How can the food we choose to eat, as well as the practices we use to source, prepare, and share our food, be a source of activism and liberation?

Karina Sanchez (she/they) is a holistic health and wellness practitioner and food justice organizer. She co-leads Veggie Mijas Chicago, supporting plant-based education, mutual aid, and community programming for Queer BIPOC communities. Karina is an herbalism apprentice with Urban Growers Collective, a yoga teacher through the Latina Sweat Project, and an energy healing apprentice at Verde Holistic Wellness Studio, where she studies Mesoamerican healing practices and facilitates trauma-informed, culturally rooted wellness offerings.

With over a decade of experience in Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion and community engagement, Kari brings a strategic and relational approach to systems change. In recent years, she has hosted workshops and community spaces that invite participants to begin decolonizing their relationships to food, health, and healing. Her work centers reconnecting people to their bodies, the land, plant medicine, and ancestral wisdom as pathways toward individual and collective liberation.

Ways to Connect With Veggie Mijas

• Follow on Instagram:

• • National: @VeggieMijas

  • Chicago: @VeggieMijasChicago

• Donate via the website to support programs, including community fridges, food access, and education.

• Purchase the digital cookbook, Manteniendo Nuestra Cultura, available on the Veggie Mijas website — a celebration of plant-based recipes rooted in culture and tradition.

• Partner or work with Veggie Mijas: they offer services and collaborations for individuals, teams, and organizations interested in plant-based education, food justice, and sustainable, equitable food systems.

In this episode, Maria sits down with Manny Hernandez and Elena Soboleva, co-founders of Scream Club™, to explore what it looks like to create spaces where people no longer have to hold it all in.

Manny, a men's coach and breathwork practitioner, and Elena, a personal brand expert and community leader for women entrepreneurs, are aware of the impact of societal gender norms on mental health and wellbeing. Together, they share how their own lived experiences led them to build a community that challenges norms around silence, emotional suppression, and rigid gender roles, inviting people to be honest about stress, anger, grief, and joy.

In our conversation, we explore the rapid growth of Scream Club, the power of collective release, and why building authentic, human-centered communities is not just healing, but necessary in a world that constantly asks us to perform instead of feel.

Scream Club is now in multiple cities across the U.S. and abroad, bringing communities together to release the stresses of their daily lives collectively as a group.

What does activism really mean? This season, we're centering the idea that justice and equity are not only pursued through protests, but also through everyday actions that shape how we show up for ourselves, our communities, and the world around us.

Whether it's teaching women how to advocate for their healthcare needs, buiding sustainable communities through homesteading, relearning ancient wisdom related to food, or collectively screaming over a body of water to promote mental wellbeing, our guests this season will demonstrate how activism takes many forms across disciplines and lived experiences. Each episode highlights how individuals and communities are redefining activism in ways that are creative, relational, and deeply human.

Buckle up and tune in!