iDigg: Beauty & Brunch: My Version of Reality

"Don't believe what your eyes are telling you. All they show is limitation. Look with your understanding, find out what you already know, and you'll see the way to fly.'" - Richard Bach

Left: Nikki Goodnight | Right: China Panion

Founders of Beauty and Brunch, Chicago

What you define as real life is an accumulation of your beliefs. Let's dig into this a bit: If you grew up in the hood and all you saw was gang violence, drugs being sold, poverty and teen pregnancy... chances are you're going to believe that's what the world is, because that's your specific lense on life. That is how you view the world because it's what you live everyday. On the flipside, if you come from a diverse town, where people that look like you are educators, business professionals and everyone around you is going to school, owning businesses, married and traveling, well that's where you'd envision yourself to be too, right?

It only makes sense that you have the tendency to believe more of what you see, and act in a way that aligns with your reality. So I'm not one to debate what people should or should not watch on t.v. because at one point or another, I watched it all! Now my argument, or how I defended my poor taste in "quality" t.v. is that I watched television purely for entertainment but in no way do I believe I was influenced by it. Quite frankly, even if you hate this genre, you could never convince me that these reality t.v. shows are not entertaining. I wouldn't go as far as say I was addicted (although I'm sure my husband would beg to differ), but I will say my go to shows were, let me see...

Love & Hip Hop....check

Basketball Wives....check

Mob Wives...check

Housewives of Atlanta....check

R&B Divas....check

Black Ink....check

Jersey Shore...check

I'll even take it as far back as Flavor of Love...smh. Network t.v.?!? Ummm...ahhh... what's that?

Okay, so what's changed?!? Why is it that I can now barely stomach a full episode of Love & Hip Hop? Why won't I even think twice about turning on Black Ink? Let me try to think back to see where it all went downhill...

Oh yeah! That's right! Everything is a HOT RATCHET MESS! I finally realized that what I was watching was getting further and further from my reality. Let me try to put this in perspective, I've been in one physical fight and maybe 3 (give or take lol) verbal altercations in my life! Thinking back to those situations, I might have said a couple choice words and maybe stared a chick down to let her know that I have just enough crazy in me, to NOT be messed with, hahahaha! But really in the 20+ years I've been on this earth, I've stayed pretty far away from drama. Plus, I would expect a few mishaps in highschool and maybe college but as an adult, ummm no - physically fighting, is so not
cute! Imagine me walking into my corporate job with a black eye or scratches on my face after
coming off the weekend, where they do that at?!?!?

So how could I be sitting up watching "grown women" loose their temper, cursing like professional athletes and physically attacking other women? Well, in my world, the majority of us (black women) DO NOT act this way and actually would much rather prefer a girls night out or brunch with absolutely no drama but instead laughs, music, great food, mimosas and thought provoking conversation.

Nikki Goodnight and China Panion must have felt the same way because they took a conversation over coffee at Starbucks and turned it into an annual sold out Beauty and Brunch event in Chicago. Nikki identified that there was a need for women but especially women of color to come together and network. Nikki, who has always been a lover for beauty and fashion but also women's empowerment, wanted to combine both passions to fulfill her vision of pulling together an intimate group of women to discuss everything from hair and makeup to careers and the state of our social enviornment.

During their conversation, China, who has an extensive background in Marketing, helped mold Nikki's vision into something actionable. The two loved the idea of bringing women together over brunch and creating a memorable experience for the women of Chicago, and in a nutshell, that's how Beauty & Brunch was created. China revved up the concept by utilizing multiple marketing channels, the most impactful of course, social media, to create an exciting buzz. Then from there, used her network and connects to secure panelist, bloggers and vloggers to get involved and help increase the reach and engagement around their event.

So just remember, when these cable networks are trying to persuade us that these t.v. shows are "reality" keep in mind that the true day to day reality that we live in can easily look more like this: