Curious about the true essence of education and human development? Join us as Dr. Kia Darling-Hammond takes us on a thought-provoking journey through her unique insights on thriving.
With a rich background shaped by educator parents and an insatiable curiosity for understanding human experiences, Dr. Kia illuminates the contrast between genuine elucidation in education and the often rigid, compliance-driven nature of traditional schooling. Discover how personal interpretation and self-actualization are pivotal elements in the learning process that can transform lives.
From the challenges of business development to the collective power of community and mentorship, this discussion is rich with practical wisdom. Dr. Kia's Bridge to Thriving framework and her upcoming book promise to inspire a vibrant and inclusive future.
Join us for an episode brimming with insights on love, unity, and the pursuit of a flourishing life!
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:01):
All right, everybody.
As you just heard in our intro,this is another episode of the
Modern Independent.
As always, I'm your host, jonAlmacy, and today I am sitting
down with Dr Kia Darling-Hammond, who I am super, super excited
to have on the show with me.
We got the chance to bond overmany office hours and
conversations about her journeyand what she's building, so I'm
(00:25):
super, super excited to be ableto have the conversation with
her today.
I'm going to give you a littlebit of a brief introduction and
start our jumping off point intothe conversation, and then
you'll hear directly from Dr Kia.
So she is an educator,psychologist, researcher and
coach with a specific focus onthriving and human development.
(00:45):
Throughout her career, she hassupported I am going way off,
listen y'all.
I am reading this live from aLinkedIn bio.
Right now, we are going to kickthat off from the beginning,
because I keep saying it as if Iam from Dr Kia's point of view.
So she is an educator,psychologist, researcher and
(01:06):
coach with a specific focus onthriving and human development.
Throughout her career, she hassupported an array of humans,
from small children to collegeapplicants, to organizational
leaders and their teams.
She believes that she has agift for helping people find the
common ground required to pavea way forward, which is why I
(01:30):
think we vibe on so manydifferent levels.
So, dr Kia, welcome to the show.
Speaker 2 (01:34):
It is so wonderful to be here.
We do, vibe.
Thank you for that introduction.
I'm just really excited to bein conversation today.
You know I'm a big IndieCollective fan, so this is
exciting.
Speaker 1 (01:47):
Yes, and which I genuinely appreciate on so many
different levels Having people.
As you know, I try to bring asmuch energy as I can into every
Zoom meeting, every conversationthat we try to have.
I'm really big on presence andbeing able to do that, every
conversation that we try to have.
I'm really big on presence andbeing able to do that and having
(02:08):
members that just kind ofembody that.
Naturally, you know when theycome into a room you can tell
other members kind of gravitateor they're getting shout outs in
the chat.
They're like oh, like he ishere, oh Brad showed up.
Or oh, this person showed up.
Um, I'm not discountingeverybody that has been through
cohorts two or three years ago.
I haven't forgotten about you.
Those are just the people thathave graduated from the most
(02:29):
written cohort.
So I love you too.
But it says something when youare able to step into that room
and say something.
And I think one of the bigreasons for that is because I've
heard from so many other indiesthat have had the chance to
connect with you about thatsuperpower that you have right
Of being able to help peopleconnect the dots or ask them
questions that lead them toidentify things in themselves.
(02:53):
Maybe they didn't even know howdid I mean?
Is that something that you'vealways had?
Is that a skill set that you'vedeveloped over the course of
time?
Can you tell us about that?
Speaker 2 (03:04):
Yeah, as you were saying that, I was thinking how
did that happen?
I think ever since I was reallyyoung, my mother has said
you're going to be apsychologist.
So I think I've always had,personality-wise, an orientation
toward curiosity about thehuman experience and I
(03:27):
definitely was curious abouteverything and asked a lot of
questions and made a lot ofobservations as a kid, sometimes
very unfortunate observationsthat other people wished I
didn't make.
So my father used to give methis lecture about discretion,
where he would spell it for meand tell me I needed it.
But my parents are botheducators and I think educators
(03:49):
have a tendency to be orientedtoward helping people find their
way right.
And you think about, like, theactual definition of education,
elucidation, that's sort of youknow, finding your pathway
towards knowledge, enlightenment, understanding, and so I think
it's my personality, I thinkit's how I was groomed, you know
(04:09):
, raised by my parents to bethoughtful and curious and to be
kind of an educator and that'sjust the way I'm oriented.
Like I just I want to knowwhat's important to people and I
want to know what's exciting topeople and I want them to move
through discomfort and feelingstuck to getting and I want to
know what's exciting to peopleand I want them to move through
discomfort and feeling stuck togetting what they want and need.
Speaker 1 (04:31):
Yeah, I want to go back and revisit the etymology
of education there real quick,because that's not something
that I'm super familiar with.
But you said elucidation whatwas that word that you?
Speaker 2 (04:41):
just threw out there Illuminate, like to shed light
upon right To illuminate, tokind of make visible, make clear
, make.
Speaker 1 (04:51):
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
You're like bringing thingsinto focus for people in some
ways, as you're educating.
That makes a lot of sense.
I like looking at educationthat way rather than helping
somebody figure out how toproperly fill out a checklist,
you know, actually illuminatingparts of the world or, you know,
(05:14):
allowing them to see a newperspective and then integrate
that and be able to act on it inthe world versus.
You know, sometimes peoplethink of education and they
think of school, right, and thestructure of school, versus what
it actually means.
That's why I was so curiousabout going back and exploring
that just for a second, becauseI was like, oh, that's actually
kind of a cool littledistinction there.
Speaker 2 (05:35):
Thank you so much, and also I think part of what
education offers that schoolingdoesn't always offer, because
it's so structured andcompliance focused is that each
of us brings our own self towhatever it is that we're doing.
So even if you gave me achecklist and I gave you a
checklist, we might actuallyinterpret and understand it very
differently, and how we wouldeven implement the things on
(05:55):
that list would be different,and so everything is very
individual and subjective in alot of ways, and so I think
that's an important piece of theself-actualization puzzle.
Speaker 1 (06:06):
Right, right, For people that are listening that
may not have ever heard of theterm self-actualization what in
your mind?
How would you explain that tosomebody that maybe is hearing
that for the first time?
Sure, that's a deep question.
Speaker 2 (06:25):
Well, you know, people have heard of Maslow's
hierarchy of needs, and so I'mgoing to actually cite Maslow,
and I won't problematize thehierarchy of needs in this space
, unless you want me to.
But Maslow talks about peoplebeing able to become all that
they could possibly become.
In other words, you weresaturated in opportunity for
(06:50):
becoming, and that becoming isanchored in all of your
potential and possibility, butit's also anchored in your
desire.
So who do I want to become?
Here are all theseopportunities.
Okay, great, I can become thatperson self-actualize, to make
yourself possible, to makeyourself true.
Speaker 1 (07:13):
Yeah, I've always.
Yeah, we definitely don't needto.
I have my own thoughts on thehierarchy of needs, but again,
maybe we just have a separatepodcast episode where we go deep
on, like some psychologicalconcepts.
That would be a lot of fun.
Yeah, I think that, especiallyhearing about the work that you
do and we'll get we'll dive intoyour career path here in a
(07:34):
second but, you know, knowingthe stuff that you're working on
and the way that you choose toapproach it, I think it's
important for people to realizethat those concepts they've kind
of been around for a while butthey are so malleable and
there's still ways to find waysto improve them and how to
communicate them, or things thatyou just found inside of your
(07:59):
framework that I think touch onthings in such a different way.
And so that's a little sneakpeek.
If you want to hear about theframework and everything else,
keep listening to the episodeuntil the end, because we're
definitely going to dive intothat at some point.
But to kind of rewind, I'malways super curious about how
people started their path andthen eventually ended up finding
indie right.
(08:19):
So I saw when I was doing mypre-episode work and stuff that
you didn't really go independentright away.
You just kind of had like aconsulting gig.
That was originally a sidehustle.
It sounds like it was like aspecific project, kind of
getting people to come togetherum for a I guess a consensus
statement was the phrase thatyou used Um, so I don't know if
(08:42):
that is like the proper place tostart, but what was your
entrance into the idea of, oh, Icould actually do some work on
my own or I could consult?
And then how did thateventually evolve into, oh, I'm
going to build my own practice.
Speaker 2 (08:56):
Yeah, so 20 plus years ago, a friend and mentor
needed.
So I've always been a littlebit of a data head needed who?
So I've always been a littlebit of a data head.
I really, really lovespreadsheets, I love information
, I collect information.
It's probably like if you thinkof hoarding I don't hoard
physical objects, I hoardinformation and I just love it,
(09:19):
love it, love it.
So this this mentor, John Snyder, knew that about me and he had
a project that he was doing.
He was at Bank Street Collegeof Education and he had to work
with the New York State it wasthe New York City Board of
Education and the chancellor'soffice and a bunch of teachers
and he was like, oh, Kia wouldbe great to bring in and play
with this data.
(09:40):
And so that was my firstconsulting gig ever and it was
actually really fun.
And I found was my firstthought like consulting gig ever
, and it was actually really fun.
And I found myself in theserooms and, like I said, I'm I am
a child of two educators.
I've been in the publicschooling universe my entire
life, right Because of my mom.
So here I am in this room fullof educators and administrators
(10:01):
who are not getting along and melittle budding mini
psychologist is going oh, let'stalk about these things.
So I'm having one-on-oneconversations, group
conversations center.
So that's how that all unfolded.
And then I took, you know,small little projects over the
years, but I always had thesesort of W-2s as we moved.
(10:21):
So I'd say, probably graduateschool was probably the, my
doctoral program was probablythe turning point, Because I'd
sort of, you know, I did what alot of people do you went to
college and then I went and Igot a job and then I said this
isn't quite doing it for me andstarted to look for other ways
to self-actualize.
And I found myself in a Masterof Arts in Teaching program and
(10:43):
became a teacher and that for atime was phenomenal.
But as many people know, K-12education is a very exhausting
space and the beginnings of myframework really started when I
was a teacher, struggling tofigure out how to create the
conditions for my students to bewhole and fully realized.
So that was sort of thebeginning.
(11:03):
Then I was like, you know, Ican't do this anymore.
Actually it moved from teachingto administration and it almost
killed me, literally almostkilled me, because I wasn't
sleeping and I couldn't takecare of myself at all, but I was
working constantly and it washigh pressure, high stress.
So I went into my doctoralprogram that's where my research
really took root and I came outand I tried to do W-2s and I
(11:23):
couldn't.
I couldn't do it and part ofthe problem was I was so focused
on thriving and I'd done allthis work on flourishing and
thriving and wellbeing andresistance, and I went into
these kind of corporate settingsand people were not taking care
of themselves or each other andthe cultures were often toxic,
(11:45):
even though all the individualswere lovely human beings who
were doing their best.
And I couldn't.
Now, with my new sort ofclarity about what it was that I
thought humans needed and whereI needed to be to continue to
recover, I couldn't be in thosespaces.
So that was when I thought canI do this side hustle thing full
(12:07):
time?
Because I don't know how I'mgoing to make a living if I keep
being in settings that theywere depleting.
You know, and I know I'm notalone, I know a lot of us in the
indie space got to a pointwhere we're like I can't, I
literally cannot live this lifeanymore because it's not living,
it's not a life.
And so then the pandemic hit.
(12:27):
So here we are and everything'schanging and a lot of the ways
that I would have moved throughthe world had to shift right.
I was a big networker.
I was always at coffees andteas and meetings and panels and
doing all the things and all ofa sudden everything went shh
and I had to figure out how totranslate all of what would have
(12:49):
been in-person work intodigital work, like so many of us
did.
And I realized that I could dothat, but I needed help to shift
to full-time.
So the first thing I did was Istruggled and, struggled and
(13:10):
struggled and got an accountantand finally, you know, a
bookkeeper and accountant, andfinally stopped struggling that
way.
Then I got clarity about whatwas going on, sort of internally
, infrastructurally, and thought, oh, I don't know enough about
business to build a wholebusiness.
And then so the accounting firmwas Collective and they
(13:34):
advertised Indie Collective andthere was a discount which I
needed to be part of the cohort,and I thought, okay, I'm just
going to do it to be part of thecohort.
And I thought, okay, I'm justgoing to do it.
And the big epiphany in thatmoment of time was just
recognizing that it was.
I've been used to doingeverything myself, but it was
(13:55):
okay to ask for help.
It was okay to get help.
It was actually going toaccelerate me if I could get
some meaningful guidance, and soI did meaningful guidance, and
so I did.
Speaker 1 (14:04):
Yeah, I love that, before we dive into continuing,
you know, into the indiecollective journey and, you know
, start asking questions aboutthat.
I want to rewind to somethingthat you said, because you have
this habit of just like goingthrough and I don't think, I
don't know if you even pick upon it sometimes when you say
stuff.
But you say some like prolificstuff, uh, and then it just like
(14:27):
kind of glances over.
So I want to hit on this ideaand maybe get your input on it
for people that are listening,that are in a culture or they're
trying to build a culture, andthe idea that every person
individually can be a fantasticperson, but then the culture can
still be toxic.
(14:48):
I guess two part why do youthink that is?
And how is culture differentthan the individual
personalities of the peopleinvolved in that org?
How can people kind of separatethat stuff inside of their head
?
Speaker 2 (15:06):
Absolutely.
I think one critical dimensionis beliefs.
So much of it is about mindsetand beliefs and so often,
especially in organizationswhere you're trying to meet the
needs of underserved populations, there's a sense of urgency and
(15:28):
a sense of scarcity, and thatis manufactured.
Right, that comes from you know.
Anybody who's ever worked in anonprofit that depends on grant
funding knows you are at themercy of the grant cycles.
You're at the mercy of thefoundation and their priorities.
You're at the mercy of all ofthese factors and anybody who's
(15:49):
worked in K-12 knows that thatschool year is like a bulldozer.
Right, you're in go modeconstantly and I think that it's
like the energy is very hot andscarce and fast.
Right, like go, go, go and theresources tend to be
(16:10):
insufficient to the need.
Right, there aren't enoughpeople.
I've only worked in oneorganization that did a
phenomenal job matrixing rolesso that if two people were out,
everything just kept going.
Right, it was fine because theyjust trained across roles and
so on.
It was really brilliantly,beautifully done, masterful.
(16:33):
However, most places don't havethat and it's not to cast
dispersions, it's a reallycomplicated, intricate thing to
do to manage that kind of youknow, training, staffing, et
cetera.
So when somebody's out sick,something grinds to a halt,
right, there's not enough subs,there's nobody to put on that
(16:55):
event, there's something,something, and it creates this
stress, right.
So there's the stress of theconditions.
We're trying to get this thingdone.
It's so important.
Then there's the stress of youknow whatever's happening in
real time.
And then when we're under stress, when humans are under stress,
especially if it gets really,really high, we tend to go into
autopilot.
We become what we'veexperienced.
(17:18):
We sort of go into the trainingthat we've experienced, and
most of us have been trained incontexts that are very punitive.
Right, school has a tendency tobe about compliance and control
you don't want to get introuble, you don't want to fail,
and so on.
So there's a lot that sort ofis wrapped around scarcity,
scarcity mindset, scarcitythinking.
And when we are under duress,we're usually less patient, we
(17:42):
are usually less creative, lesscurious, because we don't feel
like we can slow down, we feellike we have to speed up and the
place where we take care ofeach other is actually in
slowing down, right.
So I had at one point I was thechief of staff in an
organization briefly, and I gotin big trouble for sending staff
(18:03):
home.
One person was having heartissues, the other needed an
appendix surgery, but both ofthem and I sent them home
because they were sick in realtime and I got in big trouble
and the response that I got frommy boss was you know, everybody
has to be able to do their workright.
So when we orient towards thework instead of the humans,
(18:25):
what's possible together, welose, I think, a lot of the
beauty and the warmth and thevibrancy that is possible in
collaboration.
And when your idea of how toget people to do what you need
them to do is punitive,controlling or coercive, you're
(18:45):
going to create toxicity.
It's immediate.
And then you have to movethrough repair, and most of us
don't know how to move throughrepair.
Okay, I could go on and on.
I'll stop.
Speaker 1 (18:56):
No, I mean, I'd love to just listen to you ramble on
that all day, but there's, I'dlove to just listen to you
ramble on that all day, butthere's.
Oh man, you just reminded me ofsomething that I think is a
huge I don't want to say huge,but I've encountered it quite
often that like there's amisconception about the way the
military operates.
Right, having served for sevenyears in the Air National Guard
(19:21):
and obviously I can't speak forevery military unit I can speak
for my installation, myexperiences across.
You know units that I'veobserved from the Air Force in
Aviano, italy, alaska, kuwait,you know the different places
that I got the chance to spendtime.
But there's this perception thatthe military is extremely
(19:44):
punitively oriented, and it'snot except for the part that
gets publicized to the publicthe most often, which is basic
training.
Bootcamp is very much so abouttaking you down to the bare
bones.
You are the same as everybodyelse that walked through that
door.
Now everybody is starting freshand you're going to have this
(20:06):
life and you're going to havethese values and these are the
things you're going to holdyourself to.
And here's the standards.
And you know they really kindof implement more of a value
system or a belief system, right, and it can be punitive at the
time because you're trying toiron out a lot of these kinks
between people being able tobond as a unit and all this
(20:27):
other kind of stuff.
But outside of boot camp, whichis like the major place where
people are like you're going todo pushups because you did
something wrong, right, that'slike the standard military
vision that a lot of people hold, vision that a lot of people
hold once you're on theinstallation.
I had the blessing of servingunder this lieutenant colonel,
lieutenant colonel phil brown,um, and his big message, pretty
(20:50):
consistently, was if everysingle person along the chain of
command understands exactly whythey're there, why their role
is important, why their roleaffects the roles peripheral to
them and above them and belowthem in the chain, and then
we're able to intrinsically getthat person to want to do the
(21:13):
best possible job they can atthat thing, then we will run
into way less circumstanceswhere we will have to be
punitive.
And so there was a lot of timeswhere he would send people home
that were sick from duty, right, and then we would have to kind
(21:35):
of the unit would have to shift, but the goal was to keep the
unit healthy, not sacrifice theindividual wellness of the
individual people of the unit.
It was at the unit level wherethat mentality was happening.
And then I would I rememberhaving conversations because my
last two years of working underhim he put me in charge of
something called the studentflight program and it was
basically everybody that comesback for basic training as a
part of this program for thefirst six months on base.
(21:57):
So I did that for two years and, kind of you know, watched
people develop from coming homefrom basic training to six
months into their career, wouldassign them mentors and we'd
have conversations aboutconflict resolution and ego
management and context of yourposition and all this other
stuff.
And I remember one timeLieutenant Colonel Brown was
(22:17):
talking to one of the mastersergeants.
That was a transfer fromanother base and this is what
really showed me that I had ablessing of growing up under his
mentorship.
This master sergeant was sayinglike, sir, I have never been in
an installation where newrecruits are so excited to sweep
the shop floor.
And Colonel Brown's responsewas he was like well, they're
(22:38):
excited to sweep the shop floorbecause they know that by them
doing that they're allowing afully certified staff sergeant
to work on a plane.
That's going to make that planesafer for transporting a
hundred of our people across,you know, seas, sometimes lines.
It's going to allow this personto do this like they understand
(22:58):
exactly where it's at.
So, no matter how medial thetask, it was wildly important to
them inside of that context andI really love that.
It's always stuck with me.
It's always something that I'mthe one that takes the trash out
at our agency's office.
There's stuff that I doconsistently to just make that a
(23:19):
part of the culture.
Anybody in any part of thechain of command should be able
to jump in and help take care ofthe unit.
So that's just you going on.
That trend really reminded meof that conversation with him
and I always want to shout himout whenever I get a chance
because he was a big impact inmy life.
Speaker 2 (23:36):
Thank you so much for sharing that.
I'm bursting because you'llknow this from my framework, I'm
always looking for the commonthread and it occurs to me that
there was a lot of reallyimportant sort of work happening
there.
So ego management you mentionedright, and I thought of basic
training as a space where partof what's happening is people's
(23:57):
sense of individualism and egoare being stripped out so that
they can operate as a collective.
Individualism and ego are beingstripped out so that they can
operate as a collective.
And then you see that throughline to the collective to sort
of later when you're at theinstallation and everybody
understands they have a role toplay, because the collective is
what makes people strong andsuccessful.
And I was thinking also aboutunderstanding the stakes.
(24:19):
So you know understanding thestakes, so you know there's a
reason why we have to figure outhow to come together.
And some of that is primalright, like the fundamental,
like survival right, butfundamentally we are stronger
when we can come together as aunified whole, as a collective.
(24:40):
And what I think is reallydistinct about what you
described versus what I see in alot of organizations is that
everybody, in any position,maintains their dignity right
100%.
And I think, because we do tendto organize ourselves
hierarchically, but in a wholehost of ways in society, across
(25:04):
a whole host of identities androles.
There's then, unfortunately, atendency to attach value and
dignity according to status andsort of position on a hierarchy,
and what you've just describedsounds like the opposite of that
.
You know, everybody is asimportant as everybody else,
(25:27):
because nothing works well ifeverybody is not able to show up
at you know, at their best, andthat requires mutual support.
I think that's actuallypowerful.
Speaker 1 (25:37):
I remember seeing him .
This was actually.
It wasn't him, it was a majorshiflet.
She was one of the first.
No, no, yeah, it was MajorShiflett.
She was one of the first femalevice wing commanders at our
base Baller of a human.
(25:57):
And I remember her talking to alieutenant like a fresh
lieutenant when they came backfrom Officers Training Academy.
That is, you are enlisted,which means you're kind of in
like the entry level, slash,junior management class, right,
(26:17):
and then you go on to trainingand you become kind of you know,
a management level or directorlevel, if I'm comparing it to
the corporate world.
But this person had neverworked at the bottom of the food
chain.
They graduated school, theywent and they came back and they
were immediately an officer,which means that they were in
charge of a unit of like 30people right off the bat.
And Major Siffitt was havingthis conversation and this also
has really stuck with me too.
She said if you have to pullrank in order to motivate your
(26:44):
team to have a productive day,you've already lost the day.
And I've always thought aboutthat Because you know, you start
your own company and you'rehiring people, you're doing
stuff, you're I was being calledboss by like a group of five
(27:05):
people at 24.
And so I was like I don't knowwhat I'm doing, but having that
in the back of my mind is likeokay.
But if I have to say, well,well, I'm running this company,
so we have to do this, I'vealready lost Right.
And so I having that in the backof my head, I think, has been
so valuable along theentrepreneurial journey, not
just and really anywhere thatI've gone, where I'm having to
(27:27):
work inside of a hierarchicalsystem.
Right, it's the moment that youdecide to lean on that
hierarchical system.
You know, maybe you can lean onit in acute situations, Like if
it's really intense, and youjust need to be like, hey, we
need to follow orders right now.
They would talk about that inthe military all the time too.
You're in an acute situation.
Hey, I need to follow thisorder right now because it's,
(27:50):
you know, life or death.
But then when we get back tothe base, now we're not outside
of that acute situation.
I'm not just pulling rank 24-7,because you only have so many
times that you can do that witha team before they start to
think that that's your defaultmode.
Speaker 2 (28:05):
That's right, and I think what you're saying is
reminding me of an importantrelational rule, which is,
whenever you're in relationshipwith someone, you can choose to
be.
You can choose to try to kindof control, and that undermines
(28:28):
everything.
It undermines trust, itundermines well-being,
everything or you can choose tobe in collaboration right and so
I've encountered morefear-based organizations where
you're afraid to get fired,you're afraid to get demoted,
you're afraid to get it wrongand fear-based organizations
than collaborative,dignity-based organizations, and
(28:50):
I think you're right.
There are moments where it's.
I would say this to my studentswhen I taught ninth graders and
anybody who knows ninth, youknow 12 and 13 year olds.
They are unruly, chaotic humansand I love that right, and so
one of the first things I wouldsay to my students is what you
do is not up to me, right.
How you behave, what you say,what you do is actually not up
(29:13):
to me.
I don't have control over thatand I don't want to.
However, we are here togetherin a classroom and I hope that
this can be a wonderfulexperience for all of us.
So I'd really love to hear fromyou what would make this
wonderful, and so we would worktogether to craft a culture
together.
But my caveat was when it's amatter of safety, I need for you
(29:33):
to listen to me and trust meand do what I say without asking
questions.
So let's work on that.
And I actually did drill myninth graders on like we did
fire drills.
Until we got them right, we didevacuation drills.
I think I was one of the onlyteachers who did this.
Other people were teaching andmy kids were lining up quietly
outside, but it was because Iknew if we did hit an emergency,
(29:55):
I needed them to listen to me,without question.
But that meant I had to earnand maintain their trust Right.
Speaker 1 (30:03):
Right, yeah, I love the idea of allowing them to
build their own culture,especially in a classroom
setting.
We used to do that in studentflight.
Every time a new class wouldcome back from basic training we
would say, okay, here's thecore values you have to operate
in because you signed on thedotted line.
You know, welcome to the USmilitary.
But you know how do you want toembody them as the class?
Right, and typically they wouldfocus on one thing.
(30:25):
So the three core values areservice before self, excellence
and all we do in integrity, andso sometimes a class would
choose to focus on service andthey would be like okay, well,
over the course of our trendthis period, we're going to redo
the flower beds on base.
So we're going to do this.
You know, we're going to dosome of this other stuff.
So, even just drilling, youknow, one of the byproducts of
(30:47):
of practicing the fire drillsand stuff is the fact that they
know how to do the fire drills.
But after building their ownculture, participating in a
group activity where everybodyhas to play their part,
everybody has to, you know, dothe thing.
We're going to go through thisprocess.
We're building that trust.
Oh, you know, our teacheractually has our best interest.
We're going to go through this.
What a great way to anchoreverything together with
(31:08):
something that's super simple asan activity.
You to get them to collaborateon something really easy.
Um, okay, without the risk oflike sticking inside of this uh
loop the entire rest of thepodcast episode, because we
could totally do that.
I do want to get into um, youtaking the leap into indie, and
(31:29):
I think you are someone that Iwould love to hear from about
the pros and cons of the speedor intensity of the program.
You know whether that was kindof what you expected or if it
was different than what youexpected when you came in.
But also you're someone that inour conversations, I think at a
(31:55):
point in the cohort I can'tremember which week it was, but
there was like this drasticturning point where it was like,
oh, this is no longer intense.
This is like I'm just lettingit wash over me at this point
Now I'm just acting on stuff, soI'm super curious about what
the Indie Collective experiencewas like for you.
Speaker 2 (32:12):
Well, I think the first thing that I would say is
you all did a very good job ofsaying you're going to need this
many hours a week of additionaltime in order to do the work
Like it really is like being inschool, where you have class and
homework.
You have class and homework,and I was really lucky because I
(32:36):
actually had the spaciousnessand time to do the work.
If I hadn't, I would have beencompletely bulldozed, I would
have been overwhelmed, but thatis an important dimension for
people to pay attention to.
You really do need those hoursso that you can let stuff sink
in practice.
I did some additional research.
That's how I found that salesfunnel that I I'm so excited
about that sort of thing,because it's impossible to give
(32:59):
people all the informationeverybody could possibly need
for their particular situationin that little program.
But what you all do a great jobwith is giving folks a sense of
the landscape right as anindependent sort of business
owner, as an entrepreneur.
(33:20):
These are the kinds of thingsthat you're going to want to be
paying attention to and thengiving us all these really
beautiful and inspiringpossibility models.
This is how this personimplemented, and so I really
loved that and I don't know.
I don't know what the what theturning point was, but I do
remember like I don't rememberexactly what happened or
(33:40):
whatever, but what I do sort ofremember happening was things
started to click for me and oneof the things that was important
was me figuring out where toprioritize.
So, you know, everybody's indifferent places in their
business development and theirsense of what they want to do.
Some people are still just likeimagining a business into
(34:01):
existence, right, like you know.
But I sort of already had athing.
I had too many things and I hadto figure out which thing to
focus on, because that's what 20years does, right, and three
careers.
You know, I'm almost 50.
I've been around a little bit,so you know.
Now I'm like, where am Ifocused?
There's too much going on.
And one of the things that wasreally helpful was I would talk
to people in Indy, you know,peers, to you, to Sam, and I'd
(34:26):
start talking about all thethings I was doing and you would
all laser focus in on one thing, right, and that was my college
program, which was theaccidental thing I didn't even
plan to do.
Right, and everybody would justfocus and that's the thing.
That's the thing.
So it was really helpfulbecause it gave me a clear sense
of what was viable and a clearanchor and that allowed me to
(34:49):
prioritize, and then it shiftedfrom there.
But, yeah, I think there is aspeaking of the washing over you
.
I do think that there's a powerin releasing the idea that
you're going to learn it all allat once, cause you're not, you
know, and releasing the ideathat you have to get it right
(35:13):
right away, because there's somuch power in experimentation
and making mistakes.
However, being an independentlike is risky and not everybody
has the runway to make mistakes,and so I think there is a
tension between you know, ifI've got no seed funding and I'm
(35:36):
doing all of this in my sparetime and I have a full-time job,
I have just such a I need thelike fast track, streamlined,
precise method to get from hereto there, and the problem is
that doesn't quite work all thetime, right, so it's not.
There's no guarantee that youcan safely get from you know,
(35:59):
here to there in that tinylittle, you know tube of time
and energy that you have, andthat is difficult.
But because there are stakes,because it's kind of hard in the
world right now rightEconomically and so on, there
are stakes.
So you're going to people bringthat stress and tension and
urgency in and I think that doesdeserve space and attention and
(36:25):
I think the program moves atquite a pace so there's not
always space and attention forthat piece, you know.
I think you all do a good jobof saying like, don't think
you're going to have to, youknow, know it all or get it all
right away.
And I think maybe the A-team isone of the places where people
could do some of that processingwhich will work in some
(36:49):
contexts and not others.
I think it's a little bit of atricky balance and I want to
acknowledge that it's a trickybalance.
Speaker 1 (36:56):
Yeah, it is.
I mean running a community andthe amount of the way that me
and Sam talk about it at thispoint right is the community is
evolving because it's beenaround, coming up on its fifth
year, fourth year, fourth year,so at this point we have fresh
new grads coming in twice a yearevery year.
(37:19):
And we have one-year alumni,two-year alumni, three-year
alumni, four-year alumni, up tofive program participants.
So there's all of thesedifferent layers of people that
have been involved at differentlevels and we've been talking
about.
You know what is it?
What does it mean to havepeople fresh to the community
(37:39):
and then, like the sage elders?
you know, and the people thatare in the throes of building
their business and figuring itout and, you know, trying to
provide opportunity and contextand continuing education and
networking and camaraderie andall of these things to everybody
across all those differentlevels.
It becomes really, reallycomplex over time and I really
(38:02):
enjoy it because it deals withpeople, you know, and bringing
people together and watchingthem have these epiphany moments
and stuff together.
And watching them have theseepiphany moments and stuff.
And something that you saidthat I hear very, very
consistently across office hoursis that first 10 weeks for
people that you know, at the endof that 10 weeks they have to
(38:24):
make ends meet.
You know, I was one of thosepeople.
I came into Indie Collectiveand invested the last like four
out of 10K in my bank account 6Kin my bank account or something
Like I was squeezing by at thatpoint and it is like you go
through that cohort and you'rejust trying to implement
everything as fast as you can,throwing stuff, hopefully it
(38:44):
works and everything.
But I think, even if you're inthat position, putting yourself
into a place where you're nowacknowledging as an independent
Brad actually talked about thison his podcast the necessity to
continuously invest in yourselfas an independent.
When we work at jobs, if it's adecent structure and they have
(39:07):
opportunity for advancement ineducation, they tend to prompt
you when it's time foradditional education.
Or hey, you've been in yourcareer now two years.
It's time to take thiscertification so that you can
keep up on your skills.
In the RN field, we've gotcontinuing education credits
right, you've got continuingeducation credits in pretty much
any medical profession,psychological profession, things
(39:29):
that research is constantlybeing published and updated.
You want people to be able toupdate information and we've had
such an influx of people in thelast year that are coming into
the program and saying I've beena consultant for a decade and I
have not been to aneducation-based community or
I've not put myself through acurriculum in 10 years.
(39:51):
Mm-hmm community, or I've notput myself through a curriculum
in 10 years.
I don't even know if Inecessarily need this per se,
but I know that I want to investin myself and I know I'm going
to learn stuff when I put myselfthrough this process.
And then the final thing thatI'll say that really hits home
out of what you just said is youget done with those 10 weeks,
(40:12):
and so what if it didn't allhappen in those 10 weeks?
The amount of office hourscalls that I get a month out,
two months out, six months outfrom graduation from somebody
that's saying, holy shit, I gotit and it's, I nailed it, you
know, or wow.
(40:33):
I thought that this was where mylife was headed and now I'm
doing this thing.
Sometimes it's somethingcompletely different.
It's like a 180.
Sometimes it's literally like20 degrees to the left,
something adjacent.
But I didn't realize it until Istarted talking to other
community members that werefacing the same problems similar
spaces, similar issues, dealingwith the same emotions, all
(40:55):
this other kind of stuff, andthey all kept pointing out this
one part of me that I didn'teven, I didn't even notice or
lean into.
So the like that beingsomething that you brought up
makes me so happy because I, it,the community is so much more
than just me, sam.
The education, the speakers,all that other kind of stuff.
I mean it is an amazing groupof people that act as this big
(41:17):
brainstorming power group foryou to be able to bounce those
ideas off to, and be areflective mirror to you and
maybe unlock parts of yourselfthat you weren't necessarily
looking at with as muchintensity, but people are just
consistently pointing it out andwe're back to the word
collective yeah, look at that.
(41:40):
Yeah, I wonder.
Oh, I was gonna dive into thethrive framework for a little
bit, but were you gonna addsomething onto the end of that?
Speaker 2 (41:49):
I was just gonna say that's how learning works.
You know, sometimes you get athing a seed is planted and your
brain just chews on it for awhile and your spirit just chews
on it for a while, and then allof a sudden you have an
epiphany.
And that's why I'm going tosign up for Office Hours,
because I had something similarhappen and I have to share it
with you.
But we'll talk about that later.
Speaker 1 (42:06):
Yes, yeah, I was just going to ask.
You know we have 10, 15 minutesleft on the show here.
I know that the ThriveFramework is something that you
know, you've put a lot of timeinto and we've kind of touched
on different pieces of itthroughout the conversation so
far, but could you give everyonejust kind of an idea of why
(42:31):
you're so passionate about thatword specifically and then what
the Thrive Framework is meant toaccomplish or what it is?
Speaker 2 (42:38):
Absolutely.
I mean I am.
I think I became really laserfocused on thriving when, as I
mentioned, I was teaching andthen I was a school
administrator and I was watchingall of these structural
(43:00):
institutional pieces cometogether in ways that just
squished human beings intolittle boxes, even when, like
again, you had all of thesedeeply caring, enthusiastic,
creative educators, you had allthese vibrant young people sort
of theoretically had controlover your curriculum.
(43:21):
There was so much that wasbeing left out, and a thing
that's important to keep in mindabout schools is that
everything that is happening inthe world and in society shows
up in that classroom and inthose hallways.
Everything a kid is goingthrough shows up in that space.
We are, as educators, enactinga critical developmental
(43:45):
relationship with young peopleand we see them most of the half
the year right for most of theday for half the year and change
right we.
They are in our care, and so Iwas experiencing watching young
people trying to figure out howto be come right and noticing
(44:09):
that the conditions really madeit impossible for them to
explore certain aspects of theirbrilliance, their talent, their
genius, their interest, theircuriosity, because everything
was laser focused on these bigmilestones and moving people
really to the workplace andthat's actually too limited.
(44:30):
So when I went to my doctoralprogram I started trying to
research.
I was just reading, what dopeople have to say about this?
And what I noticed was,especially for marginalized
populations, the research mostlystopped at resilience.
And I understand why.
Right, when people are indistress and pain and scarcity
and survival mode, there's asense of urgency to like help
(44:52):
right, to shift and mitigatethat and to help people
persevere through that, you know, through pain, all of those
things, and that's real.
And especially for multiplymarginalized people, there was
no conversation about theirthriving, there was no future
focus.
Now I'm in psychology, you knowso, and there's, there is
positive psychology, which Ithink is wonderful.
(45:13):
It offers so much.
And so we've got methods, youknow, sort of like frameworks,
like PERMA-V and that kind ofthing, really powerful stuff.
But for some reason, once thefocus started to shift to the
margins, it just stopped atresilience and I thought that's
not good enough, and it's notgood enough for anyone,
regardless of your position insociety.
(45:33):
I think part of what is veryclear to me is that we as humans
, regardless of our location onthis planet, are facing a
reckoning around how we havelived our lives up to this point
, and we're facing theunsustainability, the meaningful
, vital threat that exists withdoing business as usual, and
(45:59):
what we tend to do is we tend toreinvent the wheel.
It's very difficult for us tobe expansive in our imagining
beyond the present, but everyadvance that we've made has been
a function of someone defiantlyimagining beyond what we know,
and so that's why I, if they'reextinct that already knew how to
(46:35):
be vibrant and thriving buthave been destroyed right, in
many cases deliberately.
So some of it's about castingforward and some of it's about
casting backward and a lot of itis about casting inward, and
that's what I'm focused on.
Speaker 1 (46:54):
Yeah, I love that.
I don't think that you canreally truly have a chance in
hell of having an accurate viewof the future if you don't
incorporate self and past I meanwithout getting too meta right
inside that type of statement.
(47:16):
If you think about what itmeans to think into the future,
right, you're trying toeliminate potential
possibilities or makepredictions about things that
may happen.
What are you using for thecontext of that?
Right, you're using yourpresent experience.
You're the it could be.
Um, you know there's lots ofstudies about judges handing out
(47:36):
harsher judgments prior tolunchtime.
Yeah, it could be the state ofyour nervous system or your
hunger level that affects yourthoughts or ability to project
forward.
We just talked about beinginside of the indie collective
cohort and being under duress ofinformation and that affecting
your ability to think too farinto the future.
And if you can get to a place,I just love that three-pronged
(48:01):
kind of outlook.
Right, you have to acknowledgethe past, you have to figure out
where you're at in the present,to who you are as self, and
then you're looking at into thefuture.
Speaker 2 (48:12):
And then I would add and we're back to the collective
.
It's not a one-person deal.
We do need to know, we need tocheck in with ourselves and know
where we're at right, we needto know what's happening here.
But ultimately, as an example,rarely do people imagine a
future through a disabilityjustice lens.
(48:32):
But the only way we are goingto get the future we need is if
we do it through a disabilityjustice lens, because everybody
becomes disabled at some pointin their life and our failure to
do that is harming peopleactively in the present and will
continue in the future.
Right, so this is an example.
So I, if I'm not currentlydisabled or haven't been
(48:52):
disabled or haven't taken careof someone who's disabled, I
can't do that imaginingeffectively.
Right, so I need other people.
Right?
Just like we keep designingschooling around adult ideas of
what young people need andrarely consult young people
about their lived experience,and that is a shortcoming right,
(49:15):
that's a mistake that wecontinue to repeat.
We don't have to do that.
Right, so we can't do the thatwithout the we.
The we is the powerful thing.
I wish more people understoodthat.
The whole point is love.
The whole point is us.
We love.
Like, if we really want to havea vibrant future.
(49:35):
That's it.
Separate doesn't work.
Different, hierarchical doesn'twork.
It's us as a collective, soyeah.
Speaker 1 (49:45):
Again with the prolific stuff that you say,
would you just go off on.
I don't have anything to add tothat.
That was was beautiful.
I think that's a great way toend the podcast.
I'm super, super grateful foryou being here, um, where could
people get in touch with you ifthey want to?
Um, hear about offerings thatyou have, um, and and learn more
about your, your business?
Speaker 2 (50:06):
well, I think I am on linkedin at dr, linkedin at Dr
Kia DH, I think, and my websiteis before the rebrand which
we'll talk about iswisechipmunkcom, and you can
learn a little bit about theBridge to Thriving framework
there too, if you're interested.
I've also written about it.
There's an article in NonprofitQuarterly and a book
(50:27):
forthcoming, and so, yeah, reach, reach out.
Speaker 1 (50:32):
I love it.
And then, if you're listeningto this and this conversation
has sparked interest as far asthe Indie Collective cohort, you
have somebody that you wouldlike to recommend as a guest on
the show, somebody that is apotential partner organization.
Feel free to reach out to me atJan looks like Jan at Indie
Collective, i-n-d-e, collectivedot C-E-O.
(50:54):
Have a great one everybody.
All right, everybody.
As you just heard in our intro,this is another episode of the
Modern Independent.
As always, I'm your host, jonAlmacy, and today I am sitting
down with Dr Kia Darling-Hammond, who I am super, super excited
to have on the show with me.
We got the chance to bond overmany office hours and
conversations about her journeyand what she's building, so I'm
(00:25):
super, super excited to be ableto have the conversation with
her today.
I'm going to give you a littlebit of a brief introduction and
start our jumping off point intothe conversation, and then
you'll hear directly from Dr Kia.
So she is an educator,psychologist, researcher and
coach with a specific focus onthriving and human development.
(00:45):
Throughout her career, she hassupported I am going way off,
listen y'all.
I am reading this live from aLinkedIn bio.
Right now, we are going to kickthat off from the beginning,
because I keep saying it as if Iam from Dr Kia's point of view.
So she is an educator,psychologist, researcher and
(01:06):
coach with a specific focus onthriving and human development.
Throughout her career, she hassupported an array of humans,
from small children to collegeapplicants, to organizational
leaders and their teams.
She believes that she has agift for helping people find the
common ground required to pavea way forward, which is why I
(01:30):
think we vibe on so manydifferent levels.
So, dr Kia, welcome to the show.
Speaker 2 (01:34):
It is so wonderful to be here.
We do, vibe.
Thank you for that introduction.
I'm just really excited to bein conversation today.
You know I'm a big IndieCollective fan, so this is
exciting.
Speaker 1 (01:47):
Yes, and which I genuinely appreciate on so many
different levels Having people.
As you know, I try to bring asmuch energy as I can into every
Zoom meeting, every conversationthat we try to have.
I'm really big on presence andbeing able to do that, every
conversation that we try to have.
I'm really big on presence andbeing able to do that and having
(02:08):
members that just kind ofembody that.
Naturally, you know when theycome into a room you can tell
other members kind of gravitateor they're getting shout outs in
the chat.
They're like oh, like he ishere, oh Brad showed up.
Or oh, this person showed up.
Um, I'm not discountingeverybody that has been through
cohorts two or three years ago.
I haven't forgotten about you.
Those are just the people thathave graduated from the most
(02:29):
written cohort.
So I love you too.
But it says something when youare able to step into that room
and say something.
And I think one of the bigreasons for that is because I've
heard from so many other indiesthat have had the chance to
connect with you about thatsuperpower that you have right
Of being able to help peopleconnect the dots or ask them
questions that lead them toidentify things in themselves.
(02:53):
Maybe they didn't even know howdid I mean?
Is that something that you'vealways had?
Is that a skill set that you'vedeveloped over the course of
time?
Can you tell us about that?
Speaker 2 (03:04):
Yeah, as you were saying that, I was thinking how
did that happen?
I think ever since I was reallyyoung, my mother has said
you're going to be apsychologist.
So I think I've always had,personality-wise, an orientation
toward curiosity about thehuman experience and I
(03:27):
definitely was curious abouteverything and asked a lot of
questions and made a lot ofobservations as a kid, sometimes
very unfortunate observationsthat other people wished I
didn't make.
So my father used to give methis lecture about discretion,
where he would spell it for meand tell me I needed it.
But my parents are botheducators and I think educators
(03:49):
have a tendency to be orientedtoward helping people find their
way right.
And you think about, like, theactual definition of education,
elucidation, that's sort of youknow, finding your pathway
towards knowledge, enlightenment, understanding, and so I think
it's my personality, I thinkit's how I was groomed, you know
(04:09):
, raised by my parents to bethoughtful and curious and to be
kind of an educator and that'sjust the way I'm oriented.
Like I just I want to knowwhat's important to people and I
want to know what's exciting topeople and I want them to move
through discomfort and feelingstuck to getting and I want to
know what's exciting to peopleand I want them to move through
discomfort and feeling stuck togetting what they want and need.
Speaker 1 (04:31):
Yeah, I want to go back and revisit the etymology
of education there real quick,because that's not something
that I'm super familiar with.
But you said elucidation whatwas that word that you?
Speaker 2 (04:41):
just threw out there Illuminate, like to shed light
upon right To illuminate, tokind of make visible, make clear
, make.
Speaker 1 (04:51):
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
You're like bringing thingsinto focus for people in some
ways, as you're educating.
That makes a lot of sense.
I like looking at educationthat way rather than helping
somebody figure out how toproperly fill out a checklist,
you know, actually illuminatingparts of the world or, you know,
(05:14):
allowing them to see a newperspective and then integrate
that and be able to act on it inthe world versus.
You know, sometimes peoplethink of education and they
think of school, right, and thestructure of school, versus what
it actually means.
That's why I was so curiousabout going back and exploring
that just for a second, becauseI was like, oh, that's actually
kind of a cool littledistinction there.
Speaker 2 (05:35):
Thank you so much, and also I think part of what
education offers that schoolingdoesn't always offer, because
it's so structured andcompliance focused is that each
of us brings our own self towhatever it is that we're doing.
So even if you gave me achecklist and I gave you a
checklist, we might actuallyinterpret and understand it very
differently, and how we wouldeven implement the things on
(05:55):
that list would be different,and so everything is very
individual and subjective in alot of ways, and so I think
that's an important piece of theself-actualization puzzle.
Speaker 1 (06:06):
Right, right, For people that are listening that
may not have ever heard of theterm self-actualization what in
your mind?
How would you explain that tosomebody that maybe is hearing
that for the first time?
Sure, that's a deep question.
Speaker 2 (06:25):
Well, you know, people have heard of Maslow's
hierarchy of needs, and so I'mgoing to actually cite Maslow,
and I won't problematize thehierarchy of needs in this space
, unless you want me to.
But Maslow talks about peoplebeing able to become all that
they could possibly become.
In other words, you weresaturated in opportunity for
(06:50):
becoming, and that becoming isanchored in all of your
potential and possibility, butit's also anchored in your
desire.
So who do I want to become?
Here are all theseopportunities.
Okay, great, I can become thatperson self-actualize, to make
yourself possible, to makeyourself true.
Speaker 1 (07:13):
Yeah, I've always.
Yeah, we definitely don't needto.
I have my own thoughts on thehierarchy of needs, but again,
maybe we just have a separatepodcast episode where we go deep
on, like some psychologicalconcepts.
That would be a lot of fun.
Yeah, I think that, especiallyhearing about the work that you
do and we'll get we'll dive intoyour career path here in a
(07:34):
second but, you know, knowingthe stuff that you're working on
and the way that you choose toapproach it, I think it's
important for people to realizethat those concepts they've kind
of been around for a while butthey are so malleable and
there's still ways to find waysto improve them and how to
communicate them, or things thatyou just found inside of your
(07:59):
framework that I think touch onthings in such a different way.
And so that's a little sneakpeek.
If you want to hear about theframework and everything else,
keep listening to the episodeuntil the end, because we're
definitely going to dive intothat at some point.
But to kind of rewind, I'malways super curious about how
people started their path andthen eventually ended up finding
indie right.
(08:19):
So I saw when I was doing mypre-episode work and stuff that
you didn't really go independentright away.
You just kind of had like aconsulting gig.
That was originally a sidehustle.
It sounds like it was like aspecific project, kind of
getting people to come togetherum for a I guess a consensus
statement was the phrase thatyou used Um, so I don't know if
(08:42):
that is like the proper place tostart, but what was your
entrance into the idea of, oh, Icould actually do some work on
my own or I could consult?
And then how did thateventually evolve into, oh, I'm
going to build my own practice.
Speaker 2 (08:56):
Yeah, so 20 plus years ago, a friend and mentor
needed.
So I've always been a littlebit of a data head needed who?
So I've always been a littlebit of a data head.
I really, really lovespreadsheets, I love information
, I collect information.
It's probably like if you thinkof hoarding I don't hoard
physical objects, I hoardinformation and I just love it,
(09:19):
love it, love it.
So this this mentor, John Snyder, knew that about me and he had
a project that he was doing.
He was at Bank Street Collegeof Education and he had to work
with the New York State it wasthe New York City Board of
Education and the chancellor'soffice and a bunch of teachers
and he was like, oh, Kia wouldbe great to bring in and play
with this data.
(09:40):
And so that was my firstconsulting gig ever and it was
actually really fun.
And I found was my firstthought like consulting gig ever
, and it was actually really fun.
And I found myself in theserooms and, like I said, I'm I am
a child of two educators.
I've been in the publicschooling universe my entire
life, right Because of my mom.
So here I am in this room fullof educators and administrators
(10:01):
who are not getting along and melittle budding mini
psychologist is going oh, let'stalk about these things.
So I'm having one-on-oneconversations, group
conversations center.
So that's how that all unfolded.
And then I took, you know,small little projects over the
years, but I always had thesesort of W-2s as we moved.
(10:21):
So I'd say, probably graduateschool was probably the, my
doctoral program was probablythe turning point, Because I'd
sort of, you know, I did what alot of people do you went to
college and then I went and Igot a job and then I said this
isn't quite doing it for me andstarted to look for other ways
to self-actualize.
And I found myself in a Masterof Arts in Teaching program and
(10:43):
became a teacher and that for atime was phenomenal.
But as many people know, K-12education is a very exhausting
space and the beginnings of myframework really started when I
was a teacher, struggling tofigure out how to create the
conditions for my students to bewhole and fully realized.
So that was sort of thebeginning.
(11:03):
Then I was like, you know, Ican't do this anymore.
Actually it moved from teachingto administration and it almost
killed me, literally almostkilled me, because I wasn't
sleeping and I couldn't takecare of myself at all, but I was
working constantly and it washigh pressure, high stress.
So I went into my doctoralprogram that's where my research
really took root and I came outand I tried to do W-2s and I
(11:23):
couldn't.
I couldn't do it and part ofthe problem was I was so focused
on thriving and I'd done allthis work on flourishing and
thriving and wellbeing andresistance, and I went into
these kind of corporate settingsand people were not taking care
of themselves or each other andthe cultures were often toxic,
(11:45):
even though all the individualswere lovely human beings who
were doing their best.
And I couldn't.
Now, with my new sort ofclarity about what it was that I
thought humans needed and whereI needed to be to continue to
recover, I couldn't be in thosespaces.
So that was when I thought canI do this side hustle thing full
(12:07):
time?
Because I don't know how I'mgoing to make a living if I keep
being in settings that theywere depleting.
You know, and I know I'm notalone, I know a lot of us in the
indie space got to a pointwhere we're like I can't, I
literally cannot live this lifeanymore because it's not living,
it's not a life.
And so then the pandemic hit.
(12:27):
So here we are and everything'schanging and a lot of the ways
that I would have moved throughthe world had to shift right.
I was a big networker.
I was always at coffees andteas and meetings and panels and
doing all the things and all ofa sudden everything went shh
and I had to figure out how totranslate all of what would have
(12:49):
been in-person work intodigital work, like so many of us
did.
And I realized that I could dothat, but I needed help to shift
to full-time.
So the first thing I did was Istruggled and, struggled and
(13:10):
struggled and got an accountantand finally, you know, a
bookkeeper and accountant, andfinally stopped struggling that
way.
Then I got clarity about whatwas going on, sort of internally
, infrastructurally, and thought, oh, I don't know enough about
business to build a wholebusiness.
And then so the accounting firmwas Collective and they
(13:34):
advertised Indie Collective andthere was a discount which I
needed to be part of the cohort,and I thought, okay, I'm just
going to do it to be part of thecohort.
And I thought, okay, I'm justgoing to do it.
And the big epiphany in thatmoment of time was just
recognizing that it was.
I've been used to doingeverything myself, but it was
(13:55):
okay to ask for help.
It was okay to get help.
It was actually going toaccelerate me if I could get
some meaningful guidance, and soI did meaningful guidance, and
so I did.
Speaker 1 (14:04):
Yeah, I love that, before we dive into continuing,
you know, into the indiecollective journey and, you know
, start asking questions aboutthat.
I want to rewind to somethingthat you said, because you have
this habit of just like goingthrough and I don't think, I
don't know if you even pick upon it sometimes when you say
stuff.
But you say some like prolificstuff, uh, and then it just like
(14:27):
kind of glances over.
So I want to hit on this ideaand maybe get your input on it
for people that are listening,that are in a culture or they're
trying to build a culture, andthe idea that every person
individually can be a fantasticperson, but then the culture can
still be toxic.
(14:48):
I guess two part why do youthink that is?
And how is culture differentthan the individual
personalities of the peopleinvolved in that org?
How can people kind of separatethat stuff inside of their head
?
Speaker 2 (15:06):
Absolutely.
I think one critical dimensionis beliefs.
So much of it is about mindsetand beliefs and so often,
especially in organizationswhere you're trying to meet the
needs of underserved populations, there's a sense of urgency and
(15:28):
a sense of scarcity, and thatis manufactured.
Right, that comes from you know.
Anybody who's ever worked in anonprofit that depends on grant
funding knows you are at themercy of the grant cycles.
You're at the mercy of thefoundation and their priorities.
You're at the mercy of all ofthese factors and anybody who's
(15:49):
worked in K-12 knows that thatschool year is like a bulldozer.
Right, you're in go modeconstantly and I think that it's
like the energy is very hot andscarce and fast.
Right, like go, go, go and theresources tend to be
(16:10):
insufficient to the need.
Right, there aren't enoughpeople.
I've only worked in oneorganization that did a
phenomenal job matrixing rolesso that if two people were out,
everything just kept going.
Right, it was fine because theyjust trained across roles and
so on.
It was really brilliantly,beautifully done, masterful.
(16:33):
However, most places don't havethat and it's not to cast
dispersions, it's a reallycomplicated, intricate thing to
do to manage that kind of youknow, training, staffing, et
cetera.
So when somebody's out sick,something grinds to a halt,
right, there's not enough subs,there's nobody to put on that
(16:55):
event, there's something,something, and it creates this
stress, right.
So there's the stress of theconditions.
We're trying to get this thingdone.
It's so important.
Then there's the stress of youknow whatever's happening in
real time.
And then when we're under stress, when humans are under stress,
especially if it gets really,really high, we tend to go into
autopilot.
We become what we'veexperienced.
(17:18):
We sort of go into the trainingthat we've experienced, and
most of us have been trained incontexts that are very punitive.
Right, school has a tendency tobe about compliance and control
you don't want to get introuble, you don't want to fail,
and so on.
So there's a lot that sort ofis wrapped around scarcity,
scarcity mindset, scarcitythinking.
And when we are under duress,we're usually less patient, we
(17:42):
are usually less creative, lesscurious, because we don't feel
like we can slow down, we feellike we have to speed up and the
place where we take care ofeach other is actually in
slowing down, right.
So I had at one point I was thechief of staff in an
organization briefly, and I gotin big trouble for sending staff
(18:03):
home.
One person was having heartissues, the other needed an
appendix surgery, but both ofthem and I sent them home
because they were sick in realtime and I got in big trouble
and the response that I got frommy boss was you know, everybody
has to be able to do their workright.
So when we orient towards thework instead of the humans,
(18:25):
what's possible together, welose, I think, a lot of the
beauty and the warmth and thevibrancy that is possible in
collaboration.
And when your idea of how toget people to do what you need
them to do is punitive,controlling or coercive, you're
(18:45):
going to create toxicity.
It's immediate.
And then you have to movethrough repair, and most of us
don't know how to move throughrepair.
Okay, I could go on and on.
I'll stop.
Speaker 1 (18:56):
No, I mean, I'd love to just listen to you ramble on
that all day, but there's, I'dlove to just listen to you
ramble on that all day, butthere's.
Oh man, you just reminded me ofsomething that I think is a
huge I don't want to say huge,but I've encountered it quite
often that like there's amisconception about the way the
military operates.
Right, having served for sevenyears in the Air National Guard
(19:21):
and obviously I can't speak forevery military unit I can speak
for my installation, myexperiences across.
You know units that I'veobserved from the Air Force in
Aviano, italy, alaska, kuwait,you know the different places
that I got the chance to spendtime.
But there's this perception thatthe military is extremely
(19:44):
punitively oriented, and it'snot except for the part that
gets publicized to the publicthe most often, which is basic
training.
Bootcamp is very much so abouttaking you down to the bare
bones.
You are the same as everybodyelse that walked through that
door.
Now everybody is starting freshand you're going to have this
(20:06):
life and you're going to havethese values and these are the
things you're going to holdyourself to.
And here's the standards.
And you know they really kindof implement more of a value
system or a belief system, right, and it can be punitive at the
time because you're trying toiron out a lot of these kinks
between people being able tobond as a unit and all this
(20:27):
other kind of stuff.
But outside of boot camp, whichis like the major place where
people are like you're going todo pushups because you did
something wrong, right, that'slike the standard military
vision that a lot of people hold, vision that a lot of people
hold once you're on theinstallation.
I had the blessing of servingunder this lieutenant colonel,
lieutenant colonel phil brown,um, and his big message, pretty
(20:50):
consistently, was if everysingle person along the chain of
command understands exactly whythey're there, why their role
is important, why their roleaffects the roles peripheral to
them and above them and belowthem in the chain, and then
we're able to intrinsically getthat person to want to do the
(21:13):
best possible job they can atthat thing, then we will run
into way less circumstanceswhere we will have to be
punitive.
And so there was a lot of timeswhere he would send people home
that were sick from duty, right, and then we would have to kind
(21:35):
of the unit would have to shift, but the goal was to keep the
unit healthy, not sacrifice theindividual wellness of the
individual people of the unit.
It was at the unit level wherethat mentality was happening.
And then I would I rememberhaving conversations because my
last two years of working underhim he put me in charge of
something called the studentflight program and it was
basically everybody that comesback for basic training as a
part of this program for thefirst six months on base.
(21:57):
So I did that for two years and, kind of you know, watched
people develop from coming homefrom basic training to six
months into their career, wouldassign them mentors and we'd
have conversations aboutconflict resolution and ego
management and context of yourposition and all this other
stuff.
And I remember one timeLieutenant Colonel Brown was
(22:17):
talking to one of the mastersergeants.
That was a transfer fromanother base and this is what
really showed me that I had ablessing of growing up under his
mentorship.
This master sergeant was sayinglike, sir, I have never been in
an installation where newrecruits are so excited to sweep
the shop floor.
And Colonel Brown's responsewas he was like well, they're
(22:38):
excited to sweep the shop floorbecause they know that by them
doing that they're allowing afully certified staff sergeant
to work on a plane.
That's going to make that planesafer for transporting a
hundred of our people across,you know, seas, sometimes lines.
It's going to allow this personto do this like they understand
(22:58):
exactly where it's at.
So, no matter how medial thetask, it was wildly important to
them inside of that context andI really love that.
It's always stuck with me.
It's always something that I'mthe one that takes the trash out
at our agency's office.
There's stuff that I doconsistently to just make that a
(23:19):
part of the culture.
Anybody in any part of thechain of command should be able
to jump in and help take care ofthe unit.
So that's just you going on.
That trend really reminded meof that conversation with him
and I always want to shout himout whenever I get a chance
because he was a big impact inmy life.
Speaker 2 (23:36):
Thank you so much for sharing that.
I'm bursting because you'llknow this from my framework, I'm
always looking for the commonthread and it occurs to me that
there was a lot of reallyimportant sort of work happening
there.
So ego management you mentionedright, and I thought of basic
training as a space where partof what's happening is people's
(23:57):
sense of individualism and egoare being stripped out so that
they can operate as a collective.
Individualism and ego are beingstripped out so that they can
operate as a collective.
And then you see that throughline to the collective to sort
of later when you're at theinstallation and everybody
understands they have a role toplay, because the collective is
what makes people strong andsuccessful.
And I was thinking also aboutunderstanding the stakes.
(24:19):
So you know understanding thestakes, so you know there's a
reason why we have to figure outhow to come together.
And some of that is primalright, like the fundamental,
like survival right, butfundamentally we are stronger
when we can come together as aunified whole, as a collective.
(24:40):
And what I think is reallydistinct about what you
described versus what I see in alot of organizations is that
everybody, in any position,maintains their dignity right
100%.
And I think, because we do tendto organize ourselves
hierarchically, but in a wholehost of ways in society, across
(25:04):
a whole host of identities androles.
There's then, unfortunately, atendency to attach value and
dignity according to status andsort of position on a hierarchy,
and what you've just describedsounds like the opposite of that
.
You know, everybody is asimportant as everybody else,
(25:27):
because nothing works well ifeverybody is not able to show up
at you know, at their best, andthat requires mutual support.
I think that's actuallypowerful.
Speaker 1 (25:37):
I remember seeing him .
This was actually.
It wasn't him, it was a majorshiflet.
She was one of the first.
No, no, yeah, it was MajorShiflett.
She was one of the first femalevice wing commanders at our
base Baller of a human.
(25:57):
And I remember her talking to alieutenant like a fresh
lieutenant when they came backfrom Officers Training Academy.
That is, you are enlisted,which means you're kind of in
like the entry level, slash,junior management class, right,
(26:17):
and then you go on to trainingand you become kind of you know,
a management level or directorlevel, if I'm comparing it to
the corporate world.
But this person had neverworked at the bottom of the food
chain.
They graduated school, theywent and they came back and they
were immediately an officer,which means that they were in
charge of a unit of like 30people right off the bat.
And Major Siffitt was havingthis conversation and this also
has really stuck with me too.
She said if you have to pullrank in order to motivate your
(26:44):
team to have a productive day,you've already lost the day.
And I've always thought aboutthat Because you know, you start
your own company and you'rehiring people, you're doing
stuff, you're I was being calledboss by like a group of five
(27:05):
people at 24.
And so I was like I don't knowwhat I'm doing, but having that
in the back of my mind is likeokay.
But if I have to say, well,well, I'm running this company,
so we have to do this, I'vealready lost Right.
And so I having that in the backof my head, I think, has been
so valuable along theentrepreneurial journey, not
just and really anywhere thatI've gone, where I'm having to
(27:27):
work inside of a hierarchicalsystem.
Right, it's the moment that youdecide to lean on that
hierarchical system.
You know, maybe you can lean onit in acute situations, Like if
it's really intense, and youjust need to be like, hey, we
need to follow orders right now.
They would talk about that inthe military all the time too.
You're in an acute situation.
Hey, I need to follow thisorder right now because it's,
(27:50):
you know, life or death.
But then when we get back tothe base, now we're not outside
of that acute situation.
I'm not just pulling rank 24-7,because you only have so many
times that you can do that witha team before they start to
think that that's your defaultmode.
Speaker 2 (28:05):
That's right, and I think what you're saying is
reminding me of an importantrelational rule, which is,
whenever you're in relationshipwith someone, you can choose to
be.
You can choose to try to kindof control, and that undermines
(28:28):
everything.
It undermines trust, itundermines well-being,
everything or you can choose tobe in collaboration right and so
I've encountered morefear-based organizations where
you're afraid to get fired,you're afraid to get demoted,
you're afraid to get it wrongand fear-based organizations
than collaborative,dignity-based organizations, and
(28:50):
I think you're right.
There are moments where it's.
I would say this to my studentswhen I taught ninth graders and
anybody who knows ninth, youknow 12 and 13 year olds.
They are unruly, chaotic humansand I love that right, and so
one of the first things I wouldsay to my students is what you
do is not up to me, right.
How you behave, what you say,what you do is actually not up
(29:13):
to me.
I don't have control over thatand I don't want to.
However, we are here togetherin a classroom and I hope that
this can be a wonderfulexperience for all of us.
So I'd really love to hear fromyou what would make this
wonderful, and so we would worktogether to craft a culture
together.
But my caveat was when it's amatter of safety, I need for you
(29:33):
to listen to me and trust meand do what I say without asking
questions.
So let's work on that.
And I actually did drill myninth graders on like we did
fire drills.
Until we got them right, we didevacuation drills.
I think I was one of the onlyteachers who did this.
Other people were teaching andmy kids were lining up quietly
outside, but it was because Iknew if we did hit an emergency,
(29:55):
I needed them to listen to me,without question.
But that meant I had to earnand maintain their trust Right.
Speaker 1 (30:03):
Right, yeah, I love the idea of allowing them to
build their own culture,especially in a classroom
setting.
We used to do that in studentflight.
Every time a new class wouldcome back from basic training we
would say, okay, here's thecore values you have to operate
in because you signed on thedotted line.
You know, welcome to the USmilitary.
But you know how do you want toembody them as the class?
Right, and typically they wouldfocus on one thing.
(30:25):
So the three core values areservice before self, excellence
and all we do in integrity, andso sometimes a class would
choose to focus on service andthey would be like okay, well,
over the course of our trendthis period, we're going to redo
the flower beds on base.
So we're going to do this.
You know, we're going to dosome of this other stuff.
So, even just drilling, youknow, one of the byproducts of
(30:47):
of practicing the fire drillsand stuff is the fact that they
know how to do the fire drills.
But after building their ownculture, participating in a
group activity where everybodyhas to play their part,
everybody has to, you know, dothe thing.
We're going to go through thisprocess.
We're building that trust.
Oh, you know, our teacheractually has our best interest.
We're going to go through this.
What a great way to anchoreverything together with
(31:08):
something that's super simple asan activity.
You to get them to collaborateon something really easy.
Um, okay, without the risk oflike sticking inside of this uh
loop the entire rest of thepodcast episode, because we
could totally do that.
I do want to get into um, youtaking the leap into indie, and
(31:29):
I think you are someone that Iwould love to hear from about
the pros and cons of the speedor intensity of the program.
You know whether that was kindof what you expected or if it
was different than what youexpected when you came in.
But also you're someone that inour conversations, I think at a
(31:55):
point in the cohort I can'tremember which week it was, but
there was like this drasticturning point where it was like,
oh, this is no longer intense.
This is like I'm just lettingit wash over me at this point
Now I'm just acting on stuff, soI'm super curious about what
the Indie Collective experiencewas like for you.
Speaker 2 (32:12):
Well, I think the first thing that I would say is
you all did a very good job ofsaying you're going to need this
many hours a week of additionaltime in order to do the work
Like it really is like being inschool, where you have class and
homework.
You have class and homework,and I was really lucky because I
(32:36):
actually had the spaciousnessand time to do the work.
If I hadn't, I would have beencompletely bulldozed, I would
have been overwhelmed, but thatis an important dimension for
people to pay attention to.
You really do need those hoursso that you can let stuff sink
in practice.
I did some additional research.
That's how I found that salesfunnel that I I'm so excited
about that sort of thing,because it's impossible to give
(32:59):
people all the informationeverybody could possibly need
for their particular situationin that little program.
But what you all do a great jobwith is giving folks a sense of
the landscape right as anindependent sort of business
owner, as an entrepreneur.
(33:20):
These are the kinds of thingsthat you're going to want to be
paying attention to and thengiving us all these really
beautiful and inspiringpossibility models.
This is how this personimplemented, and so I really
loved that and I don't know.
I don't know what the what theturning point was, but I do
remember like I don't rememberexactly what happened or
(33:40):
whatever, but what I do sort ofremember happening was things
started to click for me and oneof the things that was important
was me figuring out where toprioritize.
So, you know, everybody's indifferent places in their
business development and theirsense of what they want to do.
Some people are still just likeimagining a business into
(34:01):
existence, right, like you know.
But I sort of already had athing.
I had too many things and I hadto figure out which thing to
focus on, because that's what 20years does, right, and three
careers.
You know, I'm almost 50.
I've been around a little bit,so you know.
Now I'm like, where am Ifocused?
There's too much going on.
And one of the things that wasreally helpful was I would talk
to people in Indy, you know,peers, to you, to Sam, and I'd
(34:26):
start talking about all thethings I was doing and you would
all laser focus in on one thing, right, and that was my college
program, which was theaccidental thing I didn't even
plan to do.
Right, and everybody would justfocus and that's the thing.
That's the thing.
So it was really helpfulbecause it gave me a clear sense
of what was viable and a clearanchor and that allowed me to
(34:49):
prioritize, and then it shiftedfrom there.
But, yeah, I think there is aspeaking of the washing over you
.
I do think that there's a powerin releasing the idea that
you're going to learn it all allat once, cause you're not, you
know, and releasing the ideathat you have to get it right
(35:13):
right away, because there's somuch power in experimentation
and making mistakes.
However, being an independentlike is risky and not everybody
has the runway to make mistakes,and so I think there is a
tension between you know, ifI've got no seed funding and I'm
(35:36):
doing all of this in my sparetime and I have a full-time job,
I have just such a I need thelike fast track, streamlined,
precise method to get from hereto there, and the problem is
that doesn't quite work all thetime, right, so it's not.
There's no guarantee that youcan safely get from you know,
(35:59):
here to there in that tinylittle, you know tube of time
and energy that you have, andthat is difficult.
But because there are stakes,because it's kind of hard in the
world right now rightEconomically and so on, there
are stakes.
So you're going to people bringthat stress and tension and
urgency in and I think that doesdeserve space and attention and
(36:25):
I think the program moves atquite a pace so there's not
always space and attention forthat piece, you know.
I think you all do a good jobof saying like, don't think
you're going to have to, youknow, know it all or get it all
right away.
And I think maybe the A-team isone of the places where people
could do some of that processingwhich will work in some
(36:49):
contexts and not others.
I think it's a little bit of atricky balance and I want to
acknowledge that it's a trickybalance.
Speaker 1 (36:56):
Yeah, it is.
I mean running a community andthe amount of the way that me
and Sam talk about it at thispoint right is the community is
evolving because it's beenaround, coming up on its fifth
year, fourth year, fourth year,so at this point we have fresh
new grads coming in twice a yearevery year.
(37:19):
And we have one-year alumni,two-year alumni, three-year
alumni, four-year alumni, up tofive program participants.
So there's all of thesedifferent layers of people that
have been involved at differentlevels and we've been talking
about.
You know what is it?
What does it mean to havepeople fresh to the community
(37:39):
and then, like the sage elders?
you know, and the people thatare in the throes of building
their business and figuring itout and, you know, trying to
provide opportunity and contextand continuing education and
networking and camaraderie andall of these things to everybody
across all those differentlevels.
It becomes really, reallycomplex over time and I really
(38:02):
enjoy it because it deals withpeople, you know, and bringing
people together and watchingthem have these epiphany moments
and stuff together.
And watching them have theseepiphany moments and stuff.
And something that you saidthat I hear very, very
consistently across office hoursis that first 10 weeks for
people that you know, at the endof that 10 weeks they have to
(38:24):
make ends meet.
You know, I was one of thosepeople.
I came into Indie Collectiveand invested the last like four
out of 10K in my bank account 6Kin my bank account or something
Like I was squeezing by at thatpoint and it is like you go
through that cohort and you'rejust trying to implement
everything as fast as you can,throwing stuff, hopefully it
(38:44):
works and everything.
But I think, even if you're inthat position, putting yourself
into a place where you're nowacknowledging as an independent
Brad actually talked about thison his podcast the necessity to
continuously invest in yourselfas an independent.
When we work at jobs, if it's adecent structure and they have
(39:07):
opportunity for advancement ineducation, they tend to prompt
you when it's time foradditional education.
Or hey, you've been in yourcareer now two years.
It's time to take thiscertification so that you can
keep up on your skills.
In the RN field, we've gotcontinuing education credits
right, you've got continuingeducation credits in pretty much
any medical profession,psychological profession, things
(39:29):
that research is constantlybeing published and updated.
You want people to be able toupdate information and we've had
such an influx of people in thelast year that are coming into
the program and saying I've beena consultant for a decade and I
have not been to aneducation-based community or
I've not put myself through acurriculum in 10 years.
(39:51):
Mm-hmm community, or I've notput myself through a curriculum
in 10 years.
I don't even know if Inecessarily need this per se,
but I know that I want to investin myself and I know I'm going
to learn stuff when I put myselfthrough this process.
And then the final thing thatI'll say that really hits home
out of what you just said is youget done with those 10 weeks,
(40:12):
and so what if it didn't allhappen in those 10 weeks?
The amount of office hourscalls that I get a month out,
two months out, six months outfrom graduation from somebody
that's saying, holy shit, I gotit and it's, I nailed it, you
know, or wow.
(40:33):
I thought that this was where mylife was headed and now I'm
doing this thing.
Sometimes it's somethingcompletely different.
It's like a 180.
Sometimes it's literally like20 degrees to the left,
something adjacent.
But I didn't realize it until Istarted talking to other
community members that werefacing the same problems similar
spaces, similar issues, dealingwith the same emotions, all
(40:55):
this other kind of stuff, andthey all kept pointing out this
one part of me that I didn'teven, I didn't even notice or
lean into.
So the like that beingsomething that you brought up
makes me so happy because I, it,the community is so much more
than just me, sam.
The education, the speakers,all that other kind of stuff.
I mean it is an amazing groupof people that act as this big
(41:17):
brainstorming power group foryou to be able to bounce those
ideas off to, and be areflective mirror to you and
maybe unlock parts of yourselfthat you weren't necessarily
looking at with as muchintensity, but people are just
consistently pointing it out andwe're back to the word
collective yeah, look at that.
(41:40):
Yeah, I wonder.
Oh, I was gonna dive into thethrive framework for a little
bit, but were you gonna addsomething onto the end of that?
Speaker 2 (41:49):
I was just gonna say that's how learning works.
You know, sometimes you get athing a seed is planted and your
brain just chews on it for awhile and your spirit just chews
on it for a while, and then allof a sudden you have an
epiphany.
And that's why I'm going tosign up for Office Hours,
because I had something similarhappen and I have to share it
with you.
But we'll talk about that later.
Speaker 1 (42:06):
Yes, yeah, I was just going to ask.
You know we have 10, 15 minutesleft on the show here.
I know that the ThriveFramework is something that you
know, you've put a lot of timeinto and we've kind of touched
on different pieces of itthroughout the conversation so
far, but could you give everyonejust kind of an idea of why
(42:31):
you're so passionate about thatword specifically and then what
the Thrive Framework is meant toaccomplish or what it is?
Speaker 2 (42:38):
Absolutely.
I mean I am.
I think I became really laserfocused on thriving when, as I
mentioned, I was teaching andthen I was a school
administrator and I was watchingall of these structural
(43:00):
institutional pieces cometogether in ways that just
squished human beings intolittle boxes, even when, like
again, you had all of thesedeeply caring, enthusiastic,
creative educators, you had allthese vibrant young people sort
of theoretically had controlover your curriculum.
(43:21):
There was so much that wasbeing left out, and a thing
that's important to keep in mindabout schools is that
everything that is happening inthe world and in society shows
up in that classroom and inthose hallways.
Everything a kid is goingthrough shows up in that space.
We are, as educators, enactinga critical developmental
(43:45):
relationship with young peopleand we see them most of the half
the year right for most of theday for half the year and change
right we.
They are in our care, and so Iwas experiencing watching young
people trying to figure out howto be come right and noticing
(44:09):
that the conditions really madeit impossible for them to
explore certain aspects of theirbrilliance, their talent, their
genius, their interest, theircuriosity, because everything
was laser focused on these bigmilestones and moving people
really to the workplace andthat's actually too limited.
(44:30):
So when I went to my doctoralprogram I started trying to
research.
I was just reading, what dopeople have to say about this?
And what I noticed was,especially for marginalized
populations, the research mostlystopped at resilience.
And I understand why.
Right, when people are indistress and pain and scarcity
and survival mode, there's asense of urgency to like help
(44:52):
right, to shift and mitigatethat and to help people
persevere through that, you know, through pain, all of those
things, and that's real.
And especially for multiplymarginalized people, there was
no conversation about theirthriving, there was no future
focus.
Now I'm in psychology, you knowso, and there's, there is
positive psychology, which Ithink is wonderful.
(45:13):
It offers so much.
And so we've got methods, youknow, sort of like frameworks,
like PERMA-V and that kind ofthing, really powerful stuff.
But for some reason, once thefocus started to shift to the
margins, it just stopped atresilience and I thought that's
not good enough, and it's notgood enough for anyone,
regardless of your position insociety.
(45:33):
I think part of what is veryclear to me is that we as humans
, regardless of our location onthis planet, are facing a
reckoning around how we havelived our lives up to this point
, and we're facing theunsustainability, the meaningful
, vital threat that exists withdoing business as usual, and
(45:59):
what we tend to do is we tend toreinvent the wheel.
It's very difficult for us tobe expansive in our imagining
beyond the present, but everyadvance that we've made has been
a function of someone defiantlyimagining beyond what we know,
and so that's why I, if they'reextinct that already knew how to
(46:35):
be vibrant and thriving buthave been destroyed right, in
many cases deliberately.
So some of it's about castingforward and some of it's about
casting backward and a lot of itis about casting inward, and
that's what I'm focused on.
Speaker 1 (46:54):
Yeah, I love that.
I don't think that you canreally truly have a chance in
hell of having an accurate viewof the future if you don't
incorporate self and past I meanwithout getting too meta right
inside that type of statement.
(47:16):
If you think about what itmeans to think into the future,
right, you're trying toeliminate potential
possibilities or makepredictions about things that
may happen.
What are you using for thecontext of that?
Right, you're using yourpresent experience.
You're the it could be.
Um, you know there's lots ofstudies about judges handing out
(47:36):
harsher judgments prior tolunchtime.
Yeah, it could be the state ofyour nervous system or your
hunger level that affects yourthoughts or ability to project
forward.
We just talked about beinginside of the indie collective
cohort and being under duress ofinformation and that affecting
your ability to think too farinto the future.
And if you can get to a place,I just love that three-pronged
(48:01):
kind of outlook.
Right, you have to acknowledgethe past, you have to figure out
where you're at in the present,to who you are as self, and
then you're looking at into thefuture.
Speaker 2 (48:12):
And then I would add and we're back to the collective
.
It's not a one-person deal.
We do need to know, we need tocheck in with ourselves and know
where we're at right, we needto know what's happening here.
But ultimately, as an example,rarely do people imagine a
future through a disabilityjustice lens.
(48:32):
But the only way we are goingto get the future we need is if
we do it through a disabilityjustice lens, because everybody
becomes disabled at some pointin their life and our failure to
do that is harming peopleactively in the present and will
continue in the future.
Right, so this is an example.
So I, if I'm not currentlydisabled or haven't been
(48:52):
disabled or haven't taken careof someone who's disabled, I
can't do that imaginingeffectively.
Right, so I need other people.
Right?
Just like we keep designingschooling around adult ideas of
what young people need andrarely consult young people
about their lived experience,and that is a shortcoming right,
(49:15):
that's a mistake that wecontinue to repeat.
We don't have to do that.
Right, so we can't do the thatwithout the we.
The we is the powerful thing.
I wish more people understoodthat.
The whole point is love.
The whole point is us.
We love.
Like, if we really want to havea vibrant future.
(49:35):
That's it.
Separate doesn't work.
Different, hierarchical doesn'twork.
It's us as a collective, soyeah.
Speaker 1 (49:45):
Again with the prolific stuff that you say,
would you just go off on.
I don't have anything to add tothat.
That was was beautiful.
I think that's a great way toend the podcast.
I'm super, super grateful foryou being here, um, where could
people get in touch with you ifthey want to?
Um, hear about offerings thatyou have, um, and and learn more
about your, your business?
Speaker 2 (50:06):
well, I think I am on linkedin at dr, linkedin at Dr
Kia DH, I think, and my websiteis before the rebrand which
we'll talk about iswisechipmunkcom, and you can
learn a little bit about theBridge to Thriving framework
there too, if you're interested.
I've also written about it.
There's an article in NonprofitQuarterly and a book
(50:27):
forthcoming, and so, yeah, reach, reach out.
Speaker 1 (50:32):
I love it.
And then, if you're listeningto this and this conversation
has sparked interest as far asthe Indie Collective cohort, you
have somebody that you wouldlike to recommend as a guest on
the show, somebody that is apotential partner organization.
Feel free to reach out to me atJan looks like Jan at Indie
Collective, i-n-d-e, collectivedot C-E-O.
(50:54):
Have a great one everybody.
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