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The pandemic has impacted all small businesses, but those run by women and people of color have been disproportionately affected.

According to VISA’s black women-owned business report, nearly three quarters of black women-owned businesses estimate they can’t survive another year under current pandemic conditions.

Adama Iwu, VISA vice-president of government sales joined us today to share important information around a new hyper-local program that VISA just announced. It’s mission is to accelerate financial and educational support for underrepresented communities and women-owned small businesses.

Iwu was also named one of time magazine’s silence breakers which celebrated how women everywhere are using their influence to enact positive change.

For More Information, visit visa.com/shesnext.

THIS SEGMENT IS SPONSORED BY VISA.

Have you ever found yourself stressed and thought, “Okay, just breathe…”? Katara McCarty, creator of the EXHALE phone app can help with just that. She joined us today with some meditation tips and to share why she created the app to help women of color cope with the stresses of life. Here’s more from her:

EXHALE is the first emotional well-being app designed specifically for Black, Indigenous, Women of Color (BIWOC).

The practices in this app speak to where BIWOC are today, in America in 2020, where they disproportionately face systems of oppression that cause hurt and harm to their bodies and minds.

EXHALE provides five categories of well-being practice: meditations, coaching talks, affirmations, guided visualizations and breath work.

The app, available via iOS and Android, is free with the option to unlock additional features for an added cost. Right now, everything is free until Sept. 30 as we want to provide this as a free resource in response to justice not being served for the killing of Breonna Taylor and the recent shooting of Jacob Blake among others. We decided this needs to be a free resource for moms, grandmothers, sisters, aunties, cousins and friends.

The importance of EXHALE

EXHALE was born out of the idea that the Black and brown community is holding its breath, waiting for the next video of police brutality, the next microaggression or the next negative health impact statistic.

In the Black community, mental health issues are often compounded by the psychological stress of systemic racism. As a result, Black adults are 20% more likely to report serious psychological distress than white adults (because of oppression, systematic racism and other factors at work).

Women are at least twice as likely to experience an episode of major depression as men. Compared to their white counterparts, Black women are only half as likely to seek help. Again, this is because of oppression, systematic racism and other factors at work.

Emerging evidence further affirms that bearing witness to racially violent events online (i.e. viral videos of the detainment of undocumented immigrants in cages and police killings of unarmed citizens) can produce trauma symptomatology among Black and Latinx adolescents.

Popular meditation apps, as well as the health and wellness space in general, are predominantly white spaces led by white people. This reality leads to a lack of representation and overall support for Black and brown people seeking to practice self-care.

The benefits of meditation

When we feel overwhelmed as children, our parents tell us to “just breathe” or “take a breath.” We’re never taught why breathing is supposed to calm us down.

According to the American Institute of Stress, deep, abdominal breathing reduces stress and anxiety. For just 20-30 minutes each day, “deep breathing increases the supply of oxygen to your brain and stimulates the parasympathetic nervous system, which promotes a state of calmness.”

Our parasympathetic nervous system controls the predominant state our bodies should be during downtime, which should be 80% of the time. It’s the natural state we should be living in when not in danger. Our heart rate slows down, our breath is calm and relaxed, our digestive system is stimulated, and our hormones are balanced.

Taking the time for ourselves and focusing on our breath as BIWOC is both an act of reclaiming our power and an act of resistance. We may not be able to control what’s happening to us outside of our homes, the daily microaggressions and racism we’ll face, but we can control our breath.

EXHALE is available via the App Store and Google Play.

To learn more about EXHALE, click here or follow @EXHALEapp.

Midwest Black Restaurant Week will include Indianapolis in its nationwide tour, and the palate-pleasing showcase is happening from Friday, July 24 until Sunday, August 2. Onslow Jackson, co-owner of Krab Kingz Seafood joined us today to talk about this week’s significance in Indy.

Most businesses do not have the marketing dollars to promote their business; thus, Black Restaurant Week was developed to shine a light on minority businesses – aiding them in building community awareness to increase their bottom line.

A few of Indy’s Black-owned restaurants:

Black Restaurant Week LLC is an annual, multi-city culinary movement celebrating the flavors of African, African-American and Caribbean cuisine nationwide. Black Restaurant Week partners with black-owned restaurants, chefs, caterers and food trucks to host a selection of culinary experiences aimed to expand awareness and increase support for black culinary professionals. The organization was founded in 2016 by entrepreneurs Warren Luckett, Falayn Ferrell and Derek Robinson.

To date, the culinary experience has expanded to eight cities with involvement from 270 minority businesses and professionals nationwide. 

Part of Black Restaurant Week LLC‘s mission is to feed and fuel the cultural famine – especially with an emphasis on reviving and saving the black restaurant industry during the COVID-19 pandemic – and educate consumers on the abundance of cultural cuisines and dispel ethnic untruths.

While some of the restaurants are offering dine-in menus, the emphasis on this year is on takeout and delivery, which has been a lifeline for participating venues that were faced with the severe financial consequences brought on by COVID-19.

Black Restaurant Week will host a variety of culinary activations and virtual events during the national 2020 campaign:

For more information about Black Restaurant Week, its events and participating restaurants, please visit their website, Facebook, Twitter and Instagram. 

To find more about Krab Kingz Indy and to see their full menu, visit their website.