Quentin Mables has always had a passion in helping spread love to his Englewood neighborhood friends in Chicago. These qualities poured over into a career for Mables who is now the co-executive director of I Grow Chicago, a nonprofit that runs Peace House, which is a community site that serves and supports people of all ages in the neighborhood.
“Being in Englewood you see a lot of individuals who show that they are resilient,” Mables said. “No matter what it is, whether it’s a lack of resources or lack of economic empowerment. But, you have a community that still gets up and push forward everyday with the lack of resources that we have. We still get up, go to work, smile and tell each other to have a good day in our community.”
Peace House serves as a community site where events, tutoring, community yoga classes and food and donation pantries are held. Currently, Peace House offers 15 different programs where everybody — from kids to elders — serves a helping hand.
The mission of I Grow Chicago is to ignite collective hope and healing through connection, belonging and opportunity. They use their core pillars to empower individuals and communities as a whole.
Mables began working with Peace House after meeting with and speaking to the founder, Robbin Carroll, in 2013. She asked Mables and his friend to help take back their community and, soon after, they grabbed trash bags, started cleaning up blocks and spoke with neighbors.
“I feel like I didn't choose it, it chose me,” Mables said. “I’ve always showed that leadership skill set, whether it’s voicing my concerns about poverty, the homeless, the lack of jobs or the lack of education. I’ve always expressed my concerns.”
“Now we’re forming what is I Grow on a bigger platform and it allows not just myself, but everybody in the community to have a voice. That voice can be heard. Now people can put a face on Englewood,” he added.
Photo: igrowchicago.org
As co-executive director of I Grow Chicago, Mables role is to make sure that the program runs as planned. He makes sure that everything is intact at Peace House, such as reaching out to funders and donors, planning and setting up events and helping I Grow Chicago gain more exposure.
Mables also teaches yoga at Peace House. He was introduced to the practice by Carroll. Mables realized that yoga applies more so to not what it does for the body, but what it does for the mind.
“Chicago is one of those hustling and bustling cities,” Mables said. “It's just always on the go. How can we sometimes just sit still and be present in our mind? How can we become aware and also learn how to not just react to a situation and to take a breath before we act? Because that's key.”
“It’s all about being present in your mind, being mindful of your surroundings, your circumstances and your well being,” he added.
Mables also practices yoga with students at schools in Chicago and has a program during the summer called Breathing and Balling where he fuses yoga and basketball.
“Before you shoot that free throw on the basketball court, the first thing you do is breathe,” Mables said. “That's the first thing you do when you shoot that free throw…don’t rush it. Just take a deep breath and relax.”
This past year, Mables visited Nairobi, Kenya with I Grow Chicago to study yoga. He said that's one of the places where you visit and never be the same.
Not only is he working with I Grow Chicago, but Mables is also the founder and COO of Englewood Peace Company. Englewood Peace Company assists with business opportunities and training for residents in the neighborhood by designing and producing T-shirts that promote social change with positive messages, according to its site.
“It’s my own company, but 25 percent of the proceeds go back to I Grow Chicago,” he said. “It's more so being a liason for Englewood and being a voice in Englewood.”
Mables said the vision of creating and designing T-shirts was inspired by spreading a message and showing the great things throughout his block, city and hood. He asked his friend Clarence to draw the design for the T-shirts. Clarence sent Mables sketches when he served time in jail.
"He was sending me these pictures from jail and I was like, ‘Man when you get out, I got something for you bro, because you’re not going go back’,” Mables said. “That's not a place where anybody belongs. Mass incarceration is huge.”
Mables said Clarence designed the first shirt he ever sold and it was titled “Bury guns, not people.”
“I’ve been in a situation where gun violence has plagued our community for so long,” Mables said. “Not just Englewood, but throughout the country there are mass shootings.”
The founder said that violence has been plaguing communities like Englewood for so long because of hunger, poverty and lack of resources.
“Don't nobody care about us,” Mables said. “They not looking for us. You walk through our neighborhood, you see boarded-up houses, you see churches that are boarded-up and you see schools that are closing. You feel traumatized. I feel caged up, and it's my own city. You might as well be locked up in your own city. You don't have to be in jail to be locked up.”
Mables said he’s continuing to push “Bury guns, not people” because it's not cool to attend a funeral every other week. It does something to your psyche. He believes in equality and economic empowerment.
The entrepreneur’s journey is about pacing himself and not rushing to the finish line. He is a strong advocate in teaching the youth that, too. He advocates for parents and the community to educate kids, since the school system has failed them.
Through his work, Mables said he wants to be remembered by being honest and not being politically correct.
“I just want to change the narrative when it comes to us as people,” Mables said. “When it comes to us as a culture, when it comes to us in communities and when it comes to us as a whole. We are kings and queens. That's what we are and that's how we’re born. We have to see ourselves in that light before anybody else can.”
Sponsored by U.S. Bank.
