<div><em>What?</em>
</div>
<div><a href="https://youtu.be/H1MZA-eiKyM?si=uz2nFvYBpYY732uV" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">JL Soul Camp is</a> an annual creative and restorative affinity space for Black women with emphasis on wellness and community as tools for liberation. At JL Soul Camp women are given space to build and redefine wellness for ourselves. There are workshops that offer body movement, art therapy, and facilitated manifestation practices. There are nightly meetings that explore sensuality, inner-child work, team building exercises and inner child veneration such as roasting marshmallows around a campfire while sharing experiences and stories and camp activities such as scavenger hunts that also reconnect us with nature. Solo options are also available for Campers who feel safest facilitating their own needs alone. “Succulent naps” (as one Camper put it), resting in a hammock/ swimming at the nearby lake, personal time in the sauna or Jacuzzi, or a long intimate hike and cry around our 80-acre wildlife preserve are just a few options at <a href="https://youtube.com/shorts/ywTF4MnHYcI?si=YxYUeMxLNAmSgkbu" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">JL Soul Camp</a>.
</div>
<div><br />
</div>
<div><em>When</em>
</div>
<div>JL Soul Camped launched in August 2023 and hosts 16 to 28 Black women for 3 nights and 4 days annually in the month of August. The goal for JL Soul Camp 2027 is to host 26 Black women on 3 seperate farm retreats for 3 nights and 4 days.
</div>
<div><br />
</div>
<div><em>Where</em>
</div>
<div><a href="https://youtu.be/iYR6yy8ePVE?si=tPApIGRztEcYF-IV" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">Occidental Arts and Ecology Center</a> in Sonoma County California has helped midwife <a href="https://youtube.com/shorts/ung-2ZSnm5A?si=h-zQeqjSbMupKw_s" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">JL Soul Camp</a> as a grassroots project.
</div>
<div><br />
</div>
<div><em>Why</em>
</div>
<div><a href="https://youtu.be/cVlRalyhY7s?si=Epvnee_y0jRTZ7jM" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">JL Soul Camp</a> exists for a plethora of reasons but the short of it is real wellness and community for real oppressed and targeted peoples. Rest, open expression and community are privileges that Black women have always been assumed to have while being denied. These simple privileges hide in plain sight and directly impact our health and therefore our mortality rates, quality of life, family structures and communities.
</div>
<div><br />
</div>
<ul>
<li>Those of us who need rest most are least likely to have the means to afford it. If we can afford it our options of experiencing rest, community and wellness in a Black woman affinity space globally are slim to none. 
</li>
</ul>
<div><br />
</div>
<ul>
<li>Black women are paid on averaged $5,500 less than our white sisters while silently suffering the macro and micro aggressions of misogyny and racism. We are most likely to be murdered by our significant others, most likely to be the victims of our sons, brothers, fathers etc. being incarcerated or murdered by the law. We are most likely to suffer sexual assault and least likely to be believed and, therefore, we are the least likely report our sexual assaults and the world remains silent while we continue to go missing.
</li>
</ul>
<div><br />
</div>
<ul>
<li><a href="https://youtube.com/shorts/jqO8yRJFYnQ?si=8d2zI-KuO42CQyZV" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">JL Soul Camp</a> provides the framework for oppressed peoples to feel out loud so we can heal out loud and together. We deserve and need space, time and each other.
</li>
</ul>
<div><br />
</div>
<ul>
<li>Who else can heal us but us?!
</li>
</ul>
<div><br />
</div>
<div><em>Who is JL? </em><a href="https://youtu.be/sjbUIZT9T_4?si=aWAn3qOcEwz-G-d-" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener"><em>JL Soul Camp 2025</em></a><em><span class="ql-cursor">﻿</span></em>
</div>
<div><br />
</div>
<div><strong>Soul Camp's</strong> Founder, Joyce Lee :
</div>
<div> 
</div><img alt="" media_type="3" src="https://d2g8igdw686xgo.cloudfront.net/63416075_1645464762929080_r." width="100%" />
<div> 
</div>
<div> 
</div>
<div>Thank you for the opportunity to share this vision of Soul Camp with you.
</div>
<div> We welcome you to be a vital catalyst for social and economic growth and change through this experience.
</div>
<div><br />
</div>
<div><em>How?</em>
</div>
<div>JL Soul Camp 2024 will need approximately $60,000 to run smoothly. Room &amp; Board alone for 26 womyn for 5 days at OAEC costs $32,500. Here are some activities and components we invite you to sponsor:
</div>
<div><br />
</div>
<ul>
<li>JL Soul Camp pays for transportation for womyn who cannot afford it. In 2023, 7 of the 16 Campers needed assistance with transportation to and from JL Soul Camp, some came as far as South Africa. The womyn banned together and made it happen with a very limited budget. For JL Soul Camp 2024 the goal is to have at least $5,000 set aside for travel expenses.
</li>
</ul>
<div><br />
</div>
<ul>
<li>There were single mothers who needed financial assistance with childcare. JL Soul Camp 2024 would like to host a JL Lil Souls Camp 0.5 miles away from OAEC where parents can drop off their children who will spend 5 days learning the importance of wellness, rest and community too. We will need money for food, boarding, activities and an appropriate number of children to adult ratio of caretakers. $7,000 will be set aside for childcare.
</li>
</ul>
<div><br />
</div>
<ul>
<li>Most of the womyn who need a 5-day wellness interaction cannot afford to take 5 days off of work and make rent/eat when they return home. This affects their mental rest/wellness and ability to completely own all of their own time and experience. JL Soul Camp would like to offer compensation to the womyn who voice needing it in order to rest and heal. $7,000 will be set aside for womyn who cannot afford to take 5 days off of work.
</li>
</ul>
<div><br />
</div>
<ul>
<li>Another $5,000 will be set aside for womyn leading workshops at JL SOUL CAMP 2024.
</li>
</ul>
<div><br />
</div>
<ul>
<li>$4,000 will be used for gifts bags, memorabilia and incidentals.
</li>
</ul>
<div><br />
</div>
<div>If you would like your donation to be tax-deductible, you can donate directly to <a href="https://oaec.org/donate/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">The Occidental Arts and Ecology Center</a>. Under donations for Contribution Details, select "Donation Dedication". Please indicate that you are donating on behalf of Soul Camp. All donations to OAEC will go directly to the expenses for Soul Camp.
</div>
<div> 
</div>
<div>In Gratitude and Solidarity,
</div>
<div>Joyce Lee
</div>
<div>Founder and Director of Soul Camp
</div>

Lourdes Davila Denizard

Adrienne Blaine

Deana Dennard

Allison Bell Bern

Linda Hess

Margie Norris

Miranda Richardson

Anonymous

Nancy Schaub

Tiffany Austin

Stephen Higgins

dazie grego

Jennifer Jeanty

Gabrielle Sims

Katharine Chaney

Soul Camp

Soul Camp

Still $39,103 to go. Help us build momentum.