2022 seems to be the year of tenderness for Black women everywhere. After spending countless years in survival mode from both internal and external sources of strife, the focus in recent years has been on resetting ourselves at a foundational level. Prioritizing self-care and finding safe, soft spaces to lay down our armor have made their way to the top of our list of concerns. Therapy, mindfulness and community have also been saving graces and with the internet becoming a viable resource for all three, Black women have found solace in one another. Many voices have risen in a season where we needed one another the most, among them being educator and mental awareness advocate, Yasmine Cheyenne, whose IG page boasts more than 150k followers. In her daily musings, one can find journal prompts to help you identify blind spots in your life as well as on-time reminders centered around boundaries, letting go of self-blame and caring for your whole self. Cheyenne’s invitations to meet ourselves more intimately reverberate through women from different backgrounds but feel specifically designed for Black women who are often taught to put everyone before ourselves. Words like “I’m worthy of love, even if I’ve lost it before” are a slam to broken hearts everywhere while her The Sugar Jar™ movement provides her followers with actionable steps to carry them through their daily lives. Now her app, which has everything from meditations to workshops, is a way to stay connected to a community of women all focused on one goal: self-healing.
We caught up with the voice of the woman in progress for an inside look at her new app, what boundary setting means to her and how she keeps her sugar jar full.
Iman N. Milner: For people who may still be new to you, who, in your own words, is Yasmine Cheyenne?
Yasmine Cheyenne: I am a self-healing educator and mental health advocate who helps people learn how to create wellness practices that they can use on a daily basis. Ones that feel accessible, attainable and like they can be integrated easily—you don’t have to recreate your entire life to start taking care of yourself.
INM: Can you give me a brief synopsis of The Sugar Jar™? What brought you to it and why you decided to create an app around it? That’s a huge undertaking.
YC: The Sugar Jar became a way that I would teach because I had a real life moment in my kitchen where I started to feel like a jar of sugar where people were just coming in and out of my life, taking as much as they wanted and using as much as they wanted—it was a mess. There was sugar everywhere. I felt so depleted. I think so many of us feel like that in our lives. We’re being pulled in so many different directions. It became a way for me to teach people how to check in with themselves. Do you have your boundaries in place? Is there a lid on your jar? Are you giving what you want to be giving or are you just saying ‘yes’ because you feel like you have to? With that being the framework, every person I met would bring up the sugar jar. It became synonymous with who I am in the wellness space. So, when I started to think about the app, I knew I wanted it to be an extension of what I do on Instagram. The number one question I got asked was whether or not my posts would stop because of the app. I post daily and that will continue but I wanted to give people a chance to go deeper. I wanted it to have audio-journaling, which is something a lot of people don’t even think about doing, you can do that wherever you are. I also wanted to have workshops at a price that was more doable than the cost of a retreat or an in-person session. You can invest the $9 in yourself every month and have everything I believe in right on your phone.
INM: A lot of your work centers around boundaries and other self-care practices. What’s been your journey to prioritizing yourself and your wellness.
YC: Like everyone else, I still struggle with setting boundaries. I think there’s a misconception that people in the wellness space have perfect lives. My journey has been about reminding myself how good I feel when I say ‘no’ even if in that moment the guilt—or any of those other feelings we can feel when we say ‘no’ to someone—comes up. It started really small like do I actually want to go to this party or park on this block, I began questioning myself on everything, even the small things. I started to recognize that there were so many ways that I say ‘yes’ when I really want to say ‘no’. I am also a big advocate for therapy or coaching or spiritual teaching; whatever you have access to. Self healing is not a replacement for therapy, it’s about when you’re not in a therapy session, these are the tools you can use to be there for yourself. Most of us only go to therapy one time a week, so what are we doing the other six days?
INM: With your popularity on social media continuing to grow, how do you maintain balance between being a more public figure and staying true to your mission as a mental health advocate?
YC: I love that question. I remind myself that more than anything I am a human. In my regular life, I hold true to those boundaries. For example, I don’t post my children on Instagram. I try to make sure that the things I do or experience in my life are really for me and the people who are close to me in real life. I am not there, online, to pour out everything happening in my life; I’m there to hold space for my community. Most wellness people would probably feel the same way; we’re there to allow others to share their concerns and questions.
INM: What are three things that you live by when it comes to deciding how much sugar you have to share at any given moment?
YC: The first question is the hardest and it’s simply: do you want to do it? And this can be tough if it’s a friend or your mom asking you to do something. That stops me right there, do I actually want to do this? If my answer is no but I am still feeling like they really need my help, I go to the second question: am I the only person who can do this for them? Is there anyone else who can help them get what they need? And then the last thing I ask myself is: if I do this, knowing I don’t want to do it or that someone else can help them, will I feel resentful or empty? Sometimes we think saying ‘yes’ is better than the discomfort of saying ‘no’ but resentment eats us up and it eats away at our relationships. If I’m going to feel resentful, that may not be worth having an issue in my relationship. Maybe I just need to be honest about not being able to be there for them in that moment.
INM: What is one thing that you feel The Sugar Jar™ community can do for a person at any part of their self-healing journey?
YC: I would honestly say it’s the support. It’s not that there’s going to be an actual person there holding your hand along the way but it provides those check-ins. You don’t have to figure out what journal prompts to ask yourself. You don’t have to figure out what kind of tools you need to set boundaries. The app provides that support you may not be able to get from your friends or family. I think it really allows people to realize the full spectrum of wisdom that we already possess when we take the time to check-in.