducing Black women to the Flow Arts Community. According to the Center for Disease Control and Prevention, heart disease is the leading cause of death for Black women due to chronic stress and coping. Our intersecting identities expose us to a variety of stressors daily. Research shows that trauma lives in our bodies so mind-body activities like Flow Arts can help us relieve stress and heal, not only ourselves, but future generations. BGF promotes mindfulness, meditation, and movement which are three strategies doctors recommend for reducing chronic stress.
Our meetups and pop up events create space for multiple generations of Black women to come together for collective joy and healing. We envision a future where the systemic issues impacting our health are dismantled and all Black women have healthy mechanisms to cope with life’s stressors. BGF invests in Black women’s mental health and wellness and so should YOU.
Meet The Founder
Welcome! I’m Joyce Mann but in the flow community I’m known as Spunky Hoops. My flow art journey started in 2013. Like many adults, I hula hooped as a child and viewed hoops as a child’s toy. During a shopping trip with friends, I came across a stack of hula hoops in the toy aisle and started waist hooping. In those few minutes of play, I experienced the most fun I had in weeks and was seriously winded from the exercise. I googled adult hula hoops for fitness and fell down the proverbial rabbit hole. I founded BGF to create a space for Black women to center their wellness and amplify our JOY. Black Joy is an act of resistance.
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