Marvel&Friends: A NuMindFrame For the Melanated Soul
As Marvel&Friends pushes on through its second batch of spotlight interviews, we’re beginning to hear a consistent message for Young Black Millennials.
You’d never know it, but decision to take nearly a month off from Marvel&Friends to take time to myself as a transitioned into different work-life balance scenarios was a curse and a blessing. A blessing in that I was able to meet and reconvene with Coco and Darren on revamping and reviving their show, OffTheFeed, which hadn’t seen airtime with GoodKnocking Radio since the end of May 2016. The curse was that in a month, I did so much moving around that my head wasn’t quite straight when I put it back on. Interviews are being done live now, and we’re boosting our station’s programming up from just perhaps 40% to 75% or 80%. More music, more shows, and more equations of how to create the compelling stories of young, ambitious people like myself.
And so, I was cursed. I had to pick up the phone and send a DM to Ms. Mindframe to let her know that we were going to have to reschedule our phone interview. Not reschedule as in missing the date or time, and having to potentially rendez-vous again, but instead that in our Skype interview for Marvel&Friends, her audio was not adequately recorded. The entire thing had to be redone. For a show that lives off creating unscripted conversation for the enjoyment of its audience, that’s a curse.
Luckily, with very minimal pushback, Shaniqua, who resides nearly 7 states north of us in New Jersey, agreed to a re-record for the show.
Nubian_Reign, as we may know her on Twitter resides in Jersey City, NJ, and has embarked on a very interesting journey of bringing to light to her subscribers through her YouTube Channel, NuMindFrame. By light, of course, I mean that she’s paying it forward to the world through engaging monologues and conversations about finding healing. In short, and as she said verbatim in our interview, the channel is “dedicated to mental, emotional, and spiritual growth.”
“I come from a place of having good intentions, I’m putting out nothing but positive energy. I’m not bashing people on my channel. I’m not being spiteful or malicious.” she said of her channel and whether or not she was receiving any negative feedback about her messages.
In fact, she remarked, it was the total opposite. Surprisingly I found myself being someone shocked by this because it seems almost that we’re predisposed at this point to expect people who speak of healing and good intention to be met with harsh scrutiny and negativity. Yet, here Shaniqua is, on her 24th video and she has been met with nothing but love, light, and support.
From videos like “Moving On After Unrequited Love” to “How To Manifest Anything You Want In Life”, Shaniqua’s NuMindFrame is proving the power in of healing, as well as the desires of so many of our peers (and even those older and younger) to find healing through people they relate to. The significance in being the speaker of such healing is the fact that at one point, she was in fact, the receiver of such a message.
Removing herself from an emotionally abusive relationship, she found solace in videos on YouTube describing how to heal after walking away. So, her focus thus far has been describing the symptoms someone might be able to identify if they’re currently in such a situation.
“When I was getting over that situation in October, it was a very spec sit and I just wanted to make a video about that one, specific situation. But then people started asking me for ‘more. more’ and DMing me on Twitter. So i’m just like…I did another one, and another one, and just kept on going.”
And the rest is history.
Whether you call it a crusade, or an opportunity for mutual healing, Shaniqua’s movement has garnished positive feedback, generating more than 1,500 subscribers and over 1,000 average views per video — all within four months of launching her channel. Her dedication to providing such in-depth conversation and insight into behaviors isn’t all fluff, however. Graduating in 2014 with a degree in Clinical and Counseling Pyschology from Lincoln University, Nu assured me that she was doing all she could to keep herself away from being accountable for anything outside the context and scope of what her message was. Simply put NuMindFrame isn’t a channel that is going to give you all of your life’s answers, or the solutions to your problems, and during our interview Shaniqua made sure to put emphasis on that.
Instead, she prefers to give her own insights about narcissism, relationships, and creating the conversation that may inspire a viewer or listener to seek more help. This could be the type of conversation needed to drive so many people — young and old — to seek a better understanding of themselves and their life from certified and licensed professionals.
The truth is, mental health is a conversation we all know we ought to have, but unfortunately a worldwide intervention isn’t likely, and each person bears the responsibility of self-awareness and self-healing. From over-exposure to sensationalized death and police brutality, cyberbullying, and what many refer to as gaslighting by officials and the media, many of us are far from being OK, though we may think otherwise.
The decision to bring Nu on Marvel&Friends was a stretch. Though mutual followers since 2015, Nu and I had never met, spoken, or interacted outside of retweets and a few tweets. However, it’s important to witness the conductivity that happens when two or more people who truly stand beside their conviction come together — even if over Skype, for the second time. Nu’s well on her way to creating more and more videos for NuMindFrame, and to sending out her messages of healing, and I’m well on my way of continuing to bring stories like this to the microphone of Marvel&Friends.
Her Marvel&Friends interview is available now on iTunes and Google Play Music. Also catch me live with my wide variety of guests on GoodKnocking Radio at 8:30pm each and every Monday.
