As everyday life pressure, work challenges, and other sources of nuisance build up, we end up in a poor state of mind. All things considered, the absence of any means of communication to share those burdens or probably letting vent off this negative energy, the situation deteriorates to a form of poor productivity, self-effacement, and lack of societal impact in one’s environment. 

Lama observed this dilemma and decided to devise a new method aiming at helping individuals to express themselves and shed off any negative energy one might experience, and replace it with a positive one via arts in all its forms. Hence, she came up with the Soul Art enterprise. 

Lama joined the Syrian International Business Association (SIBA) in Months A go. As such, we availed ourselves of the opportunity to conduct an interview with her in an attempt to introduce members of SIBA, their work and successes to our readers.

‘‘Hi Lama, would you tell us briefly about your project and its objectives?’’

Welcome. Soul Art Center generally aims to enable individuals to dig deep within their inner selves and communicate with others via art and regular workshops dedicated to painting, music, and dancing. The purpose of such activities is shedding off any negative energy, or negative feelings via art… One might call it therapy manifested in all types of arts.

We also run listening workshops where one or more persons talk about a certain topic, or an experience they’ve had, or an issue that needed resolving. We also organise meditation sessions and we continue innovating fresh ideas to help individuals shed off stress and focus on their positive aspects.

This type of ‘therapy’ is not only important for individuals, but also for teams; and we have many companies and teams who seek our help collectively to improve their productivity by helping employees express themselves and bolster collaborations within individual teams too.

Our activities target people of all age groups starting 4-year-old children and the elderly alike. Art knows no boundaries, nor age. 

‘’What challenges have you faced at the outset of your enterprise?’’

The very first one manifested in defining our client-base. As you know, Dubai embraces a variety of nationalities from across the globe, each of which possesses its own peculiarities, customs and its ways of thinking and interacting. The second difficulty was marketing. Since the idea is newly-fangled, its publicity and explaining its importance, and people’s need for it was extremely difficult. Not to mention the challenge of piquing more people’s interest along with other issues of financial nature, too.

‘’What are your expansionary plans?’’

We’re currently working on improving our cyber presence. As you know, everyone is actively using social media now; and having a presence there would extend our reach and expand our client-base and potential partnerships, even outside Dubai. We could, for example, broadcast live sessions and workshops via the internet for any interested party to watch, anywhere across the globe. This would also contribute in significant reduction of our financial costs on a large scale. 

‘’How would your membership in SIBA improve your project’s prospects?’’

Through the activities SIBA organises, I can have access to successful Syrian business owners, benefit from their expertise, and communicate with them. Moreover, new work partnerships could be forged adding to the prospects of expansion and enriching my enterprise with fresh ideas. I have been very keen on joining SIBA since the very first time I heard about it through a friend who invited me to one of its activities in Dubai. I would certainly be very pleased to benefit or help any business owner or entrepreneur through sharing my experience and contributing with my ideas. It’s an absolute joy to know that an association like SIBA is there for us supporting Syrian businessmen and businesswomen alike in such a manner… It’s truly a source of pride!

‘’How can people reach and communicate with you’

This could be done via our website: soulartcenter.com or email address: info@soulartcenter.com,  phone, or visit our first centre in down town Dubai.

’’Anything to add at the conclusion of this interview’’

Thank you for this nice interview and all the best.