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Thanks for joining in June for John Caleb Pendleton’s talk on the theme of #WILDERNESS.

đŸ–ïž Graphic by @letskeepdrawing

🙌 High-fives to our wonderful sponsors: Big Shoulders Coffee, DJ Mike Caliber, and Busy Beaver Button Co!

💛 Lots of love to our global partner, MailChimp.

Thanks for joining us earlier this month for LOGIK’s talk on the theme of #FREE.

đŸ–ïž Graphic by @letskeepdrawing

🙌 High-fives to our wonderful sponsors: KEH Camera, Mondo Machine, Big Shoulders Coffee, Ink Factory Studio, and Busy Beaver Button Co!

💛 Lots of love to our global partner, MailChimp.

Thanks for joining CreativeMornings/Chicago last month for a spectacular audience takes the stage. Thanks to our sponsor Ink Factory for the digital illustrations.

Nneka Ude’s story is about daring to live. But it finds its start in grief.  A self proclaimed “true blue Capricorn”, Ude likes to be in control. So when her mom was diagnosed with cancer in 2013, she realized she needed to let go of control. She took time off work, and dedicated her life to taking care of her mom and her immediate family. When she lost her mom in 2016 and encountered pain deeper than she’d ever felt before, she knew she needed to start living her life in a new way. She asked herself a new question:“Why don’t you just bet on yourself? What’s the big deal about that?”To Ude, the word “dare” is loaded with creative ideas and daring to believe in the power of your own vision of the world. She drew on her grief and started taking action towards this vision. She found herself a “tribe” of people to connect and uplift her and encourage her to start initiatives around the ideas she had.She broke into the tech and entrepreneurship community in Chicago and looked around to see that black and brown folks were not receiving the same attention as their white counterparts. Thus The Xchange was born - a web series dedicated to telling the stories of people of color in entrepreneurship spaces. As Ude says, “There’s not a lot of dimension being given to us. If you’re not a superstar entrepreneur, there’s no attention being given to you.” The Xchange aims to tell these stories with the nuance they deserve.  When she noticed that there was a lack of access to products produced by black and brown folks, she started LoveDot. LoveDot is an online store that aims to lift up black and brown beauty practices and artisans, and is named after her mom. Starting the store was a manifestation of her confidence in her own story, and she finds it energizing to build a space for underrepresented businesses to thrive.  Oh, and did we mention that she also writes children’s books? Another initiative born from pride in her own story, Ude is currently working on publishing her first children’s book. “There wasn’t a lot of kids books that showed images of people who are as brown and beautiful as me!” Coming this fall, Ude is working on telling stories that support parents of color in teaching their children to also take pride in their identities.  To Nneke Ude, to dare means to “just be”. No matter how the outside world might make it difficult to tell your story, pushing through the obstacles to tell it anyway.  Thanks so much for your motivating talk, Nneka! We can’t wait to see what else you create. Get in contact with Nneka through her website or via Instagram, and check out the Xchange and LoveDot!

October’s Theme is Design.

We live in a world of design, an intention behind every encounter, every technology we touch, every structure we step through. Design is an alchemy, a marriage of material and meaning, investigation and inspiration, form and function.

To design is to create — out of nothing, something. To design is to play — an invitation to stay open and curious and reimagine in new ways. To design is to think — a method of learning through making, scraping failed experiments for fresh insight. To design is to be human.

Designers are called to operate in a way that transcends disciplines, making it possible to understand the world in all its complexity and envision passageways to more just futures. At their best, designers center the experiences of people whose needs have been overlooked, stepping outside of themselves and into their shoes. Design asks of us empathy and humility, if we are brave enough to answer.

Our Trois-Riviùres chapter chose this month’s exploration of Design, Olivier Charland illustrated the theme, and Skillshare is presenting the theme.

September’s Theme is Dare.

To dare is an act of faith. We work up the nerve to make the soaring leap, even when we don’t know what the outcome will be. At the core of daring, you’ll find bravery and defiance entwined. We dare to challenge the stories passed down to us that no longer fit, the stories that limit our imagination.

CreativeMornings/Porto Alegre chose September’s theme of Dare and Mitti Mendonça illustrated the theme.

Thank you for joining us last Friday for our first in-person event of 2021!

đŸ» Bear hugs to our fantastic speaker: Sam Trump

🎧💋 Major thumbs up to our DJ:Babes Only

📍 Venue: Wildman Boiler & Tank

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🙌 High-fives to our wonderful sponsors: Mondo Machine, KEH Camera, Big Shoulders Coffee, Ink Factory,DJ:Babes Only, Busy Beaver Button Co

💛 Lots of love to our global partners:Mailchimp and Skillshare

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📾 Photo by: Rogelio Gamez gear provided by KEH Camera.

August’s Theme is Release.

Inhale. Exhale. Release. Let the breeze roll over you, let the water flow languid, feel the tautness behind your eyes go slack. Release is a universal law—every build-up of tension must give way. Everything from the flowers to the trees need to do it to survive. 

Release is a critical part of growth, healing, and transformation. We can release each other from our claims. We can be the means of each others’ deliverance. It’s what gives the words “I release you” their power. 

What happens when we let go of emotions, expectations, habits, relationships, or thoughts that no longer serve us? What do we release in ourselves? What do we let loose into the world? 

CreativeMornings/Portsmouth

chose August’s theme of Release and Allie Runnion illustrated the theme.

July’s Theme is Home.

You can spend a lifetime looking for a sense of home. Sometimes we must leave our home in order to find it. In his poem “Journey Home,” Rabindranath Tagore writes, “The traveler has to knock at every alien door to come to his own.” 

Home can be a place we belong, home can be found among people we love, home can be carried with you wherever you go.  Home can be formed by people creating together. 

Home is a direction we’re tilted towards. Home is something we have to remake again and again. What home have you built for yourself? What can we do to build a home for each other?

CreativeMornings/Kansas City chapter chose July’s Home theme, and

Allison Kerek Williams created the accompanying illustration.

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