Juneteenth in Slovenia | Global HEARTH Summit
Spending Juneteenth in Slovenia wasn't on my 2025 Bingo card.
My Nigerian mum kept calling it "Melania country" before I left, worry thick in her voice. "Just...be careful, my dear." She and I both knew the professional invisibility, questions about worth, and exhausting rebuilding work I’d been carrying for months. Being “the only” or “one of few” certainly wouldn’t ease that fatigue.
Even so, as a philanthropy and nonprofit executive helping changemakers make change, I was heading to The Wellbeing Project's HEARTH Summit. And sometimes liberation thrives in the unlikely…
The first plenary opened with musicians from around the world joining to play "Bridge over Troubled Water"—a Negro spiritual reimagined as global anthem. Tears of relief came against my will. As in the song, I laid down my defenses…
Later, when Imam Yahya Hendi announced: "The presence of war anywhere is the presence of war everywhere," my eyes scanned the room. 800+ changemakers from 90 countries, all carrying invisible wars of varied shapes, sizes, textures. And here, in Ljubljana’s unlikely backdrop, I wasn’t fighting mine alone anymore.
Every moment in Slovenia felt like grace:
Nafisa Jiddawi and I getting lost in the climb to Ljubljana castle, sweating and laughing at our reunion. "What happened to you last year? You just disappeared!" she mentioned. I was affirmed that someone had noticed. Comforted because someone cared.
Louisa Zondo spoke from earned wisdom after deep loss and long-term repair: "If I'm coming from fear, trauma, and grief, there's no way that I can give love." And we all nodded that *doing good* doesn’t sustain without *being well.*
From introductions under an ancient tree to a rebellious boat ride down the Ljubljanica to commitments for accountability beyond the Summit, the group of 10 changemakers from 9 countries I’d been tasked to lead were a GIFT to me. My beloved Circle unknowingly held space for the contradictions of struggle and joy, individual battles and collective healing. Aaron Pereira painted it perfectly: "Fire and companionship have the power to transform the dark and scary night into a place of warmth and belonging."
This was my Juneteenth liberation. Not from physical chains or outright violence, but from the spirit-stifling suffocation of isolation.
Walking the cobblestones back to my hotel crystallized my 20-year career headline: what I do, what I’ve always done, is help changemakers make change by honoring both the human and the hustle. And somehow, this community – the strangers I’d flown 4,500 miles to meet – understood the assignment.
I called my mum when I got back, bubbling with stories. And now, she keeps saying, "Tell me about slow-VEEEN-yaaaaaa." The way she pronounces it—lilting and lagging in all the wrong places—is perfect. It sounds exactly as it felt: warm, welcoming, and right on time.
The lesson for anyone rebuilding: What unexpected place might be calling your name?
Originally appeared on LinkedIN.
Photos from the HEARTH
