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M h. Welcome to the Therapy for Black Girls Podcast, a weekly conversation about mental health, personal development, and all the small decisions we can make to become the best possible versions of ourselves. I'm your host, Dr Joy hard and Bradford, a licensed psychologist in Atlanta, Georgia. For more information or to find a therapist in your area, visit our website at Therapy for Black Girls dot com. While I hope you love listening to and learning from the podcast, it is not meant to be a substitute for a relationship with a licensed mental health professional. Hey, y'all, thanks so much for joining me for session one oh eight of the airp for Black Girls podcast. Today we're gonna be chatting about how you can find your people, your tribe, the people who have your back and you have theirs. But first, let's show some love to our sponsors. In recent months, you've probably seen lots of talk about people using coloring books and apps as a part of their self care routines. Coloring can be really helpful in managing anxiety, helping you to be more in touch with the present moment, and engaging your sense of playfulness that we often lose when we grow up. So I'm super excited to tell you about Color Noir in O I R, which is the first and only coloring book app celebrating black women and culture. Color Noir was created by husband and wife team Mayo Ocome and Nakala Matthew's Okomey, who have combined their talents to create a high quality app experience using coloring to celebrate black girl magic in all of its glory. It's free to download and to get it, all you have to do is open up your iOS app store, search for Color Noir that's in O I R and enjoy and make sure you hit subscribe in the app so you can get all of the amazing images, updates and premium content dropping each and every month. Again, it's available in the iOS app Store, It'll be coming to Android soon and the name of the app is Color Noir in O I R. Support for today's episode also comes from Natural Sious. Natural Sious is the world's first vegan, high performance hair caroline that delivers the results of twelve products and only three. It's designed to reduce time spent on hair care and it's proven to save up to eight percent of time on wash day. Natural Sious was founded by innovator Gwen Jamir, who is the first and only African American woman to hold the patent on a natural hair care product. These products are great specifically for busy women with curly and coily hair also known as four sea hair, and they are all natural. I've been using the products on my hair for the past three months now and they are now the only things that I use. They leave my hair entangled after washing, shiny and incredibly moisturized. It's a three step process and the products all work great together and take four less time than anything I've ever used before. So if you want to cut down on the amount of products you use and get some time back in your busy schedule, then I definitely recommend you try them. You can find the Naturalicious products and over twelve hundred Sally stores nationwide, or you can buy them online at Sally beauty dot com. Use our exclusive promo code five five five five five five that's six fives for y'all at checkout to save ten p off of your purchase. Now let's get back to our episode. So, if you follow me on Instagram or if you're signed up for our Sunday newsletter. Then you know, I was in d C at the mom Ference this past weekend. So the Momference is the first of its kind, incredible experience that brings together black and brown mamas from across the country for a day of learning and connecting. In my presentation, I talked about how moms can cultivate calm in the midst of chaos, and one of the things that I offered was finding your Mama tribe. This sentiment was echoed by lots of other speakers this weekend as well. It's just the idea that none of us can do this parenting thing alone. But it also got me thinking on a larger scale, even beyond parenting, that none of us can do this life thing alone, and we really need our people I tribe to have our back. One of the main things that I hear about this is where do I find these people? So that's what I wanted us to chat about today. Where can you begin to find your people? So one of the first places that I'd suggest for finding your people is at conferences and gatherings, kind of like the conference. So I know some of twenty one is coming up here in Atlanta next month. My Leytel just had a retreat. Christina Rice has several retreats every year. Sarah Jake's Robberts has a woman evolved every year. There are conferences associated with most professional organizations that you can attend. There are plenty of gatherings of like minded people for almost anything that you can think of. Now. I do understand that these kinds of things can be pricey, but if you can swing it, it can be an investment that pays off in lots of different ways. I think that one of the ways you can make the most of an event like this is to one do your research ahead of time and make sure that the kinds of people who have attended in the past are the kinds of people you'd want to connect with. You can do this pretty easily by searching the hashtags for the events to see what kinds of things people share, and then you can dig a little deeper to see what kinds of things these people are interested in, either based on what they share on social media, or you can even send them a message and ask if you can speak with them briefly or shoot them a couple of questions by d M to ask about their experiences at x y Z event. Many people will be really happy to share their opinions about something, especially if it's an event that they really enjoyed. I think it's also really important to be strategic about how you go into an experience if possible, is there a way that you can connect with other people who will be attending beforehand. Again, when people are excited about an event, they usually shared on social media, So try to connect with others ahead of time so that you can start to build a relationship before you even leave your city. And this might be incredibly important. It's especially if you're somebody who's introverted or a little more on the shy side. Another thing that might help is to try to get to the gathering site a day before it all starts, so that you have some time to meet other people who have arrived early and maybe a little bit more of a laidback atmosphere. The second place that I think can be great for finding your people is in virtual groups, so places like Facebook groups for particular topics. You know, we have the Thrive Tribe that is our Facebook group for this community. Community is created using Twitter hashtags and even the comments section of certain outlets in social media pages have built a sense of community that allows you to get to know the other commenters. Again, much of this work will require you to do some leg work on your part, but you can build incredibly satisfying and supportive relationships completely virtually. One speaker that I met this weekend share that she had connected with another sister on G four years ago and they just met at the month for this past weekend for the first time, so it's definitely possible. I've also found that it's pretty easy to meet other like minded people by participating in Twitter chats. So Black Girl and Home has a Twitter chat called b G I O Mindful and I just participated in that one a few weeks ago and have continued to talk with some of those participants. Creative Smart Girl has great chats from time to time, and there's also a thriving community of black women in academia under the site assisted hashtag, and all of these will be included the show notes so that you can go and find them. So if you do some research and ask some questions, online can be a really amazing opportunity for you to find your people. And then the third and final place that I think can be great for finding your people is by looking a little more closely in your everyday life. Sometimes there are people in our lives who could really become our people with a little bit of effort on our parts. So the sister that you exchanged pleasantries with at the end of yoga class, or the person in your calculus class who explains to you what happened when you miss something the professor said, or the sister who works on the sixth floor that you run into every now and then, how might you deepen some of these relationships to see if this might be someone who you really enjoy. You remember how in grade school we would just say stuff like, oh, she's gonna be my best friend. Well you might not say that now as an adult. But would it hurt to catch the sister after yoga and say, Hey, I'm new to the area and I would love to be able to meet some new people. Can I treat you to lunch at your favorite restaurants so I can get to know the city a little more. Now, of course, this may be a little uncomfortable at first, but the worst that she can say is no, and no doesn't necessarily mean that you stop. It just means that maybe you find somebody else to try with and that you don't stop until you find your people. So I'm really curious to know, and I know lots of other listeners will be curious as well. Tell us where in real life or online you've met your people, What Facebook groups, I G accounts, etcetera. Would you suggest for other people who are looking to build their tribe? Share that with us on social media using the hashtag tb G in session so that we can help each other connect. Again, be sure to show some love and support for our sponsors for this episode. Color Noir is the first and only coloring book app celebrating black women in culture. It's free to download and to get it, all you have to do is open up your iOS app store, search for Color Noir that's in O, I, R, and enjoy. Be sure to hit subscribe in the app so that you can get all of the amazing images, updates and premium content dropping each and every month. And be sure to check out Naturalisious. It's the world's first vegan, high performance hair care line that delivers the results of twelve products and only three You can find the products and over twelve hundred Sally stores nationwide, and you can also get ten percent off your purchase online by going to Sally Beauty dot com and using the promo code five five five five five five at checkout. Remember that if you're searching for a therapist in your area, visit our therapist directory at Therapy for Black Girls dot com slash directory. And if you want to continue this conversation with other sisters who listen to the podcast, which is of course, all we've been talking about, is building your tribe, come on over and join us in our thrive tribe. You can request to join at Therapy for Black Girls dot com slash Tribe and be sure to answer the three questions that are asked to gain entry. Don't forget to shop in our online store at Therapy for Black Girls dot com slash shop, where you can find our guided affirmation track, breakup journal in your Therapy for Black Girls t shirts and mugs. Thank you all so much for joining me again this week. I look forward to continue in this conversation with you all real soon. Take good care,