Today we’d like to introduce you to Kaylin Meyers.
Alright, so thank you so much for sharing your story and insight with our readers. To kick things off, can you tell us a bit about how you got started?
My name is Kaylin. I go by the stage name That Juggling Girl. I am a juggler based out of Muskegon, Michigan (born & raised).
I learned to juggle when I was 12 thanks to my middle school teacher (Mr. Jordan) teaching me the basics.
I did not begin my juggling journey until I was 17 after breaking my arm in a high school track race. During physical therapy, in a small world situation, my PT knew the teacher that taught me to juggle and had me do some juggling as physical therapy. And I kept juggling ever since learning more about the craft, community, and industry.
After recovering and beginning college, I began sharing my daily progress online on tik tok. I gained over 500k followers with hundreds of millions of views. I earned an honorary international award from the International Jugglers’ Association for my videos talking about my experiences as a female juggler in a male dominated industry. I performed on the international stage, been all across the country teaching, performing, and attending juggling events. And now have begun the early start of my professional juggling and performing career.
We all face challenges, but looking back would you describe it as a relatively smooth road?
My juggling journey has had many ups and downs, but has definitely not been a smooth ride.
Starting to juggle after a such a traumatic and severe injury brought about many physical challenges. From swelling, twitching, and pain in my right arm and hardware still being there, I had to learn how to train to fit my physical needs. And constantly have to be mindful of rehab and resting while balancing doing such an arm intensive work.
Along with the fact I am a woman. In the juggling world, it is a male dominated activity and industry. I am one very few female jugglers in Michigan, and one of the only ones on the west side. Having to navigate online harassment and hate, sexism from other jugglers, and gender bias in productions and the industry has been a challenge throughout my journey.
As well as my mental health. I’ve struggled with PTSD, depression, severe anxiety, and ADHD for most of my life. Being in an industry that can uncertain at times makes me question whether I’m good enough all the time. I never know when the next gig may be, or where, or for whom. But sometimes, that’s the beauty of it.
Appreciate you sharing that. What else should we know about what you do?
I am a professional juggler. From balls, rings, clubs, hoops, poi, and even random trash bags or objects, I can juggle just about all of them.
I personally feel I am most known for my social media presence from most of the juggling world and local community. I have videos that have been viewed upwards of 50 million times.
I specifically specialize in ball juggling, and at the moment do mostly kid’s entertainment. But as I am early in my juggling performing career, I do a variety of different types of performing in front of a broad range of audiences.
The thing that I am most proud of is my work within the juggling community. I’ve created online documents helping jugglers navigate festivals to help them feel more comfortable. I helped organize and edit a collaboration video for the international jugglers’ association highlighting hundreds of women from over a dozen different countries across the globe to celebrate World Women’s Day and highlight talented female-presenting & non-binary jugglers in our field. I created a podcast to share and educate more people on female jugglers in the community. And have created a yearly weekly challenge for 3 years to help jugglers learn new tricks in specific categories in juggling. I also now volunteer on the board of the international jugglers’ association, and had helped on their marketing in the past. Giving back to my community and helping others within it is some of the best work I feel I have done and definitely the most rewarding.
I think the thing that sets me apart from others in my field is my resilience. Starting to juggle from an injury is no easy feat. And as I grew online so early in my juggling journey and only 19, I experienced a lot of gatekeeping, bullying, and resistance. But I have done my best to never give up. And share my juggling and message of never giving up no matter who you are and how bad the odds are against you to audiences across the globe.
Any big plans?
As of writing this: I will be performing for the Muskegon District Libraries at all their locations July 13th-15th (check their website for specific details. Performing at the Kalamazoo Growlers baseball team at most of their theme nights.
My plans for the future is simply to see how far I can take my performing career. I have had to go part-time in my normal job this year to make room for more performing and gigs. Which has been wonderful, and has really put my talents and skills to the test. Which has been challenging, but also extremely rewarding and has helped me to learn and grow as a juggler, performer, and person.
My ultimate goal is to make a show tailored to anti-bullying/mental health awareness and perform for more female owned or simply all female audiences. But I mainly just want to spread my message of never giving up and my love for juggling as far as I can. As it has changed my life in so many ways.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://Www.thatjugglinggirl.com
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/thatjugglinggirl?igsh=ZzlvdjE0anM5NmV2&utm_source=qr
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/share/1AS2kNUkfx/?mibextid=wwXIfr
- Youtube: https://youtube.com/@thatjugglinggirl?si=xZDQw7U2BBZi_CPM
- Other: Tik tok: https://www.tiktok.com/@thatjugglinggirl?_r=1&_t=ZP-97UX0zqbCjG
