Meet Onna Maya

Bringing the Light

Meet Onna Maya

Bringing the Light

What does Onna Maya Do?

Onna Maya Meyer

A Gainesville Native Artist and Photographer

Empowering Women, One Talent at a Time

Onna Maya Meyer is a Gainesville friendly face that you are bound to see around town. She is the owner of Onna Maya: Empowering Photography and Intricate Native Jewelry. She may be most recognized as the woman who brings hula hoops to outdoor events. Attend any musical event, farmers market, and outdoor market and you will find kids and adults enjoying hooping in the lawn. You have Onna to thank for this.

Intricate Native Jewelry

She makes incredibly intricate jewelry. Her earrings consist of 19 rows of teeny-tiny beads and each pair takes about eight hours to make. These native-style earrings began as a passion of hers when she was a teenager. They provided her with a creative outlet at a time when most are into mischief. After a twenty-year break, she found her passion for beading return after helping a friend fix their jewelry.

She gave away all of her tools and beads many years ago and had to start anew rebuilding her collection. When this creative compulsion returned to her she had no choice but to answer the calling full force. She wonders why she gave it up in the first place. The feeling is like returning to a lost love and she is grateful.

Onna has been keeping her fingers busy since the Spring of 2019 creating pair after pair.

Empowering Photography

Onna is a phenomenal photographer. She specializes in photographing women, bringing out the inner goddess in her artful pictures. Seeing beauty in the mundane is her skill. Capturing the personality of those she shoots fills her with pleasure.

She produces raw and real photos with and without filters. Outdoor locations with intricate architecture bring out the magical quality in her work. She is not one to direct you to point your chin down or place your foot just so. Get into a playful spirit and let loose and she will capture you in all of your glory. Play music that you love or have friends in the background to make you laugh.
 

Pregnancy photos

Photographing women in pregnancy is especially rewarding for Onna. She takes fun photos outside and even underwater. Pregnant women are goddesses! But they don’t always know it. When women choose to be photographed in pregnancy, they are creating a legacy to pass down, to be enjoyed by their children and family over the years. What these women don’t always realize is how empowering the experience will be for themselves.

This feeling of empowerment will come back in waves every time she looks at her photos. This powerful feeling will carry on with her for her labor and birth. And when she needs it, while parenting her child.

Band photos

She specializes in photographing bands at music festivals too! I told you this woman is talented. She brings her hoops and her camera equipment and takes over the night! Live shows present her with amazing opportunities for candid shots amidst sunny day sets and colorful stage lighting at night. Bands can pose for professional shoots when they are not sweaty, prior to shows for album covers. But the real art lies in the action shots while up on stage!

Onna’s band cover photo of G. Love and Special Sauce was published in Wax magazine and she had the pleasure of meeting him and having him sign her copy.

Onna Maya Meyer’s photos have been published in the following periodicals:

Contact her for photography package rates.

Contact her to join your festival- selling her jewelry, bringing her hoops, and photographing your bands.

Contact her for empowering photo shoots for your social media, your website, your family portraits, and for magical maternity photographs that will last a lifetime.

Contact Onna Maya Meyer:

Email: onnameyer@gmail.com

Facebook: Onna Maya Meyer

 

Article originally published on Walden Writes for Women
 
 Written by:
Anastacia Walden
 

Who is Onna Maya?

An Empathic Soul

With her deep perspective and refreshingly authentic gypsy soul, Onna Maya’s “Other Worldly Photography” ® is fueled by her gift of truly seeing. Since she was a little girl, even before she spoke, she felt. She remembers, from a very young age, being able to feel the internal currents of others. When someone entered a room, she would immediately feel into what they were carrying, consciously or not. Beautiful and joyous; to pain, sadness, anger or frustration. Full spectrum, she would get a palpable felt-sense in her BodyMind of the frequency the other or others were vibrating. This both informed her and grew her in certain aspects, it also was extremely overwhelming at times. Onna has always been aware that she is a feeler.

When she began to participate in some deeper process work on and with herself, she learned that she was not alone. That there were others that also had this gift of feeling, seeing and noticing; and that there was a name for what she is, an empath. For a lot of her life, she wasn’t exactly sure how to navigate and manage the different emotional landscapes and terrains that were continuously moving through her. As she was introduced to: Body Mind Centering©, Hakomi©, Expressive Arts Therapy, Dance/Movement Therapy, Body Psychotherapy, transcendental meditation, Kundalini Yoga and other process-based ways of being with the BodyMind; she realized that the work she had been doing in the world, was in direct alignment with the raw expression she sourced so deeply. Intuitively, she had been ‘moving’ and expressing her experience in ways that supported her access of ‘Source’.

Part of being an empath, is the ability to see and feel into other beings ‘core material’. The places that have been broken. The places that have been wounded. The spaces that touch true bliss. The parts that long for connection, as well as the parts that feel safe in the dance of vulnerability, and so, so much more. It is through this radical tenderness and sweetness of strength, that has shaped how she moves through life. Blooming her Way, her personal ‘Tao’ of being in this world. Naturally, and unabashedly, she extends the fruits of her gifts as Sacred Offerings to and for others, to the community and ultimately to the world.

She sees the beauty in others, in her environment, in nature, in children’s laughter, in elder’s wisdom, in the sound of daily words, and she translates this through story-telling. Her story- telling manifests through many different mediums. The ones that are at the forefront of fruition, that have become gorgeously, full-bellied and full-bodied. That have ripened and blossomed over the last couple of decades. That have produced the sweetest nectar of possibility. Have birthed through insights she obtained through the journey of allowing herself to experience true-love, deep loss and the raw pain of heart-break. Through to the warm safety that comes with experiencing trust and loyalty; and the bottomless void of the gut-wrenching cringe when someone we love betrays our heart.

Her work is born of conscious awareness, advocacy, inspiration, transcendence, evolution of spirit, mindfulness around the deep importance of inclusion, and how to sustain the light in this time that we’re living in. Her keen awareness and experience of ‘group-mind’ and how to navigate independence in a loving, heart-centered, authenticity; even in the throws of unkindness, is rooted in personal experience. She has experienced that when practiced directly and continuously, she connects to something way bigger, the Cosmic Collective! Which only movement is forward! Towards mutual respect, clear and healthy boundaries, cultural awareness and sensitivity, staying informed, staying awake, sourcing peace from the kindness that we birth within ourselves, to ourselves ~ so we can truly meet one another, there. Here. Now. Not participating in any form of cruelty, fearful exclusion toward any sentient being, and/or the Sacred Mother Earth beneath our feet. Honoring the Source, bowing our heads, touching humility.

Elevating the empowered embodiment of The Goddess, and all the tendrils of beings that are stepping into their gifts. Their power. All of these landscapes and terrains are reflected in the moments captured on film. Each of us has and holds a lineage. Roots of connection. “I utilize photography to unveil and share as an offering what I see, feel and notice with whom is in the photo..Also, for those that come across the image, and immediately feel that sense of familiarity. An evoking reflection into the humanity that we all share.” Being ‘extra~sensory’, ‘heightened’ or empathic, has allowed for Onna’s palette to be rich with color, vision, expression and palpable emotion. Her passion and studies of different archetypes can also be found within her work.

Another way she personally creates and expresses is through jewelry. “I have always felt a strong connection to the land. The Native lands that are rooted underneath all that has been built, and thankfully some pieces that have been preserved.” The earrings that call to her, are inspired by those whose land this truly is. The Native, the Indigenous Peoples and Tribes that lived here first. That sourced and sustained on these lands. Onna has always been drawn to their way of life and living; and has been floored and heartbroken in the face of their continuous persecution, oppression, and generational systemic racism. Onna speaks to how they also were/are seers and feelers. She speaks to their emotionally and sensory evolved ways.

 “Imagine a society/ community/ religion, that completely supports one another to truly listen to their intuition, their inner voice. One that holds ceremony and ritual around expansion and connection to the community, the Wisdom Of the Elders, to these lands, lakes, streams, rivers, mountains and all who inhabit them. Imagine what things would be like, the respect and preservation for both the inner to outer world. Imagine!”

Traditionally Natives are extremely connected to the environment. They honor one another, the two legged, the four legged. The elements, fire, water, wind, earth and spirit. A beautifully connected, community-based, sacred-ritual practicing, devotional ceremony of the Mother Earth and all who roam upon her.

“When I string each bead, it is with the deepest prayer-full intention. I call on the medicine of the Indigenous People of this land. I bow my head in pure reverence and the greatest Respect.”  In honor of the patience and time given to communing with nature, and therefore cultivating a deeper respect and knowing of themselves, and the natural extension to one another. “Each Native, Indigenous, Aboriginal practice of our sister’s and brother’s globally stringing seeds and utilizing the earth to cultivate and create gorgeous and masterful artistry, has always moved and awoken something extremely deep for me. It wouldn’t feel authentic for me not to mention those who came before me.”

That have influenced my flavor and inspired me to always stay connected and respective of The Mother in all that I do. I give unending thanks and acknowledge daily with profound respect the innumerable Native Tribes that have lost their lives, their lands and that have not been treated with equanimity or met with the immeasurable compassion that is owed.  

It is why with each piece I create I offer a percentage to Advocacy Organizations and groups, that are Native owned, organized and run.” 

Here are some links to different organizations and groups that do beautiful and needed work in the world of: humanitarianism, justice, education, advocacy, and more. Please take a moment to check it out, perhaps you will find a door, that you didn’t even realize you were looking for.

 

Do it for the Love

Diversity Best Practices

 

In the same way hand-made rain sticks have specific sound currents, so do the songs that rain makes as it falls. Onna has listened and heard the different ‘rain songs’ her entire life. She is drawn to music, rhythm, to playing with tempo. She has seen/felt  how much in life is circular. In cycles, like birth to death.

She’s been tapped into geometric patterns and rhythms that exist within everything; fire, water, air, and earth. It is through this understanding and direct experience, Onna’s curiosity turned passion in Hula Hoops manifested. Her acute sense of ‘moving energy’ coupled with her deep knowing of the healing importance of ‘play’ in our daily lives is a pivotal motivation for her Conscious Hooping ®.

Circular objects that had almost exact resemblance to what we now know as a hula hoop, dates back to ancient Greece. They used circular metal hoops to strengthen their abdominal area in the same ways hoops are used currently. Around 1300 “hooping” was introduced to Great Britain. In the 1800’s British sailors first witnessed ‘Hula dances’ in the Hawaiian and Polynesian Islands. With the movements and the hoops made with bamboo and other woven palm threads the name was coined “Hula Hooping.” 

The origin date of Hula Hoops, predates the Greeks, though like many origin stories, nobody truly knows when was the first. What we do know, is that different regions of the world used different materials to create a hoop, and utilized them for ritual dances, exercise, and play.

Onna makes her hoops by hand. She has taught herself by regular practice and play how to balance multiple hoops on different parts of her body at the same time. She dances with the hoops, reflecting both the whimsical nature of movement and expression as well as the intricate intelligence of using and balancing both sides of her brain. Onna has become ambidextrous over time. 

She’s a testament to how much we can control/shift through meditation and a strong devotion to personal practice. The same ‘alpha state’ of consciousness achieved through deep meditation, can be activated when in sustained focus on “Hooping”. Through practice, mirroring, teaching, and creating, Onna continues to harness and advance her personal style and technique.

“When I’m feeling overwhelmed or when I’m feeling like it’s a ‘flowing’ kind of day, I hoop. Everything comes to a center. The periphery drops, there is no future, and there is no past, there’s just the now. There’s something that is completely freeing in this space.”

Onna can be found at the majority of all local community functions, with her hoops and her camera. Ready to offer others a chance to drop in and tune into themselves in ways that they may haven’t yet accessed. She offers play for the youth all the way through to the elders of this community. Her presence is a gift, and many reap the rewards. This is her personal calling. Her part, in contributing to a more connected, playful and open hearted community.

She offers group classes and one on one private classes for those that want to have an individually designed class with personal and specific attention where needed throughout the year. Both locally and around the country. All classes, intensives and workshops are offered from beginning to more advanced.

She brings her bright spirit and Conscious Hooping® to a range of different events. Birthday parties for children, teens and adult gatherings, work events for getting employees to feel connected with each other, introduction to mindfulness practices, heightened ability to focus and let go of the daily stress, as well as family reunions/events, wedding parties and anything else you could imagine.

Onna works as a conscious freelance artist, teacher and, photographer. She is humbled and proud to be the sole proprietor of an independent Woman owned and Woman operated business.