The Power of Play to Build Belonging
Welcome to the Community Strategy Podcast.
I’m Deb Schell, the host. I’m excited to introduce today’s guest, Eli Walker! She designs events and programs that build play into belonging in the modern world and how to use play to facilitate more engaging meetings.
Equipped with a BFA in Theater from NYU’s Tisch School of the Arts and as the founder and author of Drunk Yoga® (now The Uplift Experience), Eli pioneered the wellness entertainment movement to bridge the gap between #selfcare and #communitycare through her social yoga events.
Since then, she has used immersive storytelling and mindfulness practices to support tens of thousands of individuals and hundreds of institutions across the globe—including NYU and Columbia University, as well as Barclay’s, eBay, Intel, Google, Pinterest, and Mastercard—in building meaningful belonging for themselves and their teams in our modern, remote world by leveraging the art of play in live experience design.
Eli has always loved helping people from different backgrounds get on the same page. Bonus points if she can achieve this while inspiring them to live joyfully, empowering them with new perspectives, and making them laugh simultaneously. When you work with Eli, you can expect to play, move, laugh, and walk away feeling empowered with tools to create a more connected world.
During this interview, Eli shares her entrance into the community industry. She describes community-based theater as an immersive performance art in which the facilitator and storytellers go into existing communities and use live storytelling theater to help participants tell their stories and bridge sociological barriers.
From drunk yoga to uplifting facilitators
After becoming burned out on the constant daily grind of acting, she realized she needed a change. She discovered that yoga and acting both have elements of community and belonging.
She walked into a bar in 2017, not entirely sober, and accidentally created drunk yoga. She thought that if the social elements of a cup of coffee, a glass of wine, or a pint of beer combined with yoga – turning it from an individual experience into a social one, with drinking games and activities for participants to play and be silly.
It went viral. She got a book deal, brought it to LA and Dallas, and then started to learn to teach other yoga teachers to spark belonging instead of just instructing participants. She helped yoga teachers let go of the “yoga teacher voice” and find their authentic voice. She learned as the host and taught yoga teachers how to turn an individual yoga experience into a communal experience.
When the COVID-19 pandemic started, she shifted to virtual events but struggled to get participants to turn on their cameras and participate. She questioned her challenges and discovered that the key was to get people into a Zoom room that felt comfortable enough to turn on their cameras while doing yoga.
That led her to more questions about how people feel they belong and how I can create that from the beginning to the end. Eli started formalizing the facilitation for companies, organizations, and groups.
She has now rebranded as the Uplift Center, a live experience and a school for belonging that helps facilitators like you use play to spark radical belonging in a live experience anywhere.
Give participants the choice to stay or leave.
Eli gives tips for community builders who bring people together. She suggests honing in on live experiences to cultivate belonging. It means knowing where you are, why you are there, and choosing to be there. Uplift the experience with play by creating moments of laughter and levity to see a new perspective.
The job of a facilitator is to create a space for attendees to feel safe because belonging can’t be cultivated without a secure environment. Eli says the quickest way to build safe spaces is through laughter.
Eli suggests that you break the rules and make the community optional. It’s essential to clarify the container, detail the experience, and then give them a choice to join. They need to be accountable for their own experience.
She says belonging is about setting up the conditions for belonging to occur. You can’t just put a bunch of people in a room together and then say, “Be a community.” Instead, focus on setting up the conditions to create a shared experience.
Deb shares about ConvertKit and the Creator Network, which are new for 2024. By connecting customers, ConvertKit creates the conditions for a community of people who want to get more subscribers with each other to share tips, strategies, and what’s working for them.
The best way to start a small meetup is to keep things simple and consistent. Monthly meetings are the norm, but do what is doable for you. Make sure to keep the process the same each time, including posting the links and details in the same place.
Not only is Eli an expert at belonging, but she is also planning to do a one-woman show soon, LIVE, in Beacon, New York. If you want to connect with Eli, check out her website to learn more.
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