Hooplahoma is a combination of the words “Hoop” and “Oklahoma.” The mission from the very beginning has been to spread the joy of learning and the healing power of hooping to Oklahoma and beyond!

I’m Chelsea Parks, founder of Hooplahoma. After falling in love with hooping a few years ago, I was overcome with the desire to share this wonderful thing with anyone and everyone. It was the beginning of what would become my career as a circus performer. I feel like I’m living my best life when I’m bringing joy to others through performing and teaching.

I take great pride in making quality hoops for people so that they can experience the joy and wonder in playing with a beautiful colorful circle!

HOW HOOPLAHOMA CAME TO BE

July 10, 2020

I am not exaggerating when I tell you that hooping changed my life.

When I was a kid, I was good at hula hooping, but never that interested in it. It seemed like there was just one thing you could do with it, so I mastered that, got bored, and moved on. It wasn’t until I was 25 years old that I became interested in hoops again. Here is the story of how my love for hoops and the creation of Hooplahoma came to be.

Around 2015, I was working a wonderful Phish themed restaurant in OKC. If you are unfamiliar with the jam band Phish, the fans are the kind of people who love music, love festivals, and love to have a good time with friends. It was definitely the most fun restaurant job I’d ever had. Once I was hanging out with a bunch of people I worked with at a party with a bon fire and fire spinners. That was the first time I saw anybody spin a fire hoop. She was doing all kinds of different things I had never seen done with a hoop before. My mind was blown. So, because I’m not shy and I love learning, I actually asked this girl if I could try her fire hoop. Looking back now, I can’t believe that she let me do that. But she was extremely kind, and taught me how to do a very basic forward weave with one hoop. I repeated the move over and over again and started to feel the exhilarating sensation of my mind and body being connected, all my senses immersed in the present moment. I would later learn that the term for this state of being was called flow. I was hooked.

I realized there was something magical about hoops and I wanted to dive in. I got my own hoop not long after that party, and quickly became obsessed. I spent as much time as possible, which wasn’t much then, in my backyard or my living room, playing with a hoop. This might sound silly to anyone that isn’t a hooper, but hooping at that time in my life was the best stress reliever I had ever experienced. At that time, I was working at three different jobs, which I definitely do not recommend. I was awesome at it, but I had very little time for myself. I loved hooping so much, that I would get up extra early in the morning so I could hoop for even 10 minutes, before going to work. When I was hooping, I was so immersed in my own body that my mind would fall away. All the anxiety about the future, the rumination about the past, imaginary conversations, and time itself would disappear temporarily, and make 10 minutes feel infinite. Hooping made me feel alive.

Over the next couple of years, hooping was my therapy. I could tell that my mental health was getting better because I started to feel alive in my life, not just when I was hooping, but all the time. I had more clarity too, and was paying closer attention to things. Since then I have found that a meditation practice can accomplish pretty much the same result. Both it turns out are basically exercises in mindfulness. Mindfulness, like flow, is a state of present awareness. In cultivating this awareness, I became happier and started making better decisions in all areas of my life.

As I continued on my hooping journey, I began to meet more and more people who were a part of Oklahoma’s flow community. I learned that hooping, along with juggling, spinning poi, and all kinds of other object manipulation, fall into the category of “Flow Art.” Most of the people I met were multitalented, and some even rode the unicycle, which was another silly skill that I had. I knew that these were my people. 

Eventually I came to meet a unicyclist and hooper that together would change my life. Jeremy and Kelsey Philo were the couple that hosted the weekly get together for the flow community at a park in Norman, where people would come to share ideas, teach each other things, and just have fun together flowing with their props. They were also the founders of an entertainment company called Inspyral Circus. How I found out about the Philos, was they gave a workshop called “Get Paid to do What You Love: Performing Professionally.” At this point, I was still working in the service industry, and it wasn’t that I didn’t love it, but it had never occurred to me that hoops and unicycles could be a job that someone could have! It was that workshop that inspired me to pursue a career as a circus performer. 

So, in the spring of 2017, I created my own company, Hooplahoma. I had no idea at that time what it would even look like, but I had found something powerful in hoops that I wanted to share with the world. If I could somehow spread the joy that I had found within myself through hooping, I knew that I could be making a positive impact while doing something that I loved. People sometimes say to do what you love and you’ll never work a day in your life. Those people have no idea what they’re talking about. In the year between the time that I decided to pursue this new career and my first paid gig, there was tons of hard work and a significant amount of self doubt. But, my very first gig made it all worth it.

In May of 2018, my boyfriend at the time (now husband), Blake Parks, helped me book my first Hooplahoma gig. It was at the Volkswagen Show in Automobile Alley, an event where his band, Steelwind, was already booked to play bluegrass music at one of the stages. After booking his own band to play the event, Blake pitched Hooplahoma to the person who booked him, and she agreed to hire me for interactive entertainment services. I got dressed up, brought about 20 hoops and my unicycle, and played with people in the street for 3 hours. My goal was to make sure every person that I interacted with had fun, which was accomplished by either getting them to play with a hoop, or showing off riding the unicycle, which most people had never seen in person before. It was one of the best days ever, and the first time I actually got paid to hoop.

Since then, a lot has happened and Hooplahoma has evolved. I did lots more events like that, mixing performing with interacting and teaching. I also started teaching some hoop classes, and giving private lessons for hoops and for unicycling. I learned to make hoops from Kelsey Philo of Inspyral Circus, who has been a mentor through this entire journey and is now a very good friend. I also started performing with Inspyral Circus, and learned from the Philos about how to do educational circus programs for kids. Since teaming up with Inspyral, I’ve been able to perform my interactive Hooplahoma show at dozens of libraries, daycares, and schools, inspiring hundreds of kids with a message about never giving up. I even hosted a weekly meet up in Oklahoma City for the flow and circus community at Stars and Stripes Park.

As I’m writing this, it’s July of 2020, and the Pandemic has caused most live entertainment and large gatherings to go away for the foreseeable future. I was going to be extremely busy this spring and summer doing shows with Inspyral Circus all around Oklahoma. Now, since that isn’t happening, I’ve shifted my focus to teaching and hoop making. I teach one on one lessons for a couple of clients, outdoors and safely social distanced. I have also begun to teach through videos, having made now several Virtual Health Literacy Programs for the Pioneer Library System. Now that things have calmed down, it has become clear that making hoops, teaching private lessons, and making educational videos will be the way forward for Hooplahoma for a while. 

One day, it will be safe to have large gatherings again, and when that time comes I’ll get back to teaching classes, having get togethers at the park, and performing at events. It’s been tough to lose all those things, but I know it’s temporary. Until then, my focus will be on making beautiful hoops, private lessons, and fun videos. I feel incredibly lucky to still have so many people supporting Hooplahoma through those avenues.

Thank you all, and I hope you enjoyed this post!

- Chelsea