Honoring BIPOC Mental Health: Holding Space, Listening Deeply, and Committing to Change
Each July, we observe BIPOC Mental Health Awareness Month, which is a time to uplift the mental health needs, stories, and healing journeys of Black, Indigenous, and People of Color. It is also a time to acknowledge the systemic inequities and collective trauma that continue to affect BIPOC communities, and to reflect on our role, especially as mental health professionals, artists, and wellness seekers, in dismantling those barriers and creating spaces of true belonging.
While this month brings focused attention to these issues, our commitment to BIPOC mental health must extend far beyond July. This awareness is not a symbolic gesture; it is an ongoing call to accountability, equity, and care in how we show up every day, both personally and professionally.
We approach this topic with humility and a deep respect for the voices, experiences, and leadership of BIPOC communities. This post is not meant to speak on behalf of anyone, but rather to hold space, to honor, to reflect, and to invite continued learning and action.
The Weight of Silence: Mental Health in BIPOC Communities
BIPOC individuals often face disproportionate challenges to accessing quality, culturally competent mental health care, including systemic racism, intergenerational trauma, underrepresentation in the therapy profession, economic barriers, and the stigmas around mental health care present in many communities.
And yet, despite these barriers, BIPOC folks continue to demonstrate extraordinary resilience, creativity, and resourcefulness in how they care for themselves and their communities.
Statistics only tell part of the story:
According to Mental Health America, Black adults are 20% more likely to experience serious mental health issues than white adults, but are far less likely to receive treatment.
Latino youth are significantly more likely to experience depressive episodes than their white peers, but are also less likely to get support.
Indigenous communities face some of the highest suicide rates and mental health disparities in the country, rooted in centuries of displacement and cultural erasure.
Asian and Pacific Islander communities often face cultural stigma, language barriers, and underdiagnosis of conditions like depression and anxiety.
These disparities are part of a larger system of structural inequality. Addressing BIPOC mental health means acknowledging the inequities in the system while also focusing on the lived experiences of those most affected by it.
The Role of Mental Health Professionals and Artists
At Creativity and Madness, our focus is on the intersection of psychology, art, and personal transformation. We recognize the opportunity and respectfully cultivate spaces that are inclusive, liberatory, and culturally attuned.
Here’s what that looks like in action:
Culturally Responsive Care: Supporting continued education around cultural humility and bias in clinical work.
Amplifying BIPOC Voices: Uplifting the contributions, stories, and art of BIPOC creators, therapists, and thinkers.
Listening More Than Speaking: Creating space where people can speak for themselves and not be spoken over.
Expanding Representation: Actively supporting and welcoming BIPOC clinicians, artists, and seekers into our conferences and communities.
Embodied Allyship: Understanding that allyship is not a performative gesture but an ongoing, relational practice grounded in humility and accountability.
Creativity as a Pathway to Healing, Always!
Art has always been a space of reclamation, resistance, and restoration, especially for communities that have been silenced, harmed, or marginalized. Whether through poetry, music, storytelling, dance, or visual art, creative expression offers a powerful means to affirm identity, process trauma, and imagine new futures.
We honor the creative traditions that have emerged from struggle and been shaped by culture, and we recognize that supporting BIPOC mental health also means supporting creative sovereignty, self-determination, and the preservation of ancestral wisdom.
An Invitation for Reflection
As we honor BIPOC Mental Health Awareness Month, we invite you, especially if you are white or hold positions of privilege, to reflect on these questions:
Whose voices am I centering in my work?
What systems am I unintentionally upholding?
How can I deepen my cultural humility and expand my capacity to be of service?
Where am I still uncomfortable, and what am I willing to learn and unlearn?
And just as importantly: What am I doing to ensure that the healing spaces I create are safe, accessible, and affirming for all people?
There is no one-size-fits-all approach to mental health, nor should there be. Healing is personal. Healing is cultural. Healing is political. Healing is creative.
This month, and every month, we honor the mental health needs, stories, and leadership of BIPOC communities. We commit to listening. We commit to growing. And we commit to doing better.
by Dr. Amy Vail and Alli Fischenich