OUR STORY.

In 2017, Connie, the founder of Worthy Beyond Purpose, was lucky enough to be able to participate in a Summer Camp in Treasure Beach Jamaica. There was about 30 kids attending. One afternoon, while the children were eating their lunches, Connie went outside to practice her "quiet time" meditation. When Parys Francis, one of the attendees, saw her, she ran over and wanted to join. Parys was one of the most wildest kids of the bunch, and she was asking to try meditation. They sat down, took some deep breaths, and Connie did some light playful guidance. This is the moment that would change their lives forever. Connie watched at Parys dropped in to a calm, blissful state. It was like magic. This is the moment that Connie realized her mission, to teach KIDS meditation.

Parys was Connies very first student and still practices with her to this day. Now, four years later, Connie and her team have been invited back every year to not only teach mindfulness & meditation to the kids of the summer camp (over 80 attendees now), but she has been invited to teach the adults of the Parish as well. Proving that this does have a ripple effect and Worthy Beyond Purpose will transform the world, one mindful kid at a time.

In the next two years we developed a program , becoming part of the curriculum in multiple K-8 schools across LA County.

Moving this social/emotional developmental work into the school curriculum will have tremendous benefits, including:

~Developing attention and focus, better grades, more effective emotion regulation, better behavior in school, greater empathy and perspective-taking, better social skills, reduced test anxiety, less stress… etc.

In 2020 when the global pandemic closed schools, WBP immediately adopted an online platform reaching hundreds of kids worldwide. We developed an after school, donation based, creative arts & self expression program, operated under an overarching mindfulness umbrella. Through intensional lessons developing connections and emotional intelligence, our children learn how to bring mindfulness into their everyday lives.

We also created our first ever online summer camp featuring mindfulness, music, drama, singing, dance, improv and circus. We had kids from all over the country joining us and tapping into their unique expressions of self.

Now more than ever this work is necessary! Spending a year in isolation, our children are lacking social emotional development in a way that they previously got in schools. Before lockdown, they could socialize, they had face to face interaction, they were getting an understanding of their character, they were understanding how to be kind to people. All of these connection things that were lost in our isolated at home setting.

We do this work to develop soft skills, empathy, connection and community building. We do this work to teach children self-love and to give them the social emotional learning component that they were lacking being out of interaction with each other. These are the things that foster positive identity development.

We have been invited to join 7 new schools this year, reaching 700+ new students. We privately raised funds to support 1 year of this work. We are back to in-person events and hold quarterly fundraisers. We also are beginning to hold quarterly wellness events for school administrators.