We recently connected with Quibilah Alexander and have shared our conversation below.

Hi Quibilah, thanks for joining us today. We’d love to hear about the things you feel your parents did right and how those things have impacted your career and life.

I grew up in a home with my mother, grandparents, aunt, and a younger cousin. My mother worked a lot when I was growing up and so did my grandparents and my aunt. So, my family was not present to see me perform at school or help me with my homework and yet, I managed to be an honor roll student. My mother taught me through her actions that it is important to have a community of people to support you when you need it. Even though she was not able to be there physically, she coordinated with other community members to show up for me in those times. She taught me this ancient practice that it takes a village to raise a child.

Currently, the energy and concept of individualism has been prominent in society. It has taken many years for me to unweave and unlearn this concept and remember the very foundation in which I was raised. As a solo parent, there have been times when I’ve struggled with the balance of reaching out to my community for support and doing things independently. A very important aspect to my work as a death and grief doula is to curate offerings that bring the collective together to grieve, out in the open, instead of within the confines of our homes. I want to challenge the notion that we have to isolate ourselves during such a sacred time when we need community the most. I give gratitude to my mother for showing me that community matters and that we need each other to thrive.

Quibilah, love having you share your insights with us. Before we ask you more questions, maybe you can take a moment to introduce yourself to our readers who might have missed our earlier conversations?

I am Quibilah, and I am black and queer and currently reside in the Austin, Texas area. I graduated with my Bachelors degree in Psychology in 2004. I have worked in the non-profit sector for over 20 years working with marginalized children and families. I’ve always felt charged by providing support to people who need it.

I started my healing journey, over 10 years ago when I received my first reiki session. I was going through a transition in my life and felt called to receive a session. That session was very pivotal in my own journey as it shifted so much for me. I received my attunement in Usui Reiki levels I and II, shortly afterwards. This opened many opportunities for me, which led me to become a certified health and wellness consultant, certified community herbalist, I studied grief and death work, and sound healing. I started my business, Sacred Ascension to make healing accessible for BIPOC community members. We curate monthly meditation offerings where I offer sound healing. We also curate wellness retreats for BIPOC and womxn centered collectives/organizations. We create opportunities for the community to come together and move through grief as a collective at my “Grief Jams” and “Grief Walks”. The Grief Jam is an offering that allows people to identify where they feel grief in their bodies. We do stretches, breathwork, and dance through the grief. We close the jam with heart opening cacao to honor our time together and most importantly, to honor the grief that will always be a part of our journeys.

In 2023, we collaborated with the first Black cemetery in Austin, TX to spread awareness about its history and importance to the community. As our city grows and expands, historical places are being displaced and forgotten. The city is planning to build new housing developments around the perimeters of the cemetery, and we wanted to ensure that the community knew about this. We planned Ancestral Prayers, which was an offering to honor and bless the sacred lands of the cemetery, pay homage to the ancestors buried there, and show the community that the cemetery and black graves matter. We offered prayers, dancing, storytelling, sound healing, drumming, and placed flowers on the graves. I am very proud of this offering because it was something that the community needed and because ancestral reverence work is so important to me. We plan to make this an annual offering.

Putting training and knowledge aside, what else do you think really matters in terms of succeeding in your field?

In addition to training/knowledge, I think that following my intuition and honoring my own spiritual practice has been crucial as I navigate being a business owner. I curate most of my offerings based on what my heart senses is needed in the collective. I can say that my offerings are offerings that I personally can grow and expand from if I were a participant. This inner knowing has guided me to the right collaborators and opportunities to support more people in my community. I know that this is not conventional advice, but this has helped me exponentially.

How’d you meet your business partner?

I met my business partner while working at a local non-profit organization years ago. I was a supervisor at the time, and she was working directly with clients in the field with another program within the organization. We connected through talking about spirituality and other life stuff. We kept in touch throughout the years and we’ve both grown in so many ways. I contacted her to read tarot cards at one of my birthday parties and from there, things took off for us. I co-curated a retreat honoring the seasonal shift to springtime and asked her to offer guided meditations and tarot readings there. Currently, we offer monthly meditations and seasonal retreats within our community.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://ko-fi.com/sacredascension
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/sacred_ascension
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/SacredAscensionShop

Image Credits
Quibilah, Sacred Ascension