Beth Huggins - Learnings from 7 years of service in Nepal (WW 03 )

In this episode, I speak with Beth Huggins amongst the hills of coastal Ecuador on land being stewarded and restored by Regeneration Field Institute. Beth believes in development work that intimately considers unique community and individual needs with a systemic and holistic approach. I recall her soaking up the book (amongst countless other books) 'How Can I Help?' while living and working together in Nepal. She says "The concept of service in my mind is that you just show up, day after day. You have no expectations. You have no agenda. You are there to support life."

When I asked about the cultural barrier of working in Nepal, "I never imagined I'd spend 7 years in a place. But 7 years (is what) it's taken me to understand the background of those cultural challenges. To understand that, 'oh, even if I don't like this power dynamic that exists' when we work with communities, I don't really get to choose this - it's their power dynamic. It's their culture... All I get to have a say in is how I get to spend my life minutes to support other people to have a say in that - whose space it is."

We also speak into sacrifices, challenges, patience, and of inspiring people in Beth's life who have guided and positively impacted her.

Connect w/ Beth via @bugggins (https://instagram.com/bugggins/) and her work @consciousimpact (https://instagram.com/consciousimpact/) and @regenerationfieldinstitute (https://instagram.com/regenerationfieldinstitute/)

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On the next episode - we return to California to hear from an incredible teacher and friend.

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Episode Transcript

(00:00):
It is January 2024. How wild. Happy New Year everyone. Today's guest is Beth Huggins.

(00:07):
This conversation was actually recorded a year and a half ago in June 2022 on the coast of Ecuador.
Beth and I were there because we were both working for Regeneration Field Institute. Now even though
this conversation is about 18 months old, it's still very relevant to me and for Beth. One of
my favorite things about this conversation is how much then and more recently as I re-listened to

(00:31):
this conversation, how much Beth and I share when it comes to ethics and values when approaching
this type of work and acknowledging the complexity of rural development, international work,
and also the sometimes indescribable joy when things really do work and it does feel that

(00:52):
progress is being made. And it takes time. That aspect of really reaching out to community members
and slowly, steadily developing personal connections, cultivating that change from
that human level is something that I have always and will continue to cherish. And I think this

(01:13):
type of approach is not unique to this type of work, but can certainly be applied and be benefited
to almost anything we face and experience in day-to-day life. And so yeah, I really hope you
approach this conversation with an open mind and perhaps be challenged by some of the points and

(01:37):
philosophies that we share in this conversation. I'm happy to add that last year in July 2023,
Beth married her then partner, Anjesh, in Oklahoma, where she's from. And I was able to be present
and participate in the joyous coming together of the two of them, along with many friends and family.

(01:57):
I was also able to lean into my craft and desire to help document the beautiful long weekend together.
It was my first time in Oklahoma and to see all the families and settings and hear a lot of the
stories of her upbringing added so much to my friendship with Beth. I also enjoy hearing

(02:17):
the ambient sounds and bird calls in the background as we sit perched on a hill
overlooking the land. It transports me back to that season when I got to work for an organization
and be in that setting and almost feeling the tropical heat of coastal Ecuador. And as Beth
talks about Nepal, it then transports me to the lower Himalayas. And that's the sort of magic that

(02:41):
I think I wouldn't have realized starting this podcast project. That's what would happen,
but that's the power of stories. And that's what we've been able to invoke and capture. And for me,
forever immortalized in the past through stills and more recent years, videos. And now to be able

(03:01):
to capture the audio bites is such, such a satisfying, fulfilling aspects of this work.
With all that said, I bring you my dear friend, Beth Huggins.
When you feel that pain or joy, that those are valid human experiences,

(03:22):
and that's what makes life really beautiful. It's not that life is always going to look
in some way or it's not going to be this idealist future we all think of, like we're sharing and
caring and everybody works together. It's that there is moments of difficulty, moments of
happiness and moments of sadness and that you can't really isolate either side.

(03:59):
We're live here at Regeneration Field Institute, RFI for short, here in
Costa, Ecuador. We're sitting underneath a bamboo shade structure and we're perched on a hill
overlooking the main house where we're currently hosting ourselves, hosting a group of students,

(04:21):
volunteers from Cal Poly San Luis Obispo. That's right. Thanks for having me. It's an
honor. It's a joy to be here with you and to have these kinds of conversations and
be able to be surrounded by gorgeous breathtaking nature as we do it and as we've done for many
years. Yeah, coming up to seven now. Yes. I love to start by the very phenomenon that we're here

(04:48):
together in Costa, Ecuador with RFI, how the chain of events come to be that I'm here and you're here.
Would you like to recreate that story for us? Yeah, I can definitely recreate that story. So,
prior to Ecuador, we've both spent a lot of time in Nepal and I think the two themes that have

(05:10):
connected this work in Ecuador and the work we've done with Contra's impact in Nepal is that
on a deep level, we believe in organizations and communities that work towards environmental
sustainability or regeneration and also that really talk about how to make resilient,
flourishing people and how to support that to happen. And I know that that's why I'm here. And

(05:35):
another thing that kind of links these two across the globe experiences is having students or
participants or volunteers internationally or nationally participate in the work of both
organizations. We've done that for seven years in Nepal. Regeneration Field Institute also does
that. And so I think that is at a core, a fundamental core of value that I have in terms of

(06:00):
global educational opportunities existing for young people to convince young people that they
actually can have a place in making the world better, not that they have to be experts or have
PhDs or they need to come from some specific background, but that actually anybody can do

(06:22):
a lot of things and that the things that we can do to make our world better places are actually
really accessible to us. There's just not a lot of support that says that, that says like, oh,
if you have good intentions and you have good values, that you can actually support other people.
And so, yeah, both of these experiences in Nepal and Ecuador kind of have that connecting theme

(06:44):
throughout them. And it's been a theme throughout my life that's been really important. And I think
a theme throughout yours that has led us kind of on this similar track of finding these opportunities
or experiences to guide or follow is that as a student, as an engineering student, I was really
dissatisfied with what the kind of world was telling me with the skills it needed from me.

(07:07):
It was like, oh, you're an engineer, go and work for oil and gas industry or go and work for
pharmaceutical drug industry and, you know, make money and take care of your family. And that was
the most important thing you could do. But that really, I didn't feel that that was a truth for me,
that what I felt was that, okay, I have all these skills that can do amazing things in technology,

(07:28):
but why aren't we using that same technology to solve some of the greater issues around the globe,
whether it's climate change, or whether it's food security, waste and sanitation. As a student,
I felt really kind of disillusioned by how much little time was spent talking about those things,
and much time was spent talking about luxuries that only certain countries have access to,

(07:53):
like the mechanics of how to pump oil out of the ground. And so early on, I was looking for
experiences that could show me something else, something that felt more aligned with what I was
interested in. Remind me the area of engineering that you were focused in in school. Yeah, I was
focused in chemical engineering, which explains the oil and gas or pharmaceutical drug. But I...

(08:14):
From the region that you grew up in, that is a big industry. It is. Yeah. Oklahoma has a lot of oil
and gas. Oklahoma produces a lot of, yeah, both industries and in terms of pharmaceutical drugs.
But I was actually interested in medicine. And so I thought, oh, I'll do pharmaceutical drug research
to support medical realities around the globe. And then I realized that drug treatment is the

(08:41):
second stage. It's like what you do when you haven't solved the problems at the root. And so,
oh, you need intestinal parasite drug medication because there's a deeper issue at hand. And so
quite early on in my studies, I felt, wait a second, I want to talk about the root of what
people's suffering comes from, not fix it later. And this is around a time when you also did

(09:08):
EMT training. Yes. Yeah. I worked in a free clinic. I did EMT training. I was really active in the
medical treatment world. And really, that's what I was going to spend my life doing. And I went on a
volunteer trip abroad and it just flipped up everything in my world. Was that the volunteer
trip that you sent you to Ghana? It was the volunteer trip first to Honduras. Honduras.

(09:32):
With Global Brigades. Okay, the same organization. And so then I later became a student leader that
led trips to Ghana, which is how I met Ellen and Ryan, our mutual friends, who started
Conscious Impact and how we both ended up in Nepal. Right. See, I thought that you had gone to Ghana.
First Ghana. From Oklahoma. But then there was actually the Honduras part as well. Yeah. Which

(09:55):
is great because I started my relationship with Global Brigades as an undergraduate was also to
Honduras first. Oh, interesting. And it got me. That's so fun. Activated to take on, I guess,
a leadership role to take other students to have that sort of immersive experience as we did. And
went to Panama instead. But of course, the public health aspects grabbed you towards Ghana. Right.

(10:21):
Meeting our mutual friends, Ryan and Ellen. And it was from there that my eyes were open to this
greater world of like, oh, you know, it's not it's one thing to say like everybody in the world
definitely deserves health care for sure. But like, it's different as to show up and say like,
well, what do you want versus like, oh, here's health care, or here's health resources. And so

(10:45):
then I started to kind of make my understanding shift from like, oh, actually to support communities,
like what you really need to do is just show up hands free, you know, like that, like you don't
have some agenda you're trying to push that like, there, you know, I first thought people went into
health care, and that everybody needed medical resources. And then I realized like, oh, actually
people also need financial resources, they need like stable financial income, but they also need

(11:09):
secure financial institutions so that you can get a microloan if your sewing machine breaks and your
seamstress. So then I'm like thinking, oh, okay, it's all financial. And then I realized really,
ultimately, it's so dependent on the culture and the community, and the individual what they need.
And that really, all you can really do is try to create systems and community based organizations

(11:32):
that work together. And that really became clear to me, a really holistic approach. Instead of this
mostly one track mind where we're here for a medical mission, we're here to build a water
system, sitting down with the people that you may be serving and asking, creating discussions and

(11:53):
roundtable meetings as to what it is that they want or need. And even maybe sometimes below that,
what's the root cause of why they would want and need certain things? Because sometimes it may be
that they want a loan, but what is it that they really need loan for? Oh, because they start
business because they lack a service or good in their region. Right. Exactly. So this is

(12:17):
quite a good segue, I feel, into the evolution of that path, right? Because you spent those
weeks and months in Ghana with our mutual friends who started the Ghanaian programs for global
brigades in water and public health, medical and dental, microfinance, I believe was one of them
too. And it gave you these realizations as to international development or foreign aid or,

(12:43):
you know, however it's branded or marketed really comes down to getting to know the individual
communal needs of a region. And so how did that evolve? How did that take shape in the years that
followed Ghana? Initially, after Ghana, I started working for a social enterprise in Kenya that was
doing like waste and biofuel management. And I saw some real challenges to being an international

(13:09):
business and trying to make your way in this in a public sector. And particularly I saw the company
not make great decisions in terms of prioritizing relationships with the local government. Then I
saw local nonprofits do kind of a similar thing, that they also wouldn't prioritize necessarily
the right relationships, not necessarily with the government. The nonprofits usually have really

(13:30):
good relationships with governments, but they don't have good relationships with actual communities.
So when it comes to implementing their work, they're kind of limited in terms of doing really
amazing work. And so I took some time off being in Africa and worked for a nonprofit consultancy
group because I felt that there was this disconnect. Like, well, why can't nonprofits have better

(13:52):
relationships? Or like, what's the hold up? Like, if you're really good at connecting with the
government and there's like good funding, like, why can't there be better relationships in the
communities? And I saw that one of the biggest challenges is that there's just a big disconnect.
The people who fund the work are not locally there. And that was another theme that we had seen in

(14:15):
Gopal Brigades also is that when it ultimately comes down to the work on the ground, the local
people are doing it. But then when it comes to like fundraising and reporting, that's a whole
different group of people. And then just it happened, you know, not planned by any means,
but the earthquake in Nepal happened and Alan and Orion were there and they decided to start
Conscious Impact. And when I wrote to them... It coincided with your work with the central

(14:39):
enterprise in Kenya. With that ending and then working for this nonprofit consultancy and seeing
all of these repetitive problems that every nonprofit seemed to struggle with. And it just
felt like, oh, this is really interesting. And so then I said, what are you guys doing in Nepal? Do
you need help with fundraising? Because I have a lot of fundraising experience. Do you need help on
the ground? And they said, you should just come for three months, like check it out, see how you feel.

(15:03):
Like Nepal is a beautiful place. And I'm thinking like, okay, I could do that. Like, I've never
thought about going to Nepal. It wasn't where I thought I would ever spend seven years, definitely.
But even anytime I hadn't really been attracted to it. I went and I saw like a lot of open
opportunity to create and formulate a nonprofit that could kind of like try to attempt to not

(15:26):
struggle in the same ways. Of course, there's going to be struggles. Of course, it's not as
easy as it sounds to start a nonprofit, but there was just a lot of opportunity and ultimately a lot
of support needed to start a nonprofit. And so I felt, okay, this is like my PhD in nonprofit
management. I can just like do this and like learn and grow and try to find the right resources

(15:49):
in order to create something that tackled some of those issues that I had seen previously.
You have to have an experience and a time to steer and voice some of these concerns that you've seen
in other nonprofits and to start literally from the ground up following a natural disaster and
that were the earthquakes to make it so that the communication with the community is better than

(16:14):
you've ever seen it. Because you're there to be the voice and represent. And even if at the time
you didn't speak the language, the underlying intention to make that be very clear and pure
is present right off the bat. Yeah. And ultimately it's about kind of like helping
a community create spaces to find their voice. I mean, it's ultimately like trying to get out of

(16:38):
the way in some sense so that they can decide. And it's really tricky to get a community that's
multi-ethnic across different landscapes and different hillsides. And so we've had to redefine
like, what does that even mean? Like what community are we really working with? And it's really
different in a lot of senses or like you're doing a project in education, the community

(17:00):
stakeholders are really different maybe than like when you're doing a water project. And you think
like, oh, but they're serving the same group of households, which is true. But the people who
value different things are going to be attracted to different types of work and they're going to
need different voice. You're going to need different voices in either of those situations.
Right. I think the tricky part has been you didn't go in there with this clear idea nor, you know,

(17:25):
it's not a job description where, you know, Beth Huggins will come in and spend two years,
three years building this program. It's like, come for three months. Let's see like, where you fit
in this complicated puzzle that we've landed ourselves into. We have certain skill sets and
intentions to help out these communities that are devastated by the earthquake. But really,

(17:47):
this really open ended puzzle that we didn't really know where it was going to go, what
challenges we're going to face. You know, I can say we because it was, we found ourselves landing
within the first couple of weeks of each other. Right. And it was, I think disheartening is one
way to put it, but also like, like, whoa, this is, this seems like a multi-year, if not decade,

(18:12):
set of challenges. And so much of it is even more multi-layered because of the complex history
of Nepal and in the region where there's political uprisings and government overthrowing and coups
and different ethnic groups that don't get along with one another. Absolutely. And so we take all

(18:35):
that into account and in a country that is already under resource, that is not talked about in the
world much, that is like kind of bullied by China to the north and India to the south. My gosh,
my gosh, like we were in for quite a treat depending on who you ask and what perspective
you find to be the most true. Like I said, I think I have a PhD in a few areas at this point.

(18:59):
You're on your, you're on your super senior year of your PhD, seventh year.
Exactly. Exactly. I love that introduction. And I love to shift into the community living aspect
that you, myself and hundreds of others have co-created through the years. The mixture of

(19:19):
eager helping volunteers from all over the world along with the Nepali local community members
and also Nepalis from other parts of the country who come on as volunteers, as staff members,
all like sharing similar and same goals, but living and cooking and working and recreating
with one another and what that dynamic has been like in a nutshell. I know it's impossible to

(19:43):
really distill some of the essence that we've lived through, but certainly I'd love for you to
talk into the highs and lows and maybe things that are often not mentioned in that kind of dynamic.
Yeah. I mean, community living, I think on the firsthand for conscious impact is like
the organization living within the Nepali community that it's trying to serve and that that

(20:06):
targets that whole disconnect that we were talking about earlier that a lot of nonprofits face in
terms of making their programs really valuable is like, where's the community buy-in? Well,
how do you build community buy-in or okay, well you build community buy-in with like trust and
understanding, but how do you do that if you're just visiting, you know, once every three months
or short-term stays or you have only outsiders involved in your organization? So I think on one

(20:31):
hand it's that the abundance of living community really comes from like that connectivity that you
see each other on a regular basis and that that can look like a lot of different things, you know,
and I think we're really fortunate to have it look like it does in Nepal and that can go to the tea
shop in the morning and see all of the people who are at the tea shop every morning at 7 a.m.

(20:52):
The regulars. The like news of the day, you know, and I think in a lot of ways different cultures
experience that community living very differently that in some places it's Sundays are the community
day that you see one another or Saturdays or there's different structures of what community
can look like and I really believe in that. I believe that like everywhere around the world

(21:13):
exists that inherent need for community and that you can build that kind of community wherever you
are. You can, I mean, especially with today's technology, you can stay in touch, you can connect,
you can be together some of the time and be apart some of the time that still feel one another's
presence, but I think that speaking to the experience in Nepal what's really unique is

(21:37):
that we've been able to share the physical time together which is really rare in today's world
to have working towards the same goal, to be working towards the organization's dreams together.
It really bonds people and unites people and yeah it's been like a really big joy of my life at
least to experience building an organization together and building work with friends with what

(22:03):
started out as just people who were sharing similar goals and what became friends, what became family
now and like I think that that is something that yeah we've been really lucky to experience and
something that's really beautiful and it comes with yeah the structure of cooking together,
you know, like how many people cook meals together. I think every friend group I know that spends time

(22:26):
cooking together has really strong bonds and why is that? Okay well food is really essential to like
life, you can't live without it and so then like when you're sharing food and you're sharing
the act of cooking to provide food with one another there's something really special there.
I think it also comes from working together when you like get to show up every day and at 8 a.m.
you're like out in the fields planting trees together. There's something really beautiful

(22:49):
about that and how many people get to work with their friends. Like usually life is very segmented
in terms of like you have your colleagues that are your friends for sure but like you also spend all
day with them so you're not going to have your social calendar with them also and then you have
your other friends and then you have your family and everything is kind of separated and yeah so
I think there was that element of like working together also that really was beautiful. It's

(23:11):
accomplishing tangible goals and tasks. Yeah and you can measure them you know you could like see
at the end of the day or at the end of the week like wow we made this many bricks or we planted
this many trees and it really felt that you know we also had the privilege that it was really going
to you know communities that we knew we knew exactly where those bricks were being delivered
we knew exactly where those trees would be and because Conjuring Impact has decided to stay put

(23:37):
for a long time and that from the beginning we kind of had that goal in mind that long-term
angle we do get to stay around and see those things happen. We do get to like see the fruit trees
that were planted five years ago produce. I think that all of those things make it to where living
community and sharing space have been really beautiful. Yeah we've gone through weddings

(24:02):
together a lot of important Nepali festivals together there's even been deaths in the family
babies being birthed and there's a lot of farewells and goodbyes from both the Nepali team as well as
the revolving door of foreign helpers. We've built a network now spanning across 35 plus countries

(24:24):
across the world. I can't even keep count how many first degree connections you and I would have now
perhaps several hundred maybe more and then when you look at secondary connections of people who
know about us through the network that we've built around Nepal and the world it's staggering.
It really is like each post on social media and each email that you write out and one you just

(24:49):
wrote out recently about us reopening which I love to touch into soon it reaches the eyes and
the minds and the hearts of humans that we love and care that may not physically be in Nepal or
right around us right now but certainly we're connected by this thread. Absolutely absolutely
and it is also the being of service I mean I think ultimately like when you get to wake up

(25:13):
and work every day and you're working with people that you're cooking dinner with but you're all
being of service to something greater like whether it's the earth or whether it's the communities
or whether it's one another there's something greater there it's like a heart thing. Yeah the
seva. It is the seva is the selfless compassionate work of that I feel really privileged to get to

(25:36):
do honestly I think that there is an element of you know sacrifice for sure but there's also an
element of luck that I can participate in this kind of work and there is yeah there's of course
choices that I've made and but there's also benefits that I've received because I'm doing this.

(26:02):
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(26:24):
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(26:50):
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engage with me and us on Instagram at Wilderness Within pod or hashtag with the same name. Cheers
back to the show. Let's dig a little bit into I think the sacrifice and challenges. Yeah. Because

(27:14):
I think it can be when you and I talk about it because we're slightly biased as the people who've
contributed to its founding and building but certainly we've had a number of challenges
on an individual level and you talked about sacrifices you know you having been away from
your biological family which you're very close to in Oklahoma. Yeah. And number of friends that

(27:38):
you've made through the years. People either have to visit you in Nepal. Yeah. They have this tiny
window when you're when you are back in Oklahoma. Yeah. You know maybe in California to visit and
so I know that has been hard to say the least for you. Yeah. And then also on the ground in Nepal
with cultural and language barriers and misunderstandings as to perhaps like why we're

(28:00):
there the type of work that we do decisions that are made. So perhaps name maybe a couple examples
in each of these realms to share and what is ongoing what is something in the past maybe
something you've gotten enlightened out of it. How has that contributed to your growth? Well I
think the biggest way that I have learned is that when you're of service you don't really get to be

(28:25):
attached to the outcome. I'm not making personal sacrifices so I get x y and z done. That isn't
really the concept of service. The concept of service in my mind is that you just show up day
after day. You have no expectation. You have no agenda. You're just there to support life.
And that has been hard because like you said I have made personal sacrifices so it's really

(28:49):
easy to feel like okay I'm making these personal sacrifices because I'm planning to get this done.
This mini house is built or this mini bricks you know supported or create a self-sufficient
you know organization and it's like well actually I'm making these personal sacrifices because I
choose I want to see this through whatever it looks like whatever is on the other side.

(29:11):
It is hard sometimes you feel really homesick. I would say during COVID especially there was like
this really catalyst moment for me where the beginning of the pandemic happened a lot of our
international core team was departing and there was an opportunity it was kind of like okay you
can leave now or maybe you're stuck here for a long time. I remember that. And I really felt

(29:35):
committed to experiencing what it was like to not have the privilege of leaving when it gets scary.
And I think that it did really help me stretch and grow and of course like I had a lot of emotional
breakdowns of like missing family and being scared that you know like okay what if someone in my
family dies because of COVID and I've chosen to not go back and spend time with family. Like a

(30:00):
lot of people were kind of like retracting to the nuclear unit to kind of like you know if this is
your last chance to spend time with one another isn't that what you want to do? And so me choosing
to not do that was really hard because it is really important to me my family is really important to
me but I also equally felt committed to no you know what there's like a lot of challenges around

(30:24):
the world that like only very few people actually get to do that kind of a thing. Only very few
people get to like prioritize their family and not something else. And so it felt like it felt
like a necessary practice for me to go through. Probably three years prior to COVID starting so
maybe five years ago that I'd finally said okay I'm never going to spend more than six months away

(30:46):
from home because like I need to be there my nephew and niece are young like I need to be there and
then of course I'm like met with this like life challenge of like COVID where I'm going to spend
you know 20 months away from home. Yeah the things that you learn about yourself the things that
like you really do you really can break down ego and privilege and some of the things that like

(31:08):
we know we don't want to be egotistic I know I don't want to have like expectations or you know
I don't want to have privilege I want to like dismantle those things but at the same time
those things are built into some of to us in certain ways that without like really facing them
and really saying no I could do this I could take advantage of this but I'm not going to because I

(31:30):
need to stretch in this way or I feel that there's a reason I'm not going to like whatever it is you
know. And yeah COVID was one of those times because it was really hard we went from having
like a full international team to support our programs to having like very few people on the
ground went from mostly international community working together to totally Nepali community
working together. I have learned so much in that process. You're a Nepali exploded. My Nepali

(31:56):
exploded my connection to the community you know changed in a lot of ways my connection to the work
changed in a lot of ways I think I was really able to start prioritizing like what Nepali leaders
would do for our organization rather than what me and other leaders would do for the organization

(32:17):
which I think was really valuable and necessary like we'd always talked about like being out of
the way to actually get out of the way and to see what would happen and to support the process of
it happening. Yeah and then in terms of like cultural barriers you know there's a lot. Yeah
I know it's a loaded question. It is and but but it's valuable because I think it's also

(32:37):
it's why like you stay in a place. It's like I never imagined I would spend seven years in a place
but seven years has it's taken me to understand the background of those cultural challenges
to understand that oh well even if I don't like this power dynamic that exists when we work with
communities I don't really get to choose it. It's their power dynamic. It's their culture like as

(33:01):
much as I don't like it doesn't mean anything you know. I'm just this white lady like I'm a white
lady like I don't get to have a say. I can do my best to support programs that you know bring up
marginalized voices or bring up women's voices but that like the frustrating fact that every time we
go to work in a secondary school like all of the leadership is male like I don't really get to have

(33:22):
a say in that and that's okay because all I get to have a say in is like how I use my life minutes
to support other people to have a say in that whose space it is whether that's a female teacher
or a young woman professional who's going to make their way like it's their space and so.
You're making it more their space by being there and contributing to the youth empowerment programs

(33:46):
that we have contributing to adding to the curriculum that wouldn't exist in education
programs in Nepali schools right. Yeah we made it very clear with the team that we had in the past
and present with Bashal and Allison in the past to be like well this doesn't exist. We feel strongly
that can benefit the girls and young women to have more knowledge about their own bodies for example

(34:09):
and that hopefully through the knowledge of their own bodies they would make better decisions in
their personal lives and their professional lives and education to for example perhaps not have a
baby too young so much so that it prevents them from pursuing a path in their life because that

(34:30):
choice may be taken away once they become a mother too early on. Yeah totally totally and I think the
other thing about cultural barriers is that like sometimes the cultural barriers can be really
beautiful it can be like where you find humor or where you find connection can be some of those
spaces of differences and other times it can be frustrating and challenging and there's been times

(34:53):
where you know like I feel really upset with the reality that we're facing in our work yeah and I
think like that upsetness is is important but I think it's more important to notice changes
aren't overnight and that upsetness usually comes from a place of impatience probably. Ultimately

(35:13):
I just want this thing to happen and change faster than it is but that really it takes time like you
have to really be patient to see the ways that subconsciously people change first and then how
their daily actions can change. It takes time but that we're on a track I do believe that when I
talk to community members about what you know when I talk to you like a woman like Parvaat TDD

(35:38):
about what her childhood was like and what the women the adult women when she was a child
experienced and what she is an adult woman experiences I know there's positive change yeah
and I think you just have to trust that the ways in which change happen take time. You know the way

(35:58):
we implement the programs and do the work that we do is fundamentally a psychological change,
a shift in perspective, a push against certain cultural norms that's been in existence for
a long time and to think that us coming in with like fresh minds and higher education degrees

(36:21):
and this like eagerness to change to think that that alone is enough to push against that and
change the tides within weeks and months and even a couple years is foolish yeah right. I think some
of that we've had to kind of experience firsthand to realize oh yeah like that probably is our ego
being impatient and wanting like tangible results but as you just said it you're saying it with a

(36:45):
smile to the challenges that have existed to the lessons of patience that we've gained I think it's
really beautiful and to like yeah I think to document those moments too is really important
when you feel that pain or joy that those are valid human experiences and that's what makes life

(37:07):
really beautiful it's not that life is always going to look in some way or it's not going to
be this idealist future we all think of like we're sharing and caring and everybody works together
it's that there is moments of joy and moments of difficulty moments of happiness and moments of
sadness and that you can't really isolate either side both are necessary and both are like sacred

(37:33):
to the human experience. More than valid it's sacred yeah oh that's good well there's a lot
of butterflies yeah there are butterflies everywhere one came really close to us it was
really pretty it's like kind of like did you see that it matched my outfit yeah it's kind of like
a black and gray it's going like why you look just like me we've been making insect houses lately

(37:57):
and each person who's working in my group to make insect houses for the agroforestry system here at
the regeneration field institute we've been going around in a circle and asked what kind of insect
would you be if you would be an insect Jonathan what kind of insects would you be? It's fair to
say that most of our human knowledge of insects is pretty limited you know we only know like the

(38:18):
mainstreamers I feel like right right right yeah Camila and I were looking at a really obscure
insect that exists in the south of the US maybe North America and it only lives as an adult for
one week it lives for most of his life in the juvenile infant stage for like two years but it
only gets to be an adult for a week wow and it evolves it's like it trenches into a different

(38:41):
Pokemon completely I can't choose that insect but you know just like what you said like it just took
it just took us a Wikipedia hunt to go like whoa there's so many out there tens of millions
exactly okay so insect gosh you know I'm partial to bees I've been really enjoying seeing the

(39:01):
native honeybees here because they're really small and they're really docile but they don't
have stingers you know why they're not actually honeybees they're called solitary bees solitary
bees and they're actually native every place on the planet has them but they don't have stingers
and they don't produce honey they actually just pollinate and they create like solo nests they

(39:22):
don't live in hives like we think of the honeybees yeah that may be one of my new favorites then it's
very cool that's also what I said I would also be a solace hey hey well I learned from um I forget
who it was those bees help pollinate flowers that are really small because they're much smaller than

(39:44):
to introduce European and African honeybees and so they can actually reach like for example some of
these species of banana and plantains have flowers that are just way too small for the introduced
bees to pollinate and so it's the native tiny bees to to do that I found it just fascinating
it's really interesting yeah and the orchids that I've seen in the forest when I was in

(40:07):
Mindo in the rainforest I was like yeah that's the job of the small honeybees tiny little bee
yeah so that might be my current favorite it's really a good one yeah thanks for asking it's
a really cool project I didn't see that coming yeah it is really cool how do you create ecosystem
balance on every level of your from your soil to your fruit that you're producing and in this case

(40:32):
we're expediting that regenerative process that actually is built in to nature right because it
wants to regenerate itself right but hoping that with the knowledge us humans have gained and can
distribute to others that we can make that process even faster because we're impatient as the theme
goes exactly you want to do within our lifetimes so funny time is such a funny concept yeah when

(40:57):
we have finite amounts of it hopefully we take advantage of what we do have and do the missions
and work and devotions that cater towards their completion see through it absolutely so with that
said I think that's also a cool relatable segue to what's next what is in your life and in conscious

(41:21):
and pack nepaul's journey yeah we've just announced that season eight is open open and so our first
year since before the pandemic that's right and welcoming international helpers to come and do
these 10-day immersive programs and of course the availability to do longer term stays with certain

(41:48):
people that are interested yeah what's that looking like what are some maybe like programs
initiatives you want to highlight for us yeah so the yeah we're really excited to have our 10-day
offerings back our entire team has been missing that element the volunteer participant service
learning aspect of our organization has been quite the soul of it in a lot of ways everyone from

(42:12):
community leaders to staff ask all the time when when are people coming again when are they coming
and we've had extraordinary volunteers over the last two years that have come in one or two at a
time and really stayed for a long time and been like really stable found foundation for us to
continue our work in addition to our monthly donors our sustainer team like yourself that have

(42:33):
supported the funding because our organization before the pandemic was you know 90 funded from
volunteer participants and so as soon as covid cut those out we were like in dire need
to find funding in order to continue our work like when you put a coffee tree you can't just stop and
wait five years you can't just take two years off of education programs when you're studying

(42:58):
what extracurricular programs can do for young people in rural areas you have to continue it
and so we were kind of at this pivotal point and it really it was really challenging our local staff
took salary cuts it was all hands on deck in terms of making it work the last two years and it was
in largely support of from our monthly donors keeping our work alive and then some larger

(43:19):
donors and friends that we've had support us shout out to all of you my patreon supporters
all the sustainer team yes folks like chase and ana karen who came through absolutely sarah when
yes i mean several others yeah maybe we're gonna the myquest teams from greece coming in in march

(43:39):
and being our first kind of pilot volunteer programs after two years of no programs and drew
marshall for being a big donor yeah kyan hood there's a lot of good people out there that have
really supported us to make this possible the last two years to continue our work and to be able to
get to this point to say hey we're still in this position with the community where we can offer

(44:02):
these really amazing 10-day immersive programs where you get to experience intimate relationships
in rural napao as well as participating in really amazing community development sustainable development
work and that is planting trees working with farmers on agricultural projects that support
you know more agroforestry efforts so a lot of times we look at what are the inhibitors for

(44:27):
farmers to plant coffee successfully or plant fruit trees successfully and a lot of times it's
just it's new and some people don't know what to do they don't know you know with corn they've been
doing it for centuries or rice for centuries and so it's like those systems exist because of that
knowledge that has evolved over time but for trees if you've never done it before

(44:50):
do you just plant it and then you just like kind of watch it week to week what do you have to do
and so we've been really working hand in hand with farmers to make compost in their fields so they
don't have to carry compost from their house to the field build fences to protect their fields
from things like goats because everybody walks their goats and then goats love baby trees leaves

(45:12):
things like creating rainwater harvesting ponds so that during the dry season you have irrigation
available as well as doing projects like mushroom farming to where meanwhile you are trying to wait
for five years for something to fruit you still need income now and today what kinds of activities
can you do more rapidly things like herb farming we've done some lemongrass distributions and sold

(45:35):
to a soap maker outside of Kathmandu as well as getting mushrooms we had about 33 women trained
in mushroom farming in collaboration with the women's cooperative last year and like 15 of
those 33 sold mushrooms in the local market there's a really good rate of like most of them grew
mushrooms at home and ate it themselves but half were able to sell in the local market for income

(45:59):
so that is awesome the baseline is you create a nutrition source for yourself at a really low
cost right and then you said about half of them were able to sell for extra income exactly always
welcome in that setting absolutely yeah we've developed um we also have like our craft program
and we're constantly looking for partners to develop new types of products from local materials

(46:23):
whether it's like mats or tableware from woven corn husk so we every volunteer group gets to do
a workshop with local weavers and learn about that technique and tradition and then we're always
looking for ways to get those products abroad but also for sale in Kathmandu yeah that's something
that we talked about some some seasons ago years ago and it really came alive because of covid

(46:49):
because we couldn't do a lot of our other types of work and so some of our staff members were
able to really think about that and work with local women people were needing jobs there were
a lot more people in rural areas during covid because the cities were locked down so no jobs
so everybody kind of came back and it was like people wanted to plant coffee they wanted to plant

(47:09):
fruit trees and they were looking for ways to make a livelihood in rural areas and so it's a
forced shift it was a good shift it was yeah yeah we saw a lot of really amazing things come out of
it we also will have a couple of years ago we started a bus stop project and we are still
working on roofing it we have to treat bamboo so we've been working on developing connections in

(47:34):
Nepal for bamboo construction and we'll be building that we'll be having a couple of courses natural
building courses are back because our in-house engineer Mariana Jimenez who the listeners have
already heard from um she'll be making it back to Nepal this year and leading a super adobe dome
construction workshop again that's right as well as an introduction to natural building

(47:56):
yes so we've got that coming back as well as we still support the local enterprise for bricks
and so helping we still help them move bricks occasionally or help them with their production
whenever they need it and uh this last year they made 8 000 bricks for Jana Kitapa foundation again
she's been one of our biggest supporters of the bricks and her non-profits constantly building

(48:20):
projects in Badigaon a neighboring district we also have our youth programs one of the biggest
projects that has kind of emerged in the last few years is the painting school program it's become
really popular we have like a wait list of 12 schools waiting to get painted and we've already
done probably 12 so we're constantly working on sending groups to different remote school sites

(48:45):
and helping them paint the insides of their classrooms because it's some it's a luxury that
they don't get to have they don't get to have budgets for that kind of a thing of like educate
visual education materials and so it livens up the classroom it gives us a connection with a
rural school to kind of understand their other challenges that exist and how our resources can

(49:07):
help them further but mostly provides visual learning aids for young young students and then
we have our after school program that happens throughout the week at Takare primary school
and that program is really cool we've been doing that for now two years really consistently twice
a week three times a week after school sessions we cover all kinds of topics from arts and science

(49:28):
and anything that the school really asked for like last year we made a 3d model of the village
and so it was like hands-on they're you know using their hands and painting and like building their
village and it was all about maps and we showed google earth you know recording so that they could
see Mount Everest from google earth and see Kathmandu from google earth and whoa so it's a really

(49:48):
cool project and we've just got a request from another school primary school that wants to
that wants to implement their own after school program so our team is like developing a kit
to kind of pass over to them with ongoing training so that they can run their own after
school program curriculum and it'll copy like what we've been doing at Takare for the last two years

(50:10):
and what we'll continue doing so that's really cool and we have workshops at the secondary school
still girls program as well as ongoing workshops in lots of different areas we did a robotics
workshop this last spring which was really awesome they made with batteries and motors
and light bulbs they were able to make robots and it was so cool to see that that's the first yeah

(50:33):
so it's just in a lot of different developments in all areas and so as a volunteer you get to
you get to really experience like a diverse array of activities of our programs and wow
it really contributes to long-term work that our team continues to do throughout the year so as
a volunteer you can really feel like you're doing something meaningful because there's people who

(50:56):
stay behind that i'm ready to sign up beth you can will you take me back definitely absolutely
i don't ask for highlights and i know because i've spent so much time there in the past that
all that is true and there's more yeah right absolutely there's community dinner there's
hikes in the mountains i could go on there's home stay experiences there's the yeah and it

(51:19):
doesn't do your morning practice it's craft noons and like ways to just live in community as we
talked about half an hour ago and all the individual as well as collective experiences
one could have when you're there it is choose your own adventure we're still going to draw that
little adventure chicken absolutely on our check-in board definitely yeah you make it you make it what

(51:40):
you want to make it and in your case beth you've made it into not just your work so much more than
work it's a it's a form of devotion it's been a source of tremendous joy it's been your gateway
into a whole different world and more worlds beyond that because people from all over the

(52:03):
the globe have come to hakurei and our community and certainly our friendship is one of the many
embodiments of this fact definitely the thought of a year ago we were in mexico together in
the central pacific coast together celebrating the marriage of our dear friends ryan mariana

(52:25):
who are the first two interviewees of the podcast and now to you it just feels such a
a natural progression to kick off this new project of mine so yeah i'm so thankful that
you've let me hear through a somewhat casual phone catch up conversation back in i think

(52:46):
december last year january this year to be like hey i'm looking for a coordinator for some
volunteer programs and i go huh funny i'm already in southern mexico kind of close relatively
speaking maybe i'll consider hopping down here we are here we are yeah yeah it's been awesome to

(53:06):
connect with you on this side of the world and with another project and i think yeah a beautiful
testament to our friendship and the experiences we've shared so i'm super grateful that you have
had me and that you've joined me here or really i joined you physical sense for regeneration field
institutes work as well it's meaningful and great to see you in a different element less with the

(53:31):
camera in your hands more with a shovel you're powerful jonathan machete shovel yeah machete
yeah and now microphone yeah exactly yeah exactly i love to wrap up this wonderful conversation with
maybe some people and moments of inspiration you've had in the past that have uplifted you
that have had these uh kind of transformational moments who have like guided you and be good

(53:56):
mentors to you maybe just share who they are and what moments they came into great support for you
i would probably need like four hours to really cover all the people who have really
really positively impacted me but a short list to say that my parents are really really have really

(54:18):
have really impacted and inspired me to live this path and continue to support me endlessly to this
day and have shown me from day one the unconditional love that should exist everywhere we look in the
world but also the generosity and selflessness that they have in their own community and the
community that i grew up in yeah i would say that i've been really lucky i've been a really lucky

(54:43):
recipient of a lot of selfless love and whether that was teachers in school or i grew up in a
really small community so it was also like neighbors and the whole essence of it takes a village like i
very much felt that as a kid and that you know as a young adult i thought i didn't want anything

(55:04):
close to that and yet here i see in my life in so many ways i've just recreated that and so i would
say yeah they're huge big parts of my life and i also would say that my partner and jesh he has
also been a really impactful inspiration as this last two years of kind of growing with conscious

(55:26):
impact and going through the trials and troubles of covid and he's really really really smart but
also he has this very non-egotistical way of thinking about development work and sometimes
it's really inspiring to see how how much he doesn't expect from any of the work that we're

(55:46):
doing and he doesn't try to become attached to it or imbiased i'm much more like analytical sometimes
like sometimes i just like want things to get done and you know things to happen like really black and
white it doesn't have to be so complicated but he's really appreciative and really enhances the
process that it can be complicated and it can be progressing and even if it feels like you're taking

(56:11):
steps backward those are actually steps forward and he's always been he's been teaching me that for
almost two years of working together and i'm i'm really grateful to have that kind of support in
my life and love in my life that's lovely thank you so much beth thank you thanks for having me yeah

(56:33):
this feels very wholesome yeah it's such an honor to be on this and yeah i'm excited to continue to
listen in and discover the wilderness within with you and all of your other you know people you'll
be talking with can't wait i think a lot of it will come later this year and certainly it's just
a start it's non-linear i have to be patient myself that's right the quality and synchronicity

(57:00):
of us being able to link up rather than like this needs to be done at a certain pace right like crank
out to per month as a lot of businesses and like maybe entrepreneurs are told to be like consistent
in that sense but this being a passion love project and this being powered by nobody but only my own
devotion and curiosity and my love for these wonderful friends i've had in my life and by

(57:26):
patreon supporters like no one's agenda but really ours to be like well this is the coincidence and
opportunity that we have to at least get a little snippet as to what goes on in the inner workings
of what makes a person who she he they are and why do we devote ourselves to what we do and how do

(57:47):
we overcome consistently difficult challenges and still come out the other side feeling like
yeah i'm rejuvenated i'm going to keep chipping at this and that these big problems in the world
we're all aware of and hopefully working together to collectively solve and improve definitely
yeah i look forward to it. Beth Huggins everybody it's been an absolute honor and pleasure. Likewise

(58:12):
thanks for loving me being my friends. And there we have it a conversation with Beth Huggins.

(58:39):
I think we could have talked quite a bit longer but allowed us to be perhaps a part one of more
conversations to come. I'd love to dive into once again the complexities and perspectives of what
development work could look like and would look like especially with all the nuances and layers

(59:01):
depending on where it is what year it is all the cultural understandings and societal conditions
and unique stories that each individual and family and region and village could hold.
And the approach is to not come thinking that you know it all or we have some sort of silver bullet

(59:22):
that can be applied across the spectrum to any particular problem of sanitation or water
education but to really go in there with an open mind and open heart and not have expectations as
to what the outcome is but as Beth said how do you get out of the way to really get out of the way

(59:43):
but be supportive of the processes that allow the local people in conjunction with established
studies and knowing and systems so that it's not just a band-aid solution to any one particular
problem but to look at everything as a system holistically and to apply something that's has

(01:00:07):
more longevity that has more bearing in mind sustainability and to really empower folks to
start something and to perpetuate it in service of themselves and their own community. Yeah we
don't really want to fall into the trap that a lot of international development organizations

(01:00:31):
and NGOs have done which is creating a dependency or a way in which it's just practicing some
form of neo-colonialism even and so I find it really important to have this kind of discord
where we examine ourselves and actually be really critical of what the underlying motives are and

(01:00:53):
how do we continue to be support but not coming with some sort of hidden agenda so I'm really
grateful for Beth in opening up and sharing so much of what she's learned and all the nuances
and complexities of this type of work and I really hope you've come away having some more
insights maybe even more questions and thinking critically about what development work could look

(01:01:19):
like and would look like when done in a way that really serves both parties or multiple parties
and I'm really grateful to be able to geek out a little bit and chat about this type of work
because it has been a big theme in my life in well over a decade since I graduated from university
and this is a space that I hope to continue to dabble in from here and there because really

(01:01:42):
it's about the human condition and understanding that we can't really approach any one particular
problem with this one size fit all solution but really one must look at it systematically and
holistically I hope that this is a part one of maybe several parts of my conversation with Beth
and who knows where future conversations could be it could be in Ecuador again it could be in

(01:02:05):
Nepal it could be back in the states or some other place in the world we'll see if you have
any questions for Beth or myself directly please drop a line I will put in the show notes how you
can connect with Beth directly and as always I appreciate your time and attention in tuning
into this episode of Wilderness Within until next time. I think in the last few years alone

(01:02:25):
I've really come around and realized my goodness even the smaller projects like this require a
whole team they really require and really benefit from a whole community around it and so I'm here
to proudly acknowledge the humans through the years since the launch of my Patreon in 2018

(01:02:48):
who have been contributing and or contributed in the past at levels at which I just need to say
their names and acknowledge all that I've done the time they've given to give me comments and
dropping messages giving me advice and of course dropping in their hard-earned dollars or whatever

(01:03:08):
currency they're earning in to support me and all the projects that I've devoted my time to
including the Wilderness Within podcast so here we go I want to give a special thank you to Paul
Jones Antoine Mays Ayanna Ballen Deborah Carson Renee Dyke Luke Fernandez Kelly P Karina Formile

(01:03:31):
Kelsey Lynn Ken Russell Kelsey Yates Michael Chung Evans Dickles Rykie Corden Christine Schumann
Lindsay Clevvary I'm sorry if I'm butchering your name and anyone's Anne Goodman Yuxin Chuan
Otis Skipper Steve Tracy Delvin Sokanson Steven Moe Stephbert Parker Anna Ritz Kamila Newlands

(01:03:59):
Dana Wilson Nara De Garcia Dora Lee Orion Haas Michelle Kisner Steven Wong Gautier Bagah
Jackie Chow Solinsky Romare Smith Peter Wells Jackie Cheung Tsetop Sokpo
Frankie Lee Jim Barngrover Lisa Colligan Merrick Bowers Ryan Luu and last but not least

(01:04:26):
Mikey Luu thank you so much y'all really means a lot for your support past present future you make
my dreams come true you allow me to work where I travel to you allow me to create content or
passing through you allow me to trust that each month I'm gonna have this nice little baseline of

(01:04:51):
income that really sustains me that sometimes really puts food on the table it allows me to go
hey like I can come into this project I'm gonna buy that piece of gear I'm gonna hire that person
I'm gonna invest in myself and the services and goods that allow me to create and expand
and try new things and experiments and all of this is a part of it so thank you I am

(01:05:16):
so grateful for your support