I believe in seeking knowledge of self, questioning “the way it is,” social justice, mentoring, dreaming BIG, dark chocolate with nuts & sea salt, sarcasm, The Wire, and Prince.

In My Own Words

I create media and lead conversations that empower people to transform personal change into social change.

I envision a world where every person is able to develop a healthy self-esteem & has equal access to resources to build their dreams, and our media, policies and institutions all support those goals.

I'm the Founder + Curator of Know This! TV, and Founder of production company Dream Variations, Inc.

I'm also the Creator, Producer & Host of Know This! with Ariana. 

I travel. I speak. I write. I challenge. I empower. I serve. I honor why + how I'm possible. And I try my damnedest every day to fully be and love me.

Official

Ariana Proehl is a social entrepreneur, media maker and change agent. She is the founder and curator of Know This! TV online network, and producer and host of its flagship talk show, Know This! with Ariana. Named one of the Women’s Media Center’s “Progressive Women’s Voices” of 2011, Ariana’s passion for personal development work, roots in social justice education and young, fresh appeal, make her a fierce voice of this generation, empowering people to make lasting change in themselves, and in the world.

With a resume including work in non-profit, government, philanthropy, self-empowerment and the arts, Ariana is an expert at bridging the personal with the political, calling attention to the powerful connections between making both personal change and social change. She is a former Executive Director of youth development and diversity education organization DiversityWorks, a role she took on at 22. Her leadership garnered recognition by the East Bay Business Times as one of their “Top 40 Under 40” in 2006 and by the Center for Young Women’s Development with their Cheyenne Bell Leadership Award the same year.

Following graduate work at New York University’s Wagner School of Public Service, in 2011 she founded Dream Variations, Inc., a production company specializing in online and documentary media that educates, entertains and empowers. In the Fall of 2011, Ariana toured 14 cities in the U.S. with Know This!, interviewing next generation voices doing work with passion and purpose in various industries to help popularize and highlight positive contributions that often get overshadowed in mainstream media.

Ariana has spoken to audiences across the country, including Yale, Cornell University, Mills College, Texas Southern University, and New York University, and interviewed such figures as Soledad O’Brien, Cornel West, actress/activist Rosario Dawson, rising star actress & producer Issa Rae, and Grammy Award-winning musician Esperanza Spalding.