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Quentin Robinson: The Stories Our Bodies Carry | 100 Stories #6 · 100 Stories: The Narrative Intelligence Project

• Paige Williams: Welcome to 100 Stories, the Narrative Intelligence Project. I'm your host, Paige Williams. This series explores a question at the center of how we become who we are. How malleable are the stories we live by, and what does it take to change one? Across 100 conversations, I'm speaking with thinkers, creators, researchers, and more, those whose lives have been shaped by profound change. Together, we're examining the stories we inherit. The stories that become identity and the human capacities that allow us to see, question, and transform them. These conversations are helping shape the emerging field of narrative intelligence, and the foundational book that I am writing about it. This is One Hundred Stories. Today I am speaking with Quentin Robinson. He is a lecturer at San Marcos, teaching a new course he developed called The History of Hip Hop Dance. Over the past 27 years, Quentin has run a nonprofit that helps people process mental and physical trauma through movement. I invited Quentin today because he's a friend, he's a great storyteller, he's a fantastic dancer and movement professional. And he's a filmmaker. He creates incredible stories and he has a few of his own. So welcome, Quentin. Thank you for being here. Will you tell us about the work and experience that has most shaped how you see yourself in the world? Quentin: I feel those experiences and the way I see myself and how it's shaped the way I see myself in the world. movement, I feel that what comes with me is the way I perceive that people see me is when they see me they think of a moment in time if I've interacted with them or if they hear a song or if they see someone else dance or if they start to dance themselves, it's just that thing of like, Quentin, I remember we did this or I watched a performance or it's there's always moments. that that people associate with me when it comes down to a song or class or something that they've they've they've s they've learned from me on the floor. and people associate movement which is my heart with me and I feel like that's the way I move through the world. as a as a hip hop Street dancer also growing up in that way, there is no this is the specific way you're supposed to move. This is the rules, this is the regulation. There is no rule in regulation. there's a what are you feeling in that moment? What song are you listening to? And letting that out. There is no no pre thought. it when you're freestyling. And I I like to think when it comes to me and the way I move through the world and the way I see myself is adapting, being able to adapt to whatever song life throws at you. I incorporate that that feeling to those moments. Paige Williams: tell me about growing up from, you know, the story that kind of shaped who you were as a kid from Fort Lauderdale, Florida, to where you are today and how that story has transformed. What's been some Quentin: Yeah, mm-hmm. Paige Williams: of like the most transformational stories that has shaped who you are today versus who you were when you were growing up? Quentin: there's one thing that ties me in to that that same kid that grew up in the basement. It's the the idea of of of hunger knowing what that feels like, knowing that feeling of being hungry for more and never getting complacent. Paige Williams: Mm. How did Quentin: Because that that complacency skills is a real thing. Paige Williams: How does that hunger narrative in your life how did it turn into creation for you? Quentin: the idea of wanting and waiting for someone or something to to I'll use the word save me or save us and waiting for it, that is the complacency and and that hunger and that want, that transformation, how I used it is Do it now. There's no better time than now. if I can train right now, if I can get better at this right now, if I could be the best at this thing right here, right now. When it's time, that preparation, there's no there is no doubting me once that door opens. There is no saying, Well, I don't think no, we have to we have to take all doubt out. So that hunger is is that need to crush and destroy all doubt and it just builds that level of creativity to go, All right, what what is the limit? Like what have as a as a human being, what have you seen on a dance floor that made you go, Whoa, and what can I do to make you go, No, I didn't see what I just saw? Like that that reality breaking physical ability breaking thing that you look at and you go, was both feet on the ground in that moment? I don't think so. Was it like I want that feeling? and that's what helps build the next project. It helps build the next thing, it helps build the next dance move again to the song life throws at you. Whatever song life is playing in that moment, you gotta be able to adjust to it. You gotta be able to hit the beats, you gotta be able to like get into the groove of that song that life puts on you in that moment and keep it and keep it and keep the flow going. Even if you jump off beat, it's okay. We mess up choreo every once in a while. Get back on it again. It's your performance Paige Williams: That's okay. Right. That's right. Quentin: your groove. Paige Williams: What story do you tell about a transformative moment in your life and how has it changed over the t years? Quentin: There's two moments that tie in together So growing up, it was rough. But movement was something and when I say movement we call it cutting up one from dancing, the style that we do is is is popping, but we call it cutting up one from city boy. You couldn't just walk into another neighborhood. You couldn't just walk into another school. You couldn't just walk anywhere alone without possibly at a ninety percent chance getting into a fight with whoever lives in that neighborhood. Impossible to not get into a fight or something in that in that way. Or jumped. Or shot. Or robbed. That's impossible. So But as a dancer and during that time We could walk into we could go from Fort Lauderdale to Miami to the worst of the worst neighborhood and have a guy walk up full goals in the mouth. We call bunk dreads, like the big thick dreads, gold jewelry rings. You can clearly see that he actually has like an AK leaning on the car. But when he sees Paige Williams: Mm. Quentin: you, he goes, you we we call little kids jips. you that little jit that that dance over there wouldn't do it in Fort Lauderdale, y'all's at the talent show. Yeah. and then they get excited and then they go, I'm gonna go get my cousin real quick. I bet I'd I bet he can beat you, and then they go run off, get their cousin, and then like forty people come out from that neighborhood, and then you just you have a dance battle and everyone's like cheering you on and everybody's celebrating and and then when you're done, they like dap you up and they're like Alright man, good job. Hey bro, that was tight work. And then sometimes they'll even pay you for beating their cousin. And be like, Hey man, you got that one, you got that one. And now you have that pass. You walk into that neighborhood. You walk into that high school. Y all of these things are possible because of movement. So that's one thing. The other thing that ties that in is the simple factor that I was in Afghan Me and my buddy, we would throw these parties at the USO. everyone's invited except the colonel. And we would have a dance competition and we would put up five hundred dollars. Everyone can get in. And, you know, the people from India, the people like all of these different places, Georgia, they would get in because five hundred in India is a good amount, especially to win in a dance competition. So I had a buddy named Fossil and I sat with him in the office one day and he was just sharing with me how him and Martin Luther King in Gandhi were the same person. But then in that same like paragraph, he stated how he had a disdain for Pakistanis, people from Pakistan. Because he's from India. People from Pakistan, there's a feud Paige Williams: Mm. Mm-hmm. Quentin: go there's been a feud for a long time, and he was telling me how much he hates them and all of these different things. I was like, has a Pakistan ever done anything to you and your family specifically? He was like, no. But they're just bad people. All of them are bad people. We threw this party and the song from Wiz Khalifa, Black and Yellow, was playing. That black and yellow, black and yellow, black and yellow, that song was playing, and I look up and fossil is throwing down with a group of Pakistanis over there having the time of their life. like dance, battling, having a great time, high five and all of the things. And when it was done, they continued talking and I saw them at the Chaw Hall. Paige Williams: dance healed these like old cultural narratives. Quentin: It it did and they and that brought his group of friends and the Pakistanis group of friends and all of were just continu that dance moment was it just continued the way they interacted and hung out all the time after. Paige Williams: what can dance communicate about identity, about memory, about grief or healing that spoken language can't? I mean, in that case, Quentin: We Paige Williams: like dance healed an idea. Quentin: Yeah, we hold so much trauma in our body. We hold so much like damage and so many things that that we can't always identify on the surface until we feel or we hear sometimes a song can trigger an emotion, but we don't understand that emotion. But with movement and in getting that tension out of our body, we hold so much tension in between our joints. We we ball up. We we cover up. We go into the fetal position sometimes when there's fear, when there's hurt, when there's pain, when there's trauma, our body naturally does that to protect itself. So with movement, when we start to expand and wave and we do all of these different motions that kind of breaks those moments of tension and it forces our body to to to be more exposed to the environment. That's why on a stage there's so many different emotions that I can go through depending on the performance, the intimacy of the crowd and everything, because to dance with no words is a very exposing thing to do. And on top of that, to capture attention and entertain and be good and have someone feel what you're feeling. Like we have all of those things because our bodies tell story. Our bodies we are art. So yeah, that that expansion of movement, that storytelling, it allows a lot of stress and tension to be released. Paige Williams: Have ever discovered a time when you're dancing or through movement where your body was carrying an unconscious story and then you realized it? And what happened after you realized it to that story? Quentin: Two thousand seventeen. I was at VidCon. Paige Williams: Mm. Quentin: We got the news that my mom went in for a liver biopsy. And she did that and she everything was fine, you know, a lot of pain, but she did it. But a doctor called her back and was like, Hey, we found something in in her stomach. Like, what is that? I didn't hear anything back for like a day or so. I'm at VidCon my brother, Bobby, dance name's liquid. He was backstage with me when I got the phone call. And it was they think they found cancer in ma and mom's stomach. And she needs to go in immediately. And she's still at the hospital. She hasn't left yet that entire time. Cause they wanted to start treatment immediately. So that's being said to me backstage. While we're getting ready to go one, two, three break, right before. we get on stage and we start, we we do the whole thing, it's the finale at midcon. There's like seventy thousand teens like present in this Anaheim convention stadium that we're in and there's the final song. all you have to do is that take a minute, dun dun dun dun. I forgot the name of the song, but it was that song and I was last and I took the final the final few like seconds of the song. And while I was dancing, everything was bigger. Everything felt more like I felt a lot of energy leaving my body as I was dancing on that finale. And in that moment when the song was done There wasn't sadness. It was me For some reason my mental was like she just watched that. Paige Williams: Hm. Quentin: Like she just saw that and that was for her. And she had to feel that 'cause she knew that I was performing and she and I was like, Should I like come back right now? and they're like, No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. Paige Williams: What role does repetition and practice and physical movement play in changing a deeply held story about who we are? Quentin: Mm. I feel like it's the same thing when we think about writing, when we think about graffiti, when we think about lyrics. We can go into tombs and we can look at the graffiti, we can look at the the hieroglyphics. They tell a story. Our body is capable of doing the exact same thing without saying a word. When we go to different locations, when we go to different parts of the world, a lot of the times we use hand gestures. We go back to step one, which is motion. When we go to a foreign location where we don't know the language, we use motion. So that storytelling and and how we hold it, we go through experiences. When we experience life, even if there's an argument, even if there's a a tension back and forth, there's a emotion, there's a facial feature that we have, there's that that swelling in the back of the head that fills up when when that tension builds. Like we have all of those moments, and regardless, even if it's Pierce. That's a part of it. Paige Williams: can have you been successful in translating it into film and then delivering it to an audience? how do you see like sharing a narrative in film versus sharing a narrative on the stage through dance? Quentin: first the intent and knowing what your goal is and knowing what you're going for. on stage, you have to be able to capture the audience. I won't go to an intimate setting and throw on Flow Riders Apple Bottom Jean song and an intimate audience and start dancing crazy. No, you have to know the audience. You have to understand the story you're telling. Does it go with not just the venue, but does it resonate with you? And the way you tell that story through movement, you have to be very particular You have to be big about that. If I'm picking something up, I'm just not gonna go no, I'm gonna like open up my hands. I'm gonna wrap my hands around that. I'm gonna pull like I gotta show you what I'm do while I'm doing it. You know? Whereas film I can jump the process here and there. But for the real moments of feeling, I want to show that full on. I don't want to cut away from that full moment of where I need you. It's like the it's like the the the intro to the antagonists. I want you to know what the problem is. I want you to know what I'm going through in that moment. But how I get to it, we can we could manipulate that on film. But when it's time to show you how I'm dealing and show you that fight, I have to put you front and center with movement. And with movement, the movement has to be intentional. There's a difference between a battle dancer, a studio dancer, and a performative dancer. A battle dancer won't give you the same performance as a stage performer. Because a battle dancer is they're smaller. They're one on one. They're going at a person. If I put that battle dancer on stage and he does that to the audience, then I'm like, why is he so angry at us? It's just different. Paige Williams: Yeah. Yeah. Quentin: It's just different. So you have to know how to translate that. That's why every battle dancer is not a filmmaker. They're not in commercials. They're not in a studio. In a studio dancer is not in the on a battle in the in a battle. A studio dancer is not on on film or creating that much. You might see in a step up movie or something like that, because that's a lot of choreography. But at the end of the day, there's a diff there's level, and I won't say levels, there's different avenues of approach with dance. and that's that hunger we go back to, I've never settled for having being really good at one particular spot. I can pop, I can wave, I can glide, I can touch, I can animate, I can do all of these things, and then I can produce, I can write, I can act, I can do this, I can go to a studio, I can be in the in the performance with other dancers doing choreo. I can go to a battle. I never put myself into one block one box. Paige Williams: What story do you tell yourself that allows you to not put yourself in a box? Quentin: look around and I pay attention to a lot of things in my environment. My mom always taught us Prove it wrong. Prove it wrong. I learned about this today. Try to prove it wrong. studio dancing, that's the best. Try to prove it wrong. Like go against it. like understand it, because when you go against it, you understand everything there is to know about it. Prove it wrong. If I tell you to prove the Atlantic slave trade wrong, you're gonna learn so much. You're gonna learn a lot. So My goal was always in order to move forward I have to be able to move through every room. I have to be able to to to at least speak the language of of movement and dance in order to keep moving forward. Because there's a ceiling to everything. Paige Williams: your nonprofit using movement to heal trauma. how have you seen the body and movement heal trauma? Because often trauma is attached to the story in our body and the story that we tell ourselves. So how does that movement actually help people process it and release it? Quentin: with that there's moments of of the aha, the aha moment. And that aha moment is when a kid or baby or toddler stands up for the first time and they take those few steps and everyone's like, Yeah, and now it's it's cool, right? Like it it's that thing. It's that aha moment. And everyone has aha moments throughout life. Something that you you thought wasn't possible or something you thought you wasn't gonna get or be able to to to finish or experience or travel to. There's always aha moments, but there's nothing like a aha moment where one, sometimes you may feel goofy doing something, or you may feel, I'll never be able to do that. And then when it happens, especially with your body physically, there's a light switch that just turns on and it just sets a fire to you. So Going over to the to not just a Ronald McDonald's you know helping people with that that's going through chemo and and make a wish and all these different foundations, when we get up, if I told you, hey, go hit your light switch, you just get up and go and that's it. But to the person that's going through a recovery and rehabilitation, every step every every even the mobility of using their finger to turn a light switch on, depending on what they're going through. is something that was once impossible or thought to be impossible to be able to do again. So to be able Paige Williams: Mm. Quentin: we say dance, a lot of people think I would walk into the into a facility and go, all right, we're gonna learn the moon walk, people. No, that's not that's not what what the movement portion is. That movement, there is music involved. There is storytelling involved because that's a part of the movements for movements program. We storytell, but we connect our movement and one of the exercises to our own story. So there's an exercise we do where over a period of almost seven minutes, we've been timing it. Almost seven minutes, we create a poem about ourselves. Rather it be something traumatic, maybe it be something we overcame, rather it be something that we want to or we have experienced or we are in fear of. And then we have a trusted partner or someone that you've been working with, they read that off. And while they're reading that off, you're putting movement to your words. So it's performative, but you're moving to your words with with movements that match that feeling best. So, case in point, went to a school, there's a student, the problem child, I can I could identify that student from before the door even closed behind me. I know which students the teachers are like, I wish that kid stayed home today. Like I can identify that. And those are my favorite students. Those are the ones I love to work with because by the time we're done, they are the goofiest, silliest, most outspoken, understood ones in that classroom by the time we're done. Paige Williams: that? What's that transformation about? Quentin: it's a lot of times we're just not understood. When we're not understood and know no one's gonna understand us, we don't give people a chance to even try. So that student that's late, the student that was the trouble student that I knew as soon as I walked in, this is in Missoula. I was teaching at Hellgate, Hellgate Hellgate school out there. And Paige Williams: Yeah. Quentin: One of the students, I just saw the student over there and the teacher was like, no, no, no. He they he doesn't participate in anything. I was like, not today. So I went over there, sat with the student, told him what we're doing. But hey man, just help me out today. So he stood up, he was helping me out. I'll tell him what to say. He'll say it to the class. He helped me with the whole exercise of getting people to write. I was like, you don't have to write right now. Just repeat what I'm saying to you, to them. They'll do it. Okay. He's like, all right, cool. So he started doing that. parroting everything I was telling him to do. He was a part of the situation. He was a part of the room. He was a part of the process. And then afterwards he came to me and was like, Can I write something too? I was like, sure. So he immediately, everything that I told them to write down about the the the project that we're doing, he remembered everything and he went straight to his paper and started writing. And I was like, I'll keep them busy for a little bit. Take five minutes. And he jotted everything down, was done in like three, had a full page Teacher said that's the most he's written in that class the entire time he's been there just about. Next thing you know, everybody started pairing up, putting movement to the words, practicing with their partner and everything. And then I took the teacher and I said, You, this is your partner. And I paired them with that student. Your partners today. And the teacher, I walked over there and the teacher had just like a few tears in his eyes. And I was like, Why, like, what's going on? Everything okay? And immediately the teacher was like, he pulled me to the side and he was like, I don't know, like, I didn't know all of this. I just didn't know all of this about this student. He was basically homeless. He's always eating in class because he's getting to school late and one of the students gives him food and he eats it in class because he does he can't make it there to the lunchroom because he doesn't have money to get breakfast anyway. And he he's not on a program. doesn't have money to go to a vending machine, And his clothes were always damp. So he's saying all these things in his writing. He got to the word compassion and a student the teacher said the word compassion out of his writing and a student stared at the teacher and was like, I don't know a movement for that. I don't know a gesture or anything for compassion. And that hit teacher Paige Williams: Mm. Quentin: really, really hard because here's this kid. He can spell it. But he don't know what that looks like or feels like to put it into movement. And that teacher, his mind just clicked and was like, Got it. That alone, the teacher understood that student in those moments. Because he couldn't identify with movement compassion, which is love and care and and thought and all of these different things. He didn't and he couldn't. So our experiences with love, all of these different things, there's a movement for it, there's a feeling. But this kid didn't know compassion. And that hit this teacher extremely hard. And I got a note from that teacher like a few months later in 180. 180 on the student, 180 on their relationship, one Paige Williams: Wow. Quentin: on everything. Paige Williams: That was that was his aha moment. Both of Quentin: was it? Paige Williams: Wow. How do culture, race, gender, place, community shape the way a body is interpreted? Both by the person living in it and by the audience watching it? Quentin: I can say when I walk into a space, the first thought that I get isn't are you a dancer? The first thing I get is either an athlete A musician A rapper, an artist of some sort. Never dance. Because culturally when you say you're a dancer, where I'm from, I'm considered a dancer. But around the world culturally, when I say I'm a dancer, people associate dancing with modern, jazz, ballet, contemporary. That's dancer. Where I'm from, we don't when you say you're a dancer, people don't think, yeah, you do ballet. No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. They think, you dance. No, no, like I'm I'm a dancer. So yeah, you go to the club, turn on music, and you can dance real good. You do no, I'm a dancer. So even at home, the idea of of my of the body is different. Even at home. we're perceived as well yeah, you just dance, that's normal. And outside they are mad they automatically think ballet jazz modern contemporary. So when I walk into a space I use that as damn near a superpower. It's like that Clark Kent thing. It's see the poet up there, I see the the musician up there, I see the sing the beautiful singer, I see the the rapper flowing, I see all of that. I'm like, this is home. All of this right here compiled together. I do that. through me. that song, that that rhythm, that storytelling, that spoken word, I do that through expression, through my body. So culturally There's a there's a positive and a negative. Positive is Again, where I'm from the training I've had, which was self taught in the beginning, and then exchanging here and there with individuals from different disciplines over time and just learning myself, walking into a room and that music starts, rather it be again, I could dance on stage with just jeans on and socks. And it's not interpreted as a a hyper sexualized thing when I start movement. There's no idea of magic mic or anything like that once I start dancing, once I start doing the styles that I love to do. There's a wow moment because again, there's not a lot of fire marine, six foot two black dudes from the hood with dreads that's gonna get up there and do what I'm getting ready to do. That's the upside. That's the Paige Williams: That's right. Quentin: wow moment. The downside to it is I can walk into a space and say, I can do this, this, this, I've done this, I've done that, boom. The budget will stay at a certain marker. Paige Williams: Mm. Quentin: Following the lights will stay at a certain marker. I can show you, unfortunately, a white kid or a white a white a guy or girl doing something that I did in middle school. What in where we from, we call we it's like get that out of here. That's like that that's the way we it's it's like I don't know, it's like looking at a a old video of something, you're like, That ain't it no more. You know? Like it's it's not a disrespect, but it's almost disrespectful to go That's hip hop. And that is amazing. That's the best thing I've seen in a long time. It's like I did that. when I was in the seventh grade, like that's recorded. Like that's been done already a thousand times. Why why are there people still making millions of dollars in views off of doing the moon walk? That's the commercialized version of what we've created and produced from where we come from, from that grit, from that gutter. It gets commercialized and then it gets lowjacked. And then packaged, rebranded, and put on a shelf. And we watch Paige Williams: Mm. Quentin: that go out and we're like, That sale date is bad already. Like that that Paige Williams: Mm. Quentin: that's been done. But to the masses, they'll never know. Paige Williams: So you've you're such a pioneer and and you've written this course on hip hop and the history of hip hop that you're gonna lecture. So tell me what narrative intelligence needs to know from the history of hip hop. What can we learn from it? Quentin: You literally just said it. The history Paige Williams: Ha Quentin: The history. Not Shannon Tatum's step up movie. Not You Got Served. But the history. DJ Cool Hurt. That first DJ, that first moment, that first night when hip hop was birthed, when he got on there and it just started. the people not just the people but the sacrifice, the migration of people that went that that went from the South to the to the the Oakland and all of these other places during the riots and all these other things like that. Like there's so many different moments in history where when it's taught correctly There's a different level of respect. That individuals hold when they learn what they're doing, not learn how to do it. When you learn what you're doing, you will have a different respect. I can go on YouTube and mimic a dancer from anywhere Paige Williams: Yeah. Quentin: around the world. But what I won't know is if I mimic a dancer from a certain part of Africa, a certain part of Asia, or I mimic For instance, you will never see another culture Mimic a Samoan ritual. Like when they're doing their I forgot what it's called, the hike. I don't want to mess the name up of it, but when they're doing their their the chants and and the Paige Williams: Yeah, yeah. Quentin: when they're doing that, that's a story. That's their culture. That's them. You will never see a group on a gap commercial doing that. You will never see that. And if you do, it's gonna be hell today. Because that's a story. That's life. That's that is so many different things that they put in that. So with hip hop, that's story, that's life, that's the way we move, that's the way we we we shift through the world. That's not just a thing you go do. You don't just do hip hop. You live hip hop. There's elements to it. That's what they're gonna learn. They're gonna learn to treat hip hop and know when to use it the correct way and how to appreciate it. The same way, which again, to be invited in that family, to be a part that a marriage. You see them doing it at the marriage. They're inviting that person into their family. That's almost rich that's ritualistic, right? Learning hip hop should damn near be ritual like it should be a ritual to learn hip hop. Paige Williams: The word that's coming to mind is embodiment. Quentin: Yes. I precisely, yes. Paige Williams: You like you are an embodiment of movement, of creativity, of storytelling, as Quentin: Yes. Paige Williams: expressed through your movement. You've mentioned your mom in a beautiful way a few times. And, you know, we started with we just take doubt out of it. And then I can be anything. I can do anything. And she said, question the narrative or question the truth. Like, that's the truth. Why don't we question it and push against it? And then there was the story of going out on the VidCon stage, not knowing what's next. And it just strikes me that the narrative You've learned from your mom has shaped who you are and how you move through the world. Quentin: Yes. Yes. watching and seeing what we went through and what we were able to get through. And then as an adult, especially right now with my kids, Paige Williams: Mm-hmm. Quentin: Realizing she had four. Two. And these dreads are almost getting pulled out every other week. And she had four of me, of me and my siblings, you know. So it's it's it's one of those things, three boys and one girl. You know, so Paige Williams: Mm. Quentin: in a rough, rough area on a teacher's salary. elementary school teachers salary in Fort Lauderdale, Florida in the eighties and nineties. Paige Williams: Yeah. Whew. Of course your mom was Quentin: First a teacher Paige Williams: a teacher. Quentin: first teacher's aid, a teacher's aid in the eighties in early to mid nineties Paige Williams: Nothing. Quentin: in transfer up. Paige Williams: Yeah. Wow. Quentin: But she sang and I could I could three way someone in right now and just go, Hey, you remember when my mom sang there's a hero and they would probably get goosebumps and teary eyed. Paige Williams: Yeah. Quentin: Voice was one of those voices that you hear and it's up there with those like arethas and patties that just gives you the chills. She danced. There's a video of me dancing with her before she passed away. I didn't even know she was in that pain. I didn't know she was going through therapy two months before VidCon and she shot a video with me and Bobby again. She came out, she shot a video with us. She she was a author. She did stage plays. She was signed to Lion Records as a singer. She ran tracks. She held records on a track and field. She was just it. And I say me and my siblings, all four of us, we are all quarters of what she was. We're all just a quarter of what she was what what she was. So Paige Williams: If you got to say this is what narrative intelligence means, how would you define it? Quentin: Narrative intelligence. feel like it depends on who you're telling it to. Who you're telling it to. and Are you willing be sh like are you willing to give the information straightforward rather it benefits you or not? Because you're controlling that. When I think of narrative, I think of control. And when I say control, not in a negative or positive way, but the narrative is in your hands in that moment. And what you're giving is And a bit and again, who are you giving this this this intelligence to? Who are you giving this information to? Are you willing to give it to cut and dry? So it goes back to me stating in a nutshell the way I plan on teaching is Have that respect of knowing what you're learning. knowing it, learn like getting like like getting the information, what you're doing, why you're doing it, the who made it possible. So Good or bad, you're going to get it cut dry in the truth. Regardless of if it does minimize or if it does bring out that idea of, this comes from trauma, this comes from pain, this comes from hurt. There was anger behind this. That part, that's all it is, is just a part. So that narrative intelligence is is who you're telling, that's one side of it. And the other side is What have I gone through? Who am I? What have my experiences shaped? How did I build who I am? Out of all of those things that we spoke about, rather it be family, dance experience, growing up in a rough spot, my mom, the way she she she held all of us. That built me up and that built the library of of things that I can always flip back to. So when that situation, that narrative comes up that something else controls, hits me or comes to me, or is it right in front of me, my experiences and what I've been able to gain and what I've been through gives me context clues on how to deal with that situation, that narrative that's being put in front of me also. Paige Williams: Quentin, this has been amazing and really a different perspective on it. You know, talking about movement and story has been awesome. Thank you so much for your time. Quentin: no, thank you. I I really enjoyed this and I gotta get back out there 'cause I miss y'all out there. So yeah. We'll do. Paige Williams: Yeah, come see us. Here's what I'm taking from this conversation about narrative intelligence. Quentin helped me see that stories do not only live in words, they live in movement in the way the body protects itself and what it remembers, and in what becomes possible when someone is finally invited to move differently. I keep thinking about the student who could write the word compassion, but could not imagine a movement for it. Movement revealed something language alone had not, and once the teacher saw it, the story he held about that student changed. Quentin also reminded me that expression without history can become extraction. Narrative intelligence may include learning to read the stories held in bodies while respecting the histories that gave those movements meaning. And now I want to invite you into the narrative intelligence inquiry. What is your NQ? Take the narrative quotient assessment at storykeys.co and subscribe to 100 Stories, the Narrative Intelligence Project, wherever you listen to your podcast. Follow the project on YouTube for future conversations and please send to a friend. Quentin, thank you so much for talking to us about movement and narrative intelligence.