In 2016, the artist formerly known as Gabi Wilson released her debut EP under the new alias, H.E.R., and had the world shook. The masked songstress won her way into our hearts nearly a decade ago as an 8-year-old when her rendition of Alicia Keys' "If I Ain't Got You" went viral, and now she's on a mission to reinvent R&B.
Vogue recently caught up with H.E.R. before her performance at Afropunk to talk about her identity, the impact she hopes to have on the music industry, and how she practices self-care. The 21-year-old entertainer is known for her laid back demeanor and IDGAF vibe, and can usually be caught on stage in a pair of baggy sweatpants and sunglasses.
"[My style] is straight-up comfortable."
As for her beauty routine, the singer stays true to her mission of starving the ego and feeding the soul and says that doing less is always more. She continued:
"Like, I wear sweats on stage. Sometimes, I could have no makeup on, and my hair could be a mess, but I feel beautiful."
And the saying is true, when you feel beautiful, you look beautiful. That beauty has transcended through her music and touched thousands of young women across the world. This was no small feat, and she achieved it by simply being herself. She told Vogue:
"People would tell me, 'Your music got me through so much, your music is like my life, your music is my diary. I guess I just help a lot of young women accept themselves and accept their mistakes and grow."
In August, the young artist told Rolling Out that despite popular belief, she was never "hiding her identity." Making the choice to put the focus on her music rather than her appearance was actually her way of offering fans true vulnerability. She said:
"If anything, the music is displaying exactly who I am. It's telling you everything. When I first [decided to] release the music, I didn't want my name attached to it, and I didn't want my face attached to it because that would get in the way of really understanding who I am. If anything, I wanted to show more of myself, more of what I go through and what I feel more so than what I look like, what I wear, or who I'm with. It's about focusing on the music."
Even to celebrities, the flashing lights can become too bright sometimes. Just ask Kanye. As for H.E.R., she chooses to opt out of celebrity glamour and focus on her passion. She explained that her minimalist lifestyle choice to become free from vanity was ultimately made out of necessity:
Johnny Nunez/WireImage
"Some people want the attention, some people want the spotlight, and that just wasn't it for me. I wanted it to be about the music, so maintaining that is kind of difficult. But it's something I found made the most sense because it's about the music at the end of the day. That's what I'm most passionate about. It's kind of scary telling a story and being totally honest and totally vulnerable."
H.E.R. has a unique ability to create a soundtrack for the soul that resonates with millennial women and evokes an emotional response across both genders and generations, much like the early work of one of her biggest inspirations: Lauryn Hill. She told Rolling Out:
"I want women to be able to look back and have this same feeling they had when they listened to 'The Miseducation of Lauryn Hill.' That still lives on and still gives a great message to women."
Although the divine connection that she has with her fans is a blessing, heavy is the head of she that wears the crown. Sometimes the pressure to be great can be overwhelming, and Gabi says that she handles that pressure with some self-care routines of her own.
"I just take five or 10 minutes out of my day in the morning when I wake up to focus on my day, focus on myself. It just keeps me sane."
Click here to read the full interview and watch H.E.R. get ready to perform her set on Afropunk.
Featured image by Johnny Nunez/WireImage
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Since it’s Stress Awareness Month, we caught up with Keanne Owens, LCSW, founder of Journey To Harmony Therapy Center, to talk about these triggers and what Black women can do to manage and cope.
Owens is an experienced South Florida-based counselor and social worker who offers her services via Grow Therapy, a therapy and medication management platform. She has worked with Black women professionals to unpack issues related to workplace stressors. “One is the pressure to perform–having to meet deadlines and deliverables. And a lot of times, these subtle stressors from performance are put upon ourselves as Black women. We want to make sure we’re doing our best. We don’t want to be critiqued in certain ways.”
Excessive micromanagement leading to fear of overly critical bosses is another subtle trigger that can negatively impact Black women in the workplace.
“Whenever something is done wrong, or we experience some type of injustice and have to report it, it’s the fear of retaliation–[fear that] we won’t be taken seriously or [our words] will be taken out of context because of being deemed as the ‘angry Black woman,’” she said.
Black Women And Workplace Stress Triggers
Her sentiments are backed by research. A recent report by Coqual found that 28% of Black women (compared to 17% of White men) say their supervisor uses “excessive control or attention to detail” when managing them. There’s more: A survey by the National Employment Law Project found that Black workers were “more likely to have concerns (80 percent) and twice as likely as white workers (18 percent) to have unresolved concerns at work, with 39 percent reporting they were “not satisfied with the employer’s response or did not raise concerns for fear of retaliation.”
The survey also found that 14 percent of Black respondents said they “avoided raising concerns to their employer for fear of retaliation—more than twice the average rate of 6 percent for all survey respondents.”
Owens pointed to the fact that these subtle stress triggers can negatively impact our physical health and our career advancement. “A lot of time it’ll affect our productivity,” Owens added. “We start to have negative thoughts of ourselves. The stressors can also cause fatigue. We’re no longer meeting or working up to our desired potential.” Other challenges as a result include insomnia and increased insolation, withdrawal, and lack of motivation to apply for jobs or promotions even when qualified.
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How To Manage Subtle Stress Triggers
While there are systemic issues at play for Black women at work that has less to do with us and more to do with major overhauls that must be addressed by the powers that be, there are steps we can take for the betterment of ourselves and our mental health. Owens offered the following tips:
Tap into a support system, whether it’s a coworker you trust, a family member, an organization, or an outlet like a hobby.
Create a good work-life balance before burnout even starts. “Having certain boundaries [is the goal] such as, for example, if you get off at 5, you get off at 5. If your job description is this, you don’t go above and beyond because that brings you to a lot of burnout,” Owens said.
Prioritize self-care, whatever that means for you. “If you don’t have a routine, create one. Practice mindfulness and even some meditation,” she added.
Create structure in your life outside of work. “Even if you have a family, applying some structure in your routine helps relieve stress,” she said.
Get into grounding techniques. “Do a real quick square breathing exercise, that’s literally 30 seconds, or you can do a grounding technique that’s less than two minutes, right there where you are. You don’t need any other materials. That’s something you can do with just yourself and your body.”
Ask for help. “As Black women, we don’t ask for help enough,” she said. “Find where you need to ask for help. A lot of times, people think that’s indicative of weakness, but we need to rewrite that narrative. It’s okay to ask for help where you see fit. [If] you’re a mom, [it could be] every Wednesday from 5 to 6, your children are with the dad. You have to carve out that time.”
For more information on Grow Therapy, visit their website. You can also find out more about Keanne Owens, LCSW, via BeginYourJourneyToHarmony.com.
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