When the weight of the world felt too heavy, a beacon of hope and transformation emerged in our heartfelt conversation with Jennifer Campbell, CEO and founder of SoulStar. Jennifer Campbell is a leader of leaders. Through her Systemic Leadership Summit, global leaders meet to create lasting shifts in how leadership is perceived and experienced, emphasizing holistic inclusivity, sustainability, and strategic diversity.
It has been her passion for almost 30 years and it brought her life to a screeching halt when a conflation of a few emotionally arresting moments forced her to face how utterly depleting her work had become.
Change became a necessity and Jennifer did just that. But is this what is required for us to pay attention to our needs? Join the Besties for an engaging discussion about getting off the treadmill of life, re-invention (and more re-invention), and choosing a joy-centered life.
This episode and all previous episodes are available on YouTube. Please join our Besties Quad Squad as a Patreon subscriber at the $5 or $10 monthly level. You'll receive exclusive behind-the-scenes content.
Soul Star: Become the Most Fulfilled Woman You Have Ever Been
Shonda Rhimes: My year of saying yes to everything | TED Talk
Visit Black Boomer Besties from Brooklyn website for behind-the-scenes extras.
When the weight of the world felt too heavy, a beacon of hope and transformation emerged in our heartfelt conversation with Jennifer Campbell, CEO and founder of SoulStar. Jennifer Campbell is a leader of leaders. Through her Systemic Leadership Summit, global leaders meet to create lasting shifts in how leadership is perceived and experienced, emphasizing holistic inclusivity, sustainability, and strategic diversity.
It has been her passion for almost 30 years and it brought her life to a screeching halt when a conflation of a few emotionally arresting moments forced her to face how utterly depleting her work had become.
Change became a necessity and Jennifer did just that. But is this what is required for us to pay attention to our needs? Join the Besties for an engaging discussion about getting off the treadmill of life, re-invention (and more re-invention), and choosing a joy-centered life.
This episode and all previous episodes are available on YouTube. Please join our Besties Quad Squad as a Patreon subscriber at the $5 or $10 monthly level. You'll receive exclusive behind-the-scenes content.
Soul Star: Become the Most Fulfilled Woman You Have Ever Been
Shonda Rhimes: My year of saying yes to everything | TED Talk
Visit Black Boomer Besties from Brooklyn website for behind-the-scenes extras.
Hey Aunt, hey Les, how are you? I'm doing great Good. Happy to be here.
Speaker 2:Good as usual and you do not look worse for the wear because I know you just came off a long shift.
Speaker 1:I did, I did, but um Tell her how you do it, saving lives. Saving lives and making all the little girls in labor and delivery happy. Welcome to another episode of Black Boomer Besties from Brooklyn, brooklyn. I bet you. Before I said that our listeners thought that they were in like a musical comedy and I was like the star of the show with the singing and the dancing. But no, I'm Cha-cha, exactly, I'm singing and dancing because we have a guest, a wonderful guest. Oh my gosh.
Speaker 2:We do Wait, wait till you guys hear I can't wait. I don't know how we're going to get it all done.
Speaker 1:Okay, I know, I know it's just a lot, so I'm going to jump in and I'm going to start with a brief bio. Let me just tell you, this lady is so dynamic. She has bios in levels and in chapters. So there's the brief bio, there's the long bio, and wait till you guys get to see her website and all of this. It's really impressive. Okay, jennifer Campbell is the CEO and founder of SoulStar. Jennifer Campbell, the visionary force behind SoulStar, empowers women leaders, changing the world through radical self-care. With over 27 years in Fortune Global 500 companies, she's a recognized figure in systemic change leadership. Jennifer's impact extends globally through the systemic leadership summit, reshaping leadership paradigms. As CEO of SoulStar, she champions women disruptors. I know you like that, angie.
Speaker 2:Ooh, I love it.
Speaker 1:Addressing systemic challenges with a 100 year vision for humanity and the planet. Beyond her work, jennifer finds solace in the Netherlands, indulging in fine dining and jazz music. Her dedication to positive transformation continues to shape leadership with authority and integrity, and I just want to say that you and I share a love of dining. It doesn't even have to be fine for me, though, just dining, and I bring to you Jennifer Campbell Hi.
Speaker 3:Hi. Well, thank you, that was an amazing introduction. Thank you for having me, and I so look forward to this conversation. I can't wait, and yeah love to dive in.
Speaker 2:It may be a conversation that is not like any other that you've had, because I'm going to start with the way that we met.
Speaker 2:So Jennifer and I were at a large convention in Puerto Rico back in January, held by Hello7, which is a company that is dedicated to creating millionaires from people who are not usually thought of as millionaires Black and brown folks, LGBTQIA folks, disabled folks and so we have this desire to grow wealth so that we can support the causes that matter to us.
Speaker 2:We are disruptors and as a part of this summit which I thought was the most one of the most amazing parts of it was that everyone who was invited was encouraged to create what we call brain dates. So there was a system where you could go in and choose to run a brain date, which allowed you to share your expertise with whomever wanted to join so it was usually two to five people and Jennifer set up a brain date that was called I have it right here it's called how to create a wildly fulfilling life radical self-care. So clearly I needed to be at that one. Clearly we were kindred spirits, so I went to that, and that is how Jennifer and I met and why I consider her a friend and a partner, kind of so, journeying this world, making joy central, and yeah, so that's how we met.
Speaker 1:Okay.
Speaker 2:So, jennifer, I wanted to Leslie, just read your bio. I'm highly impressive. Your work spans tens of thousands of people and those people touch millions, I'm sure because they are leaders, they're their leaders and you're in a global impact. Exactly One of your specializations around change management. I don't think many people realize that, especially in corporations, that change has to be planned. I practice change management when I was in corporate also, and people think that it just happens Somebody high up says something and then everyone below falls in line. So first talk about change management, what that is, and because that is, I think, core to how you are a disruptor.
Speaker 3:Yes, of course, and thank you so much for this opening question.
Speaker 3:You know, change management for me, as I put it out there in the world, is about a structured methodology for the people side. So when, as a leader, you decide to implement a change because the business needs it and that could be anything, it could be a merger, it could be IT transformation, any of those bigger or smaller changes Then people need to go through a process in order to adjust to the new situation, and this requires all kinds of different things, and so I call it the art and science of the people side to change. That's what change management is, and I think that change management is actually a weird word. After being in the field for three decades this year actually before I even graduated I wasn't changed, and actually it's more about change and a moment rather than change management. I don't think people can be managed into change. What you can do is create all these conditions that enable people to make their own individual choice to go along in the direction that the leadership wants to take the organization.
Speaker 3:So that's how I view change and that's what I think it is.
Speaker 1:I just have a question about that because, for those who know me personally, I'm change averse. I am very I guess an old term would be stuck in my ways, and when I find a way that works for me, I really have some difficulty with initiating change. I can appreciate it when I'm on the other side of it, but I'm one of these reluctant change people. I don't change my hair, I don't change my makeup. I have way the same clothes I've worn for 30 years and this and that you know. And even in my work life I've been at the same place for 17 years. So how would you address such a concept to someone like me that you know? How would you carry me into change?
Speaker 2:So Jennifer think of Leslie as a late adopter.
Speaker 1:I guess that's yeah, yeah.
Speaker 3:Yeah, and you know, leslie, I'd like to let you in on a little secret, and that is that the far majority of us human beings are change averse. We like our habits, we like our patterns, we like to do things our way. And there are, of course there are people who are early adopters, just to use a term for people who are very eager to change or forward to change, but usually that is the type of change that they really like. And that is just like with surprises when you ask someone, do you like surprises? And many people say sure, but actually it's not that we just love the surprises that we like, but the surprises that we don't like we don't deal with.
Speaker 1:Well, so this is very similar.
Speaker 3:So for me, as to when I need people who qualify or describe themselves the way you just did, is it's about connecting with someone first. Oh, can you tell me more about where you are and what you enjoy in your work, what you enjoy in the status quo? Why is the status quo so important for you?
Speaker 1:So again that people connection.
Speaker 3:Yeah, you've got to meet people where they are. You can't just grab their hand and drag them over some finish line called the change result. It doesn't work that way. Behavior change doesn't work that way. And so it's a connecting, it's an understanding of where people find themselves that may be different than their colleague, and it's equally respectful, an equal respectful place, as opposed to the early adapters or anyone else on our journey towards accepting change. Yeah it's.
Speaker 2:Most of my career was in IT and there was so much of a belief that, oh, if we build a system, it was this amazing system and we got the business buy in upfront. So of course, we just have to what I would call chuck it over the fence and they're going to adopt it and it's like no, that's not the way it works. So we would try to. I would try to find the person who was least, who was most resistant to change, and work with them first, because typically by doing that we were able to get other people to see the benefit and to kind of understand the vision that we're trying to seek. But I'm going to tip it out of this.
Speaker 2:I just thought it was important to have people understand the scope of this work called change management. It's still called that, even though I hope they adopt you because you're absolutely right. You're absolutely right. It is because there are such an important people dynamic in the field that you your chosen field, and I can imagine that this work has really kind of fed your soul, because you're working with people either who are going through the change themselves, but also leaders who have to take people through the change. But you came to this point where you needed to really make a big change in your life, and so I wanted to ask you to talk about that, like when did you know? And I just saw recently you posted about Shonda Rhimes' talk, where she talked about her year of yes, and I was like what was resonant for you about her? And I know, because I know some of your story, that you experienced a similar thing yourself.
Speaker 3:Yes, yes, actually, to be quite honest, angela, I have these loops where I see something in the world, or I experienced something, and or my curiosity takes me somewhere and I convert that into my entrepreneurship, into my business, and so there are actually a couple of things that happened and it was captured so nicely in Shonda Rhimes' TED Talk. So what struck me and it's only quite recent that I saw it, even though it's been out there since, I think, 2016 around- that time.
Speaker 3:But what she speaks about is where she says when people ask me about how I'm inspired to do all the work that I do and become such a titan, and she said most people think it's the writing. Of course I enjoy writing, she said, but it was this wave of becoming the titan, with all the TV shows and the productions and everything else, and she was writing that wave and writing that wave and identifying with being the titan and having this feeling. That is this tremendous flow type of feeling. And one day it just stopped. And I've had a couple of moments like that where you're successful at doing something and then something happens and that feeling of flow just goes out of the door, and so for me it always throws me inwards when that happens and Shonda's realization is also my realization is that the real flow and the real joy in life is about following your inner hum, to be in alignment with who you really are and then give to the world. Because if the thing that the world thinks that you've become and for her it was summarized in the word titan, being the titan, you spiral out of it as soon as this flow, just from one moment to the next, just leaves and becomes a burden, it becomes a drag, it's no longer fulfilling, and I've had a couple of moments like that in my life and I think that once the wave is over, it's also an evolutionary thing. Once the wave is over, it's time for the inner work and also time for after the inner work and the rest and the reflection, to then go to a second wave and a third wave of expression into the world.
Speaker 3:And so, when it comes to, for example, soul Star, which is one of my latest iterations of that wave, is that I was running annual summits. So, next to my work with leaders, I was running annual summits on the topic of systemic leadership, and the systemic leadership summit is one of the things that was the longest wave for me and that impacted so many speakers and so many attendees, so many participants to the summits. And I recall that one of the last I think it was the last summit that I organized I was extremely busy and my mom had. It's so interesting, my mom had such a profound role in all of these types of moments, but this time I was very busy and she said shall I come over and cook for you for a week? And I thought, oh, that would be such a gift if you could do that, because I don't have time to cook, it's just summit summit summit.
Speaker 3:And it was the week before the launch. So, and I was preparing everything and getting up early in the morning, I would start work and then I wouldn't stop until 11, 1130 PM that night and what my mom noticed is that I didn't have time to eat. So at some point very long story short at some point she put the plate next to me and when I still didn't touch it, she just took a spoon, put food on it and then put the spoon in it and she said Jennifer, I know that you're very hardworking, but I didn't know that you work this hard. And it really hit me and I was like OK, I'm going to do this one more time because I need to go. The show must go on for now, but after I need to be really careful about what I decide on, how I do this, because this is not good for me, it's not sustainable.
Speaker 2:It's not sustainable. Not sustainable.
Speaker 3:And then something else happened during the summit, while I was doing live interviews where I was interviewing two people, a man and a woman and all of a sudden I found myself in a place where this white speaker was openly, when there were 1500 people on the call, listening and watching. He was questioning my role and attacking me on skills that I use in the interviews that I had been highly praised for, and so I kept trying to keep on a straight face and to finish off the interview, and as soon as we hung up, I got calls from across the globe, from people in the systemic field. What was?
Speaker 1:that.
Speaker 3:One woman from Chile said Jennifer, are you okay? And then she said Jennifer, these people don't know you, they don't know your vision and they don't know your people. So please take good care of yourself.
Speaker 1:Wow, that's an emotional.
Speaker 3:And that was such a tremendous thing. I've had other people call on explain what was the systemic attack that was happening. But after that, this was my moment of losing the hum. Like Shonda said in her TED talk, the soul, like it, went completely out of the event and for me, and so I did finish it. But after that one, I was exhausted and two, I thought who takes care of the people who lead systems, of systems, meaning me, who does that? And I thought, okay, well, something else needs to happen.
Speaker 3:And once I got my bearings, it took me a couple of weeks to recover from everything. And then something new emerged. Something new emerged and it's one of the SoulStar programs and it's called Radical Self-Care for Women to Change the Planet. And that was the onset, that was the seed of SoulStar, of how important it is, as a businesswoman who has a big vision but who encounters all these systemic things while she's putting a vision out there in the world, to take good care of herself. And this is a seed for everything else, including the topic of the brain date that we were in, how important it is to set up your life that gives you what you need and what you love, because that's where the hum is, that's where it gets.
Speaker 1:It's really coming from within, not from without.
Speaker 3:And it's not about the outer thing, and of course it's also a story.
Speaker 1:So moving for me. I'm like tearing up looking around for tissues right now. I'm not really sure why it affected me so much, but obviously it hit me in a personal way as a believer one thing that I always say there are no accidents and so many things happen for a reason, and most often people think of coincidences or accidents because they don't really understand a reason. And we may never. But that guy that called you and harassed you may have saved your life, and not only that, he set a course for the rest of your work. When your mom may not be there to feed you, the lady in Chile may not be there to call you. This person awakened that fire in you and showed you that something had to change.
Speaker 3:Yeah.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and that's just so deep.
Speaker 3:Yeah.
Speaker 2:Leslie, now I didn't realize that I'm like, oh, my eyes a little wet and then I wipe this one.
Speaker 3:I'm like oh, this one is a little wet too.
Speaker 2:I'm like God it's crying here and I think a part of it is because it's so resonant. We're three black women and Jennifer's family is from Suriname, formerly Dutch Guiana, and so this living and thriving in a world where or in spaces, I should say, where it's majority white, and getting that type of attack, it does throw you back, no matter how seasoned you are, well competent, yeah, it throws you back because, at least for me, what would happen when I encountered similar things, or even microaggressions, is you start thinking about well, do I belong here? And that self-doubt starts to creep in. It becomes less and less, because I do think you develop a groundedness and a thick skin around it, but it still penetrates. It still penetrates.
Speaker 1:It does, and it's still weathering over a period of time.
Speaker 3:I like that word weathering. It's exhausting.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it's exhausting.
Speaker 2:Yeah, as we say. Yet, and still, yeah, still, they're soul star, they're soul star.
Speaker 3:Yeah, they're soul star, and you know it's.
Speaker 3:The thing is, for me, a lot comes around full circle when it comes to this, because what I noticed is, as you talked about the summit that we attended and the target audience, we know what systemic marginalization is and actually it's one of the main reasons why I wanted to have more systemic leadership in the world and to facilitate that, because when there's more focus on systemic leadership instead of hero based or control based leadership, it allows for more inclusion and it allows for more people to feel like they belong.
Speaker 3:But the irony of it was my discovery that the even the systemic world, so all these different experts in the systemic field, are practicing approaches that were developed by a white man in 99% of the time, so the language is predominantly English and all these people become really big when it comes to a systemic approach or systems thinking. And there are very few women. There are women and a lot of women are now educating themselves in this area, but the overall field is just a reflection of what we see in the world, just as much as in other areas as in this area.
Speaker 1:So the foundations of it carry in with its own internal biases.
Speaker 3:Yes yes, the systems grounded are also facilitating marginalization. And I was just blown away. I was like okay how are we? Going to do this now, then how are we going to do this? And even these approaches, even these things that we can use to understand what's going on in the systems that we built, whether it's our education system or the political system, or the medical system yes, the medical system, all the systems that we created, so many have these old patterns that marginalize certain groups.
Speaker 3:And we know from whenever we said foot on earth that there were many spaces where we felt like we're not put first and we're not as much welcomed as others. Sure, and we don't feel like we belong so it sounds like a daunting past.
Speaker 1:It's almost like you have to dismantle the system in order to rebuild it, but with that dismantling comes all the pushback. We have something that works already, and why do you have to take it apart?
Speaker 2:But also you yourself were trained in that system. I was yes, so you have this training and these structures that you're trained in as you were speaking, jennifer, there's so many analogies to what you said, especially when you are in a position of influence where you see what's broken, but you were trained in the broken system and it's almost like you have to pull yourself out of it and then try to pull others out of it, but then you have to give them a new paradigm.
Speaker 1:It's so meta. It's so yeah.
Speaker 3:It is. It's very meta, it's very mind-boggling. You know, I recall being in my master's on and this was organizational constellation work and we were on graduation day and I recall our main teacher asking us to do constellations. And you have to explain that. What is that? Yeah, so how do I explain a constellation? The simplest way to do it is to say it's a way to represent a human system, and a human system could be something like a family or a team or organization, so networks of relationships between people, and some of us were born into like our families and some of them we choose to be part of, like organizations. And a constellation is a physical representation of different groups or individuals within a human system. So, for example, if you were to do an organization constellation, then you could have people called representatives in a room and you could pick one person to represent the CEO and one person to represent a middle manager and one person to represent an employee, and this physical representation allows you to see the dynamics.
Speaker 3:So it's not like people are acting when they're representative, but they actually feel into. If I'm in this organization and this is the role I have what does it feel like here? And the funny thing is, we human beings are very sensitive to the interrelatedness between ourselves and others, and so when we enter this space, we can pick up on those energies, whether we are that person or not, that's regardless, because the spot that you have in an organization or in a team is something that you can actually feel like, physically feel, and you can do constellations to give you information about a situation that may be difficult or where people feel stuck or when you feel like. I would like to understand the dynamics in this situation because I feel weird about it, so it has all kinds of applications.
Speaker 2:So it creates this. So, for example, if you're in a conference room, the energy changes when the CEO walks in. Yeah, you know you can. You can feel that change. There might have been some levity in the room prior to them joining and it just completely shifts. So that's, that's what came to mind. As you described, everyone has been in. Or when you're horse playing and a parent walks in.
Speaker 1:I was going to think, that's what I was going to say. When mom comes home.
Speaker 3:So we all have a sense of when you're part of the family, you're the child and you're playing with your brothers and sisters, and mom comes in or dad comes in. Everybody has a sense of what that means, but a constellation actually helps you to feel what's going on. So when it's a very complex situation where there's many, many different parties or parts of the system involved, and the CEO comes in, and then a client comes in, and then there's this, and then there's death, and oh, am I about to get fired or are we are so. So those are all things that you can then explore with a constellation. I see I see.
Speaker 3:So. So we were on graduation day of the organization constellation masters and the main teacher asked us to, to, to just explore the field, and we were sitting in the room. We were sitting in the, on the outer skirts of the room and in the middle was a big mat, as if that was the field of the work. And so what we saw happening is that the people who got out were mostly women, and then, all of a sudden, we, we had a spontaneous constellation and the women were on one end and men were on another end, and it it looked so weird to me.
Speaker 3:And then at some point, I'm the only black woman and I and I also took part in the constellation, and at some point, at the end of it, the teacher stepped out and you looked at it, and and when we all sat down again, he said it seems like systemic work is more difficult for women than for men, because what this constellation tells me is that the systemic approaches were re-eated by men. And I was sitting there as the only black woman in the room. There were two more women of color, one was Asian, one two Asian, and I was sobbing because I was standing in the place of black women and I felt how hard it was to do the work. I've been in it for quite a while this was not my first masters or first and I was like, wow, why is this so uncontrollable? And it was not just my position. I felt what it was like to be the group of women of color trying to do this work, and it's hard.
Speaker 1:And this black girl magic, this black excellence, this I haven't even difficulty putting it into words, but it's a conversation that Ange and I have been having over the last few days in the context of what's happening here in the states with district attorney Fannie Willis and the standards that she is poised to hold in terms of her office, in terms of her gender and in terms of her race, and Let me tell you, jennifer, when I'm with you in that moment, right now.
Speaker 3:It just got quiet, it's so familiar.
Speaker 2:And oftentimes there's no one to talk to about it, because no one would understand, no one would. Then If you pulled someone aside, it would be so difficult to convey why you were in such a state of emotion, negative emotion around it, and that is kind of another layer of the. Is that who do you talk to?
Speaker 1:Yeah. And then on the other side, so many people outside in looking in and say but you're such a powerful person, you're in a position of power, you're a leader, you have it all. Why are you complaining? What is the angst? Where is this? Aren't you appreciative?
Speaker 3:Yeah, and it's all not that, it's just an expression of how they do not understand what you're experiencing. At that point I just know that in that moment the day was over, and actually it was the before last day, so it was one more day and I went straight to my hotel room and I called my partner. He's a big white guy. And I called him and I said I don't know who I am anymore and it took him half an hour to get to place, to understand where I was. And this has nothing to do with him being a bad person, right, or his desire to help.
Speaker 3:He just didn't get it. He didn't get it and so he had no idea how to help or support. And this thing about oh, you're such a such a powerful person and you're so knowledgeable and you know what's going on, and I thought you know and this is this is. This is a thing I had to learn, and it's also systemic. The difficulty is that when you are a powerful voice in the system, where your voice is not the majority voice or your gender is not the majority gender, or your race is not the majority race, right, and what you do is you're a powerful difference in the system.
Speaker 3:And being a powerful difference in the system is usually very threatening for systems, because systems want to perpetuate their patterns. It's not just individuals who want to do that or people who are change a verse. It's also about the network of relationships was built in a particular way. It's a fabric of families, teams, organizations, societies, institutes and so forth, and these are systems that almost seemingly have a life of their own, and if something in it is creating a big difference, it's an invitation, it's a stressor, and what then does is it kicks you out.
Speaker 2:Like a virus.
Speaker 3:It's not, it's because you're too different, it's too threatening, oh my gosh. It's too disabling. So it is in that instant. It is not personal. The power of context or the power of the group is always bigger than the end of my mind is blown right now, and so so it's almost like these systems always flock to the steady state.
Speaker 1:Yes, they do To the center.
Speaker 3:The center.
Speaker 2:Right, yes, and so, yeah, finish that, because I need to hear that last piece, and so it's not personal, not the individual level is the systemic level. Yes, and therefore, what?
Speaker 3:And therefore, even though it feels very painful in the personal sense, it's not your fault, it's not you, it's the system dynamics that is way more powerful than you as an individual, and so it's not your fault when you get kicked out or when you're marginalized, right, we know that. And what's so important and that is also what SoulStar is about is what happened to me on the third day, or actually during the entire summit that we attended, but on the third day it hit me. On the third day, I entered the convention center in San Juan, in Puerto Rico, and for the third day, I walked into a group of people who looked like me and I felt tears rolling down my face because I was not a walking difference in the system.
Speaker 3:I was a black business woman, a successful one, wanting to become even more successful, and everybody else around me is that and wants that, and it's such a, it's such a you can put down your armor, you can put down your and just lean in and be, and that is what's so important for me and you recognize that.
Speaker 2:Yes, and that's visceral.
Speaker 1:That's visceral.
Speaker 3:It is.
Speaker 1:I mean, you walk in and your soul feels that SoulStar, that's what I call SoulStar, soulstar. What a beautiful bow to wrap on this episode actually Before, because we're running toward the end, before you go. I know you spend time in the Netherlands and tell me about your life. Jennifer lives there, so you live in the Netherlands. I get it. I thought that you were. You went back and forth, yeah.
Speaker 3:No, no, no I am. Dutch, I live there, yeah she's Dutch, she's.
Speaker 1:Dutch. Okay, I'm gonna say something funny.
Speaker 2:English is not her first language. No, it's not. Which is?
Speaker 3:well, all right, let me just it's not my name.
Speaker 1:Let me just I'll admit I looked at a map to find where the Netherlands I just wanted to make sure I was close.
Speaker 3:It's hard to find.
Speaker 1:It's very small. I was close, but I just wanted to make sure I knew where we were talking about. And then can you say something in Dutch that I just want to hear? I want to hear the language.
Speaker 3:Okay, well, what would you like me to say in Dutch, If you?
Speaker 1:said this dog walking across the street is pretty. I wouldn't know the difference, but you know I don't know.
Speaker 3:Okay, I'll say that the honte in the straatloop is mooi.
Speaker 2:I feel better for it. That's like when I walk in a room oh, can you speak Jamaican? It's like really I'm a caricature. Now Is that I don't mind?
Speaker 3:You know, I know that we're wrapping up, but I do want to share something about language. The funny thing is so. My parents came to the Netherlands as first generation Cernemies. I was born in the Netherlands. Obviously, I'm black and my name is Jennifer Campbell, and I don't have a Dutch accent when I speak English. So many people, when people meet me and it depends on the context they don't know where to put me on the planet.
Speaker 1:I can also think about the embarrassing moments of people speaking about you in your ear shot, not knowing who you are and what language you speak.
Speaker 3:But it's funny. It's funny and I do take advantage of it, because I love working internationally and it allows me to do fun things like being in podcasts like these Awesome.
Speaker 2:It's been such a joy having you. Really it's such a joy having you.
Speaker 1:I do a range of emotions I was found myself tearful. I'm like I started feeling a certain kind of way looking around for tissues and now I'm laughing and talking about dogs crossing the street. I love it. This has been so wonderful.
Speaker 3:Thank you. I had so much fun with you and I love that you allowed yourself to be moved. These are just some of my stories, and I think that if we share stories amongst each other, that it also helps a lot to feel supported and to feel that we are backed up by others who are experiencing similar things as we do.
Speaker 1:Sure, and I want to tell our listeners that we'll be sure to put all of Jennifer Campbell's information and websites and socials so that you can really dig in and look at some of the work that she does and hopefully it will appeal to you personally that you might connect with her.
Speaker 1:Yeah, oh welcome, thank you, thank you. So I will say that Black Boomer Besties from Brooklyn podcast is produced by Angela Fraser, our video editor is Matt Dershowitz and our social media marketing team is from Couture Copywriting, and this has been another episode of Black Boomer Besties from Brooklyn, brooklyn. Thanks for listening.