I believe all people are holy and sacred, needed and necessary.
This is the bedrock of who I am.
It warms me to know you've brought your great heart to this place. My name is Stephon, and at my core I am a beloved believer, bound to the belief that we have the power to free ourselves.
That belief owes something to Toni Morrison's Beloved — to the scene in the Clearing, where Baby Suggs, holy calls a wounded people to love their own flesh, because nowhere else would. She didn't preach meekness. She created space for people to be and become — to stand in the fullness of who they are.
Every day, I'm trying to expand that Clearing. Everything on this site is one of the ways I'm imagining, and working toward, a world not yet here. I hope you'll join me.
Equity and access to the tools people need to be well.
FlowWell Yoga + Wellness is a community-first wellness ecosystem bringing justice-centered yoga, teacher trainings, large-format events, and VR-integrated practice to Washington, D.C. and beyond.
Black Folx Wellness Collective creates space for Black folx to be well — through free and low-cost programming that nurtures the mental, physical, emotional, and spiritual needs of our ever-growing community. Justice as wellness. Healing as resistance.
As a writer and teacher, I'm asking us to tell the truth about who and what we are. As Black folk, we are a mighty people who, with the right tools, can imagine a new way of being.
As a believer, I know my God is calling us to do right by one another — which means doing right by the earth realm.
Since 2019.
Since 2019, I've led executive communications and public engagement inside some of the highest-visibility institutions in government and higher education — the U.S. House Select Committee on the Climate Crisis, the House Committee on Veterans' Affairs, American University's Center for Diversity & Inclusion, and D.C.'s Office of Neighborhood Safety and Engagement, where I planned the 2nd Healing Communities Symposium, convening hundreds of District residents, violence-intervention partners, and business leaders around a multi-pronged approach to preventing gun violence.
I hold an M.A. in Political Communication from American University and a B.S. from the University of North Texas, and serve as faculty at the Kripalu Center and adjunct faculty at American University.
I believe we get free through embodiment, and that to get free, we need justice — justice meaning all people have access to the fullness of life.
I may one day be a politician myself — only if the people see me worthy to elect me. Until then, I intend to help us remake the nation, and the world.
Also: my forthcoming novel, Whisper Park.