When Did Self-Care Become a Solo Sport?

22/01/2026 - From 19h30 to 21:30 - Public

This event is organised by Trianon Scientific Communication and hosted at The Nine.

We talk endlessly about environmental sustainability. Carbon footprints. Circular economy. The metrics are clear.

Social sustainability? We've turned it into individual wellness programs. Meditation apps. Solo yoga. Therapy subscriptions.

The message: fix yourself, alone, with a screen.

Meanwhile, burnout affects 77% of workers globally (Gallup, 2022). EU burnout costs: €617 billion annually (Eurofound, 2018). The wellness industry is worth $66 billion (Global Wellness Institute, 2023).

We're spending billions on isolation to fix problems caused by isolation.

Here's what we've forgotten: For 40,000 years, humans built social resilience through collective movement. Every culture independently developed synchronized rhythm, not for exercise, but because moving together fundamentally changes how we relate to each other.

Recent neuroscience confirms it: synchronized movement increases cooperation by 50%, builds trust, lowers cortisol, increases oxytocin, and synchronizes heart rates across participants (Tarr et al., 2016; Wiltermuth & Heath, 2009).

You can't build social infrastructure with solo activities. That's not how humans work.

What if we stopped optimizing individuals and started rebuilding the connections between them?

So here we are in January, when everyone makes promises to themselves, about themselves, by themselves. Time to download another app, join another gym you'll never visit, commit to another individual transformation that statistics say won't last past February.

What if (just hypothetically) the problem isn't your willpower? What if the problem is that we've been sold a fundamentally antisocial solution to what is, at its core, a social problem?

Already interested? Register here

Still not sure? This is what this event is going to explore.

This event is an experiment in collective rhythm as social infrastructure. Specifically: stepping.
A percussive movement tradition from African-American Greek-letter organizations that explicitly refuses individualism, you literally cannot step alone and call it stepping.

No apps. No equipment. No individual metrics. Just humans, making rhythm together, and seeing what that does to a nervous system that evolved to regulate itself through proximity to other humans.

What will happen during this event:

Part 1
Dr. Audrey-Flore Ngomsik, CEO of Trianon Scientific Communication, CSR strategist, will guide you through an interactive quiz designed to make you question everything your company's wellness program assumes about human behavior.

Part 2
Briana Ashley Stuart takes over. She's an entrepreneur, professional dance artist who's spent years working with people who are convinced they can't dance, don't like dancing, and definitely shouldn't be anywhere near a dance floor.
Her specialty? Using movement to build social sustainability in communities and corporations across Europe and beyond.
Her superpower? Creating spaces where people discover their bodies already know how to do this, no dance experience, no coordination, no rhythm required.

Stepping uses your body as an instrument: hands, feet, voice. No music. No choreography. No mirrors. No watching yourself. No comparing yourself to anyone else (Briana actively discourages this). Just humans, creating sound together.

You cannot step alone and call it stepping. The form itself refuses individualism. Which is exactly the point. Briana's approach strips away everything we've learned to fear about moving in front of other people. Her highly energetic facilitation isn't about teaching you steps, it's about creating an atmosphere where you can't help but participate. Where the person next to you isn't competition, they're collaboration. Where "getting it right" isn't the goal because there's no "right" to get.

She's worked with everyone from community organizations to corporate executives. What they all discover: the strength, confidence, and creativity that shows up when you stop trying to perform and just make rhythm with other humans. It does something to your nervous system that a wellness app simply cannot replicate.

Why this matters

• For communities: Social sustainability isn't about individual wellness metrics. It's about whether the social fabric can hold under pressure. Whether people trust each other. Whether there are actual relationships that can absorb shock when things break down.
• For organizations: Companies with strong peer relationships see 21% higher productivity and 59% lower turnover (Gallup, 2017). That's not individual resilience, that's social infrastructure.
• For everyone: We've been sold antisocial solutions to fundamentally social problems. This event asks: what if we've been thinking about social sustainability backwards?

Important: This Is NOT about dancing
Let's be very clear about what this event is not:

• Not a dance class. Nobody's teaching you choreography. Nobody cares if you can dance.
• Not a performance. There's no audience. Everyone's doing this together. Badly and beautifully and all at once.
• Not about coordination. If you can clap your hands and stomp your feet (not necessarily at the same time), you have all the skills required.
• Not about rhythm. Rhythm is negotiable. Participation is not.
• Not about being good at this. It's about experiencing what happens in your body and in the room when humans create sound together.

If you actively dislike dancing, you should especially come to this event. Because this isn't dancing. This is collective rhythm as social infrastructure. It's about community resilience, not performance. About neuroscience, not talent. About discovering that your body is an instrument whether you think you can "dance" or not.

The people who get the most out of Briana's sessions? The ones who show up saying "I have no rhythm" and "I don't dance." Because they're not trying to be good. They're just trying it. And that's all this requires.

Who should come
Citizens curious about what social sustainability actually means beyond corporate jargon. Anyone tired of "self-care" advice that makes isolation worse. Anyone who suspects we've been thinking about community resilience entirely backwards.

Especially: People who've never attended a sustainability event because they all sound boring. People who "don't dance" and want to keep it that way (this isn't dancing). People who are sceptical that a 90-minute session could change anything (good, bring your skepticism).

Anyone with a body. Dance experience not required. Rhythm negotiable. Willingness to be slightly uncomfortable appreciated.

Click here to register to this event