"Where Curls Come From"

Redwood Fellows Ella Saunders-Crivello and Eva Bermudez Zimmerman in conversation.

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SPEAKER_00 0:16

Hey everybody, I'm Andrew Ferguson of Redwood Fellows. Welcome to Stories from the Grove, a podcast production of Redwood Fellows made possible thanks to the generous support of CCM. You know, our media is filled with examples of people exploiting their differences to pull us apart. This is different. Stories from the Grove is about leaders who seek to lean into their differences so they can understand each other and find common ground to strengthen Connecticut. I hope you enjoy the stories from the Grove.

SPEAKER_02 0:51

Ava Bermuda Zimmerman. I'm Ella Carvello. Stories from the Grove.

SPEAKER_04 0:59

Yeah. I was just like, I was thinking about all of our um retreats and always just like looking at you with amazement and inspiration. You just always were so real and fun and just like bring in a little bit of joy into serious moments in ways that I really appreciated. So I was like, oh, I'm excited. I'm excited about it.

SPEAKER_02 1:24

It's very kind of you. I I've never thought of myself as uh someone who brings joy, but but thank you.

SPEAKER_04 1:30

Oh my god, no, I felt it right away. And also, you know, that we have a we have a wide range of ages, which is so wonderful. But I also was like, okay, 30s, 30s, 30s, 30s. Like I can tell the intergenerational divide, um, in some ways. But yeah, where do you want to start? Where should we how should we do this? Well, we were talking about hair. Yeah. Where do where do your curls come from? Where are you from? Tell me.

SPEAKER_02 2:01

Oh, my curls come from uh my African roots, uh, Puerto Rican. And I feel like in Connecticut, oftentimes saying uh I'm Puerto Rican, I don't get that sense of pride because there's so many Puerto Rican people in Connecticut. Whereas like when I went, my brother lived in California for quite some time. And when folks asked me, what are you? they just couldn't place uh ethnicity, and I'd say I'm Puerto Rican. I felt so exotic. They're like, I've never met anyone from Puerto Rico. Uh there's a lot of um Southeast Asian, Asian culture in uh California, especially in Los Angeles, but not so common Caribbean, and my curls are from the Caribbean. My mom's side has more African roots, uh, West African according to 23andMe. And then um my dad's side has more. We always assumed it was Spanish roots, but apparently there's it's mostly Portuguese. Um, and the irony is that I lived in Brazil and learned Portuguese, so who knew?

SPEAKER_04 3:03

Perfect.

SPEAKER_02 3:04

Inadvertently getting to my roots. But yeah, talking about curls is like a gateway to talking about everything.

SPEAKER_04 3:10

I know. I already am like, oh, I wanted to talk about that. How about your curls? Yeah, where are your curls from? Well, it's interesting you mentioned 23 in me because um I've shared with some Redwood fellows, but now I'll share with everyone. Um, I didn't know um my mom's ethnicity until last year, two years ago. That's big. Um, yeah, so we always thought, so I my dad is half Italian. Okay. My parents both grew up in Montreal. I'll stop clapping. My parents both grew up in Montreal. Um and um we knew stories from my mom of her childhood. She grew up in foster care and she um knew that she had met her mother who she believed was Irish, turns out she was Scottish. And um, you know, as she was um older in her teens, and her mother um told her that her father, who was not in the picture, was black and said he was Jamaican. And so my whole life I've had this kind of like invisible tie to Jamaican culture. My mom's name is Marlene, and she called herself Marley her whole time her whole life. And um then we um I was thinking about building my own family and would go to the doctor and get like, you know, do you have X, Y, and Z in your family history? You know, like um, is there anything we should be thinking about as you're thinking about conceiving? And I was like, I don't know. I don't know. Um, you know, I know that my mom and dad are both young and healthy, and um, I just decided it just felt like I just wanted to stop saying I don't know. Like I just was over it. And so I got her 23 and me one year for Christmas. I couldn't do it for myself. I just and this was like um seven years ago. Um she was a whole life in that identity.

unknown 5:16

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 5:16

Um, and and not even really, it was always she has a story that she would look through the phone book and her last name is Saunders, and she would see a bunch of Saunders and call them, and the yellow pages, sorry, and call them and say, um, you know, just like listen. This is a story she's told me, and she said a lot of them had Jamaican accents, so I just assumed we were Jamaican. So birth name was Saunders. Her given name was Saunders. And you know, um, she was raised in many foster homes. She did stay in one for um a set amount of years, but you know, she was on her own at 14. Um, so she just, you know, she was just scraping for that identity. And and Jamaican, because of that, because of like that murmur that her birth mother gave her at one point when she was an early teen, you know, she just was like, okay, we're Jamaican, we're gonna go on. And she just, you know, I grew up in New York City and um went to a very progressive school. And my mom also is gay. And, you know, we just we just had so much pride and like diversity, and just we were like, this is who we are. This is, you know, um, this is just um we can be proud. I mean, thank goodness, right? Like that is not everyone's story. And so then after the seven years ago, I gave her this. We found out some health history. It just felt a little bit, it was, you know, I was in my, you know, early nonprofit days, so I couldn't get her like the highest upgraded version of the history. So we found out like, okay, 50% West African, 50% northern European. That that checks out. Sound like me. Like Caribbean people. Um and we're like, okay, that checks out. And then um, this is such a funny long way to answer. Where'd you get your curls? It goes to the root. Literally, no pun intended. It goes to the root. Um but long story short, a few years ago, she gets a call, and she'll be comfortable with me sharing this story because it's so wild. Um, she gets a call. I think you're my sister. Whoa. Um yeah. Um, and um, you know, I'm I'm not gonna share all of her family and you know, childhood trauma and all that, but it was heavy and hard and also like, holy moly, this is amazing. Um, and so after years, I mean, just from just a little bit of fear and also just um the unknown, she finally met up with um who turned out to be her half-sister who her whole life has been living streets away from her. Um streets in New York? In Montreal. She moved back to Montreal. Yeah, she moved back to Montreal when I was in college. Yeah. Um, and so she um she is very close with her. She also has two half-brothers. Um we ended up meeting them. They shared that um they're actually Bayesian from um Bahamas. Oh, yeah. So not Jamaican, but um it was so much clearer. The roots are the roots are and it was just, I mean, I looked at her hands um um and they looked like mine and my mom's. And I was like, I mean, it was and her mother, her birth mother, they have the share the same dad. Her birth mother is also of uh sorry, um Irish maybe German. Like they're I mean, she's white. Similarly, similarly, both mixed, and they are um it's just beautiful. I mean, they just are like have this blossoming, you know, relationship, and she's really pushing my mom, you know, who grew up um, you know, as a teen with an afro, but then always passing white. She's very light-skinned, and she's like, you gotta get connected to your black roots. And she's like, Yeah. Yeah, but that's you know, you've had when you've had a lifetime, she unfortunately grew up in quite racist homes. And, you know, you have a lifetime not having anything to connect to and just trying your best, but I won't share too much.

SPEAKER_02 9:34

I asked, well, yeah. I asked my dad. Um, so I mentioned I I lived in Brazil, I did an exchange program. Um, and in the application for the exchange program, it was Rotary, they allow you to put your your preferences of where you want to go. And I wanted to go to Japan. I was that kid that loved anime and was fascinated with Japanese culture and was, you know, learning Japanese on my own, trying to figure it out. I did not get Japan. Japan was not on the table for me. They're like, well, put you far, but a little different direction. So apparently, um, and I found this out when I when I moved to Brazil, they chose Brazil for me because Brazil has the second biggest population of Japanese uh Japanese contingency in the world. So other than Japan, you got Brazil. And then even more fascinating, in 1895, uh the government of Brazil uh passed a law, uh, a creed called Brancamento Total, which means whitening, total whitening.

unknown 10:43

Oh.

SPEAKER_04 10:44

Real race. I was excited in hell I was races.

SPEAKER_02 10:49

That they gave free land and agricultural subsidies uh to uh individuals from countries that were white, and Japan made the cut. So through uh through different iterations of this same decree being offered to a multitude of white cultures, you have Germans who move before, you know, before the war. So not Nazi Germans, but Germans who move before the war to Brazil and South America. You have, you know, Dutch folks, and there's little communities in Brazil that are entirely of that culture, that still speak the language, that still live and congregate in in that reality, um, more so Japan than any other, uh, because Japan is not known to be a culture that likes to diversify. They they like to be stay true to their culture and to their identity, meaning they don't really marry outside of their race. So here I am, a kid wanting to go to Japan, shipped over to Brazil, but with a Japanese family.

unknown 11:58

Wow.

SPEAKER_02 11:58

Fully Japanese family. Uh we live in Sao Paulo, São Paulo, Mirangabla, São Paulo, and then Santa Catarina, um, Itajei. So different parts because they had property to say more things. But what brings me to the connection to your story and and the realization of um of your mom and her and her siblings, right? Her newfound siblings, is that something that I learned through that interaction, through that Japanese interaction, and through their children who were trying to figure out and navigate a sense of culture being brought up by, you know, Camila, my host sister. Uh her her father was Japanese-Jabanese. He was born and raised in Japan and had moved uh to Brazil in his 30s. Um, and then her mom was first generation. So her parents had already, you know, reaped the benefits of that, of the many years of that offering. And I asked her, who do you identify? Because Camila was very Brazilian. She knew samba and bagogi and she ate all the foods. And and I, she was insulted by my question. She's like, what do you mean? I'm Brazilian. And I'm like, I'm like, are you? And and here I am, you know, in the United States, the there's there's a sense of Americanness. You know, we all get to live in our Americanness, be American, and if we have the ability to celebrate another culture, that is allowed and welcomed. You know, maybe not so much so these days. Maybe there's a lot of pushback in society of like really embodying your culture and your identity. But I feel like in immigrant narratives here, a lot of my friends and the conversations we have, it's a welcoming of that, that you could be this and that. You can be both, and and it's okay. Whereas Brazil is mostly made up of, you know, the very diverse mix of African, European culture, uh, this melting pot similar to the Caribbean. And to be Brazilian typically is to be a three blend of native Portuguese or you know, Portuguese, mostly Portuguese, and then African, and after generations, 400 you know, years later, here I am, I'm Brazilian. So I'm like, Camilla, you're you're like pure Japanese. And she's like, I am Brazilian, and I'm owning that. And she's like, to me, and this is coming from a 16-year-old girl. Wow, to find her identity. She's like, Yes, I understand I'm Japanese by descent, but I am culturally ethnic. I am Brazilian. My music, my food, my desires, my passion, this is this is my culture as much as it is theirs. And there is no their here. Um, so then that introspection, then I asked my dad, I'm like, Dad, um, am I Puerto Rican? Like that girl's like so firm on her culture. And I'm like, am I Puerto Rican or am I American? Because I was born in the States. So I'm like, am I Puerto Rican like you're Puerto Rican? And then his answer was baby. You get to decide who you want to be, who you want to be. So your mom, even though she maybe missed out on, you know, let's say 40 years of not being Bayesian, right? Because she didn't know. And now she's newly found in that reality. It's a choice.

SPEAKER_01 15:37

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 15:37

You have those roots. You have, you know, somehow you are connected to that Caribbean reality. But it's not like you get to sever ties just because uh you discovered new information. It's it's a choice that you get to make if if you want to double down on this new reality. I think to eat to each their own, you know.

SPEAKER_04 16:00

And it's so beautiful, right? I mean, like you're saying, for a 16-year-old to have that much pride and conviction and and just you know, awareness is incredible. And for my mom to now be tentatively finding that is also incredible. And for me too. I mean, I you know, I haven't even approached, you know, where how this feels for me yet. And so like it's a journey. It's it's like a I mean it and and it's just it's kind of a metaphor for life, right? Like I'm thinking about just these, you know, these walls we put up that are just you know fabricated. I mean, it's just we can constantly be of course bettering ourselves, but we can constantly be feeling like we are identifying in ways that feel more authentic. And if that changes the next day or the next year, that's great. That's okay. That's okay. That's not only okay, that's great. We can be allowed, allowed the exploration. And I feel like, you know, it's just been um I'm just thinking about like, you know, how people just have so much, not only from an ethnic and racial perspective, but also so much of their identity wrapped up in where they live and where they work. And yeah, it's just like um I find it so inspiring when people, you know, shed that. You know, I just found out someone yesterday is retiring at 43 and they're leaving Connecticut, they're in Bridgeport, they're moving to Portugal.

SPEAKER_03 17:40

Wow.

SPEAKER_04 17:43

But like why, like, why do we have these rules around like that's not okay? Of course that's okay. If that feels like that's what you need in this moment, yeah, power to you. Yeah, that's just my opinion.

SPEAKER_02 17:57

She wanted to get out of the wheel, the donic.

SPEAKER_04 18:00

Yeah, I don't I didn't um get into it was a very quick update and get into the why. The why the what the motivation, the motivation. I'm sure there's many reasons, but um I was curious. I'm just like so curious because we haven't had a chance to talk one-on-one yet, which is wild. But I just want to hear more about how you got into your work. I mean, unless you unless you taught me.

SPEAKER_02 18:25

No, no, it's just um I it uh all things go back to Brazil. Yes. Uh so um I was brought my both of my parents are uh activists. So when I was very little, two years old, they signed, my parents signed my myself and my siblings up to be plaintiffs in the Chef versus O'Neill case, which is a desegregation, education, desegregation funding case. And that led um, I I guess the most people might not recognize Chef B. O'Neill, but they do recognize the the magnet schools that exist in the state of Connecticut. So when you hear crack or, you know, when you hear Rusk um uh regional education, um, there they're schools that allow for within the public school setting for busing in and busing out of students in order to obtain a more diverse and more fair um educational opportunity. So that was created because of the chef case. And when I was little and my my parents are educators, my dad he had his teaching degree and moved here. Um he he was in the army and was literally looking for where where does he where could he raise his family since he's in the United States and his time was almost done with the army. He lived in a couple of different states, wasn't really vibing. And his friend said, well, there's a lot of Puerto Ricans because of tobacco that live in in Connecticut and Massachusetts. He lived in Massachusetts, had my brother, and you know, they had him in Worcester, didn't like it, wasn't really keen, and then um started applying to different jobs nearby and got offered a position in Hartford. So then Hartford at that point was in its peak time of gang violence and uh a lot of crime, high crime rate, a lot of high high death rates, um, unfortunately, students um being caught in the crossfire, but they were looking for educators that were from the island that spoke Spanish that could relate to the influx of students that were Spanish speaking. So they they offered him a position, he took it, and the friends that he met that had master's degree that were professionals, that were also Latinos, many of them moved to the suburbs with this intention of getting away. Like we're we've made it. We we are beyond our poverty, we've grown to this place in society that we've earned to live in the burbs and be professionals and raise our kids in um suburbia. But what my dad noticed, and I didn't exist, right? He was noticing that a lot of these kids that were growing up were having a lot of access to uh confusion, access to drugs and getting embroiled in a lot of um situations that weren't really healthy due to confusion of self. Like they didn't know their culture, they didn't know their placement, they're, you know, a black kid, brown kid in white America, nobody else looked like them. And this disconnection really pushed these kids to, you know, losing, losing themselves. And then that with other, who knows, other reasons why um a young person does drugs, right? The a multitude, uh, he didn't want that for us. So he's like, I'm gonna put my kids, I'm gonna. I'm going to make sure that we stay in Hartford. We're going to live in Hartford. We're not going to go to suburbia. The intention was that they'll get to know at least their roots and meet other students that look just like them. And even though the schools aren't good, we'll fix it. So then that's where the court case came in. We're going to fix it. So from two years old all the way to my full childhood existence every weekend, every spare moment, every family event had some social activity, some activism, a rally and organizing a picket. I was that kid on my dad's shoulders, that kid holding my mom's hand while we're navigating a rally. And it wasn't just supporting the educational cause. It was also like supporting activism in all of its nature. So if there was, I remember going to there was a strike in Hartford that was hitting like its fifth year near our house. And we'd go there on the weekends and bring food and really show our support to the nursing home workers. My dad became a union steward. He was very involved in his union. But all of that activism led to a reality where you can raise three kids. And at that point, my mom wasn't working in the school system yet. So they were raising three kids with two cars in the driveway, with a nice house in the south end of Hartford on one salary. Because they worked so hard on union contracts that the teachers were making uh, you know, good money, like enough. And the economy was different. So back to your question of like, how did I get into this inadvertently, right? So I knew by the time I was thinking about what am I going to do for college, what I, what, what do I what do I where do I see myself? I'm like nowhere near my parents. I didn't want to follow in their footsteps. I'm like, that's exhausting to hold all this weight on your shoulders of helping people through activism. Like, that is not me. I want to help people, but not like that. I wanted to be a neurosurgeon. I'm like, I was I was that the science nerd. I was on the robotics team. Uh I won the science fairs, like I won three science fairs. I made it to States twice. Um, the quintessential nerd, you know, I was like really the full stereotype, um, you know, reading science books for fun. I remember reading Einstein's Greatest Blender at 13 for fun about physics and like worm black holes. Uh and then and then I went, you know, I went to Brazil. Then I went to Brazil. And in with Rotary, you had to pick up uh projects very similar. Um, that that program was very similar to uh what what people might know as like Peace Corps. So you have to have a project while you're there for the full entirety of your trip that is service to the community. And my service in the community was working at a hospital, and I thought this is a precursor to me then going to pre-med uh and then go to med school, and I'll have a better understanding of this job that I really am passionately pursuing, you know, this career I'm building for myself in my mind. And I hated it. I absolutely hated it. It was not only was it depressing to the point where like a lot of the kids that we were servicing that hospital, um, they had real health needs, but they also didn't have bare necessities. They'd come to, they'd come to the clinic uh shoeless. And in South America, specifically this area of Brazil, they had monsoon season. My understanding of monsoon, like the only connection to the word monsoon was Jumanji. Like where they had the monsoon and jumanji. And I'm like, yeah, yeah, it's a lot of rain. Yeah, oh, it's rain for two months where it can flood up to three feet of water and it can and it can sweep you away. It is raining. So these kids, I I still had to go to work in the clinic, and these kids would come in without shoes, without, you know, proper attire to survive this rain, no umbrella or anything. And and then in addition to that, we have to like meet their needs for not having access to vaccinations, having a fever, you know, putting themselves in jeopardy to having um brain development problems because the high fever has spiked for so long. I thought that there's gotta be another way. So then 16-year-old me said, um, we gotta do something. And it was that year, it was also the election for Lula. And in that Lula, it was his first run, he was the great white hope. He was like the end-all be all for like, we're gonna change things and society in Brazil is gonna be so different. So I started campaigning for Lula. Oh my gosh. I had, you know, at home I canvassed. Um, I canvassed when I was little. Uh, my dad let me canvas, go door knocking by myself at 12 for Al Gore. So I'm like, I wasn't so far removed from what you know political door knocking looks like and pole standing. So I went it all in for Lula and I'm like, well, he's saying that he's gonna fix and get the kids some shoes and make sure that they the clinics have medicine because they have universal health care. So that's totally logical. And that path brought me right back to my parents' reality. And by the time I left Brazil, I'm like, I this is I want this is it. This is it. And you're 16, you said? I was 16, yeah. I was 16. But I had a lot of very strong-willed 16-year-olds around me who knew who they were.

SPEAKER_01 27:54

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 27:55

Um, and by 17, when I when I moved to Puerto Rico to go to university, I'm like, I was firm on that. I was firm I wanted to change public policy. I was firm I wanted to be an activist and figure out ways to change laws that would help people. And as I say now, um, 20 years into a career, which is insane, you know, 20 years into a paid career in organizing, um it's not a, you know, it's not a passion project, it's a lifestyle. I think any real activist, any real organizer uh doesn't keep the the intensity uh just for a paycheck or for um it's or or for some self-fulfillment. It it is truly this idea that society will be better and the outcomes will be better by you putting the effort in. So to me, it's a lifestyle. Um I I didn't expect to be doing this, you know, years later, but even if I had uh decided to pursue science and medicine, I'm pretty sure it would have always circled back to activism.

SPEAKER_03 29:10

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 29:12

Long-winded. I love that. No, it's I mean, I was just um I was just listening. Thank you for sharing that. And it's just so I love hearing people's stories. And um I just was listening today to I've become obsessed with Trevor Noah because I stopped.

SPEAKER_02 29:29

I just read his book for the first time. And I know I'm so late on this.

SPEAKER_04 29:33

I know too damn for me. Yeah, it's fantastic. So that was where it started.

SPEAKER_02 29:37

Because of the fellowship, because people kept mentioning from our brook swab. People kept mentioning oh the book.

SPEAKER_04 29:43

You know, he's brilliant and obviously hilarious. And I um for Christmas got my husband and and I went to see his stand-up in Stanford, and um it just is like taking on a whole new meaning for me of just like how much I look towards him for, you know, if I'm just like having a lull in my day or I'm driving and just like in the thick of like the pickup drop-off, you know, rush. I'm just like I'm putting on his podcast because he has such an incredible way of um humanizing and accepting everyone as they are, and also um just being so authentic to like his curiosity. Like I just find the way that he brings in guests and the way he asks questions and the way he does his stand-up, and you know, there's just this um there's not just comedy, it's like philosophy, it's history, it's just like genuine curiosity about just understanding how things work, how people work, why people were. I mean, it's just I just find him inspiring and and feel really connected to that side of his curiosity. And one of his guests today was um was um a journalist, and she's talking about um you know, just this default to optimism that she's trying to have in all of her life. And I'm kind of hearing it in some of your story of just um why can't we change the things we want to change? And and instead of just this like knee-jerk pessimism, she shared a story of um in October 1903, she was looking for some project in New York Times archives and she saw an article that was like, um, flying machines will never will never fly, you know, like it was basically just like stop trying to make planes work, like just stop. It is not worth it, it's not a good economic choice. And um, and um two months later, the Wright brothers had their first flight. And it just kind of made me, I just was positioning this moment in our country, in our state, in my life, of just all of these moments where like pessimism is easier and um and where like you know, I know you're in the childcare. Oh, perseverance is real. You have to keep pushing getting up and keep having that hope and looking for that hope and finding the joy in it. And that's why I was kind of talking about like I just appreciated how like you just, you know, um you just have this air about you that um that you can tell there's that optimism because what else is it for if you're not optimistic and wanting to continue to make the world better or our community better or our family better? I mean, you can go as narrow or as wide as you want. And um, I loved that story and I just I just um I'm hearing it in kind of your skin as well.

SPEAKER_02 33:10

To use the phrase um from Estelle Perel, um how do we estate? Yeah, okay.

SPEAKER_01 33:22

I love it. I love her.

SPEAKER_02 33:24

I love her. She she's she always asks um in her sessions, uh, how do you fuel the tank? Like what basically like what what motivates you, how do you recharge? Um and I I think in the nonprofit world, the our core values that that um our our mission statement, or you know, if it's our North Star, our moral compass, however you want to phrase it, it brings us to this introspection. Um, because you're we're not in careers that you you're not becoming a billionaire from trying to help people. And and it's hard work. It is continuously, it doesn't matter what type of nonprofit work you do, without a doubt, if you're doing nonprofit work, that means you've heard hardship. You've seen hardship, you've been at the center of people in need and oftentimes lived at yourself. Yes. Yeah. So you you're this this introspection is part of that narrative. And if you're in that nexus between the advocacy and then the political, um, they're juxtaposition. You have this introspection and this realization that it's not fair, the system's not fair, hardship is real, mixed with the political end of we're not gonna get there. Or enough is enough, or that's not our role. So these two worlds are constantly colliding. And if you're a staffer in between those real, those realities, you have to figure out a way to navigate it. Like, how do you make the hardship that is very real, that introspection and reminder of like I'm doing this for all the right reasons, resonate with the political world that's always pushing and telling you that enough is enough. And you're saying enough is never enough when someone is dying, when someone is waiting, when someone rights are being taken away.

SPEAKER_04 35:26

Yeah, we're never given in the first place. Yeah. I know I um in our were in my work, um, in our work, you know, we are constantly hearing and surrounded by um just people being awoken to their hardship. And um for a lot of folks that's extremely uncomfortable um and unusual and something that they try to avoid. And um I I know through my own experience and certainly through my work, um, you know, when you can find with choice of how you get there, that path towards being just aware of that hardship. And not only that, like it's just we're nonprofit, we grind through it, but also just like how does this feel in my body? How is this impacting my productivity, my life, my relationships, my relationship to myself? Am I actually taking care of myself? Like when you can get to that point, um, that's where change is happening. And um, that awareness has been almost the hardest barrier for us, just awareness of like why this matters, awareness of how to um, you know, find ways to support yourself that can work um, you know, specifically in our work through mindfulness. But you know, there's many, many different tools and practices that and and support systems and resources that get people there. But um it's just it's so amazing and exciting and you know, sometimes it's hard for people to sit with that like that rage or that fear or that worry and actually accept that so that they can move through it.

SPEAKER_02 37:25

How did you transition from you know understanding mindfulness for yourself and then being able to create spaces where advocates and and staff, right? Nonprofit staff, are taking moments for mindful mindfulness in themselves. Like how did you how did you transition into okay, I need to take care of myself, and then say, Oh, I can also bring these attributes to other people because they also need it.

SPEAKER_04 37:56

Yeah, I mean, I can't take credit for the idea that organization was founded 10 years before I joined. Um it was volunteer run, no, not necessarily. It was volunteer run by an incredible group of founders that um had their own journeys and their own decades of careers, um, but found a lot of value in sitting together and um coming intentionally to, you know, at that point really just meditate together and like not, you know, in so many ways and so many practices, you know, certainly in in the ancient wisdom, ancient history of it, it is a very insular, singular, independent practice. And for them, um, you know, they've they had the privilege of, you know, experiencing retreats and had the privilege to and wanted to have that be something that was not just you know these special trips or these special moments and actually just a regular part of their way to connect with um their community. And so they started really small and just started inviting people and started hosting at public libraries. And then they started realizing that this is something that can be brought to schools. And then, you know, um there was you know a theory of change around like um there is no reason that this should be seen as a luxury right now. You know, um there is this notion that this is something that can only be accessed if you have time, money, privilege, you know, go to a yoga studio and that could not be farther from the truth, but there is that um misconception. And so, you know, when I joined, um, it was shortly after the theory of change where they realized like we need to put all of our energy into access for under-resourced communities. Um and we need to hire someone. We can't do this volunteer. We need to hire someone like this is this is a mission. We see the need, we hear how important it is. We need to hire someone who can help us, you know, do this um in a way that meets that need. And so I was um just someone sent me the job description. And um, I had my own journey that was quite fresh, you know. At this point, I've been here, I've been at um Community Mindfulness Project for three years, but I had my own journey that compared to our founders and our board members, um, you know, who had had decades of practice, I was like five years in, three years in actually, um, because I um I shared with with our cohort, but um I was just trying to survive motherhood. I just, you know, I had um access to mental health support and care through thankfully um to my husband's credit, pushing me to go to a therapist for a few years. Um and you know, I just was working, as you're saying, these really intense jobs. I was like traveling the world um and just, you know, had the stamina for it. Um, but and and was really proud. Like I just I loved my life. I loved how hard I worked, but I became a mother in COVID. And all of these rules that I thought were like showing me how to be a great leader and be a great, you know, change agent and all the things were just like survival. Like they were just like keeping me going every day. So by the time 2020 hit, um, and I became a mother unintentionally. I was, you know, um not like planning to be a mother in like the pandemic. Nope, nope. I was like, oh wow, I'm pregnant and you're in a global pandemic. This is scary. Um, and you know, um I just um I just broke me. It just broke me. I didn't have any support system, any of the village. Um, you know, obviously we had so much privilege and still I was so alone and so um uh I was just really struggling and like not just mentally, like the physical struggle was just compounding and colliding every single day with the mental struggle. Um, I was recovering from a C-section, you know, being with a newborn baby is um lactating, is like being in a marathon and being chased and being hit by a bus all the same time. Like it's just like no, yeah. And I am like, yeah, so um that's how I found it because I just didn't have a choice. So you're piecing yourself together. I need to sleep. My baby's sleeping, I need to sleep. Why am I not sleeping? And I just finally remembered, you know, an app that someone told me about and found it for myself. And it made me um sleep. Thank God. And it made me kinder to myself because I just didn't give myself the space or the time to really recognize everything that was going on, not only in my little tiny apartment, but in the world and in the country. And, you know, I'm reading news as I'm nursing of you know, the dead counting. Like that is not normal. And I know that's so many people's experience.

SPEAKER_02 43:32

So um, you know, and I'm it makes me think of like the the um analogy or the example of uh the when when the masks drop in a plane and you have to make sure that oxygen is a thousand percent.

SPEAKER_04 43:48

We talk about that a lot. And so to answer your question, you know, I came in and um was so amazed by the foundation the organization had built and just imagine. Immediately, you know, we just really thought about the strategy. And I had experience in nonprofit, but we were also hearing from so many of our partners and so many organizations that I felt inspired by that I wanted to support. Like we need you to stay in your jobs. And if, you know, in Connecticut, one of the latest stats is 77% of nonprofits cite burnout as their top workforce issue. And that's like probably an underestimate. That's who that's who they surveyed and who actually was honest about it. You know, like it's just um it is so um essential to um the health of our society for nonprofits to retain their staff, to stay connected to their community, to not, you know, we we see a lot of vicarious trauma on the front lines, we see a lot of empathy fatigue. You know, if you're every single day um working face to face with people who are just in the toughest moments of their lives, um that has a weight. And so, you know, not only do we work with the clients in recovery or individuals in, you know, transitioning post-incarceration, but we support their the staff that are supporting them. And we want to really make sure. And so um, you know, it just it just felt so essential to just the fabric of um where I see the opportunity and I hope we will continue to move in that direction. But um, yeah, I'm like, what was your question? No, you answered it.

SPEAKER_02 45:38

You know, the the the transition between you finding that self, that's finding that that centering, and then going into doing it for others. You definitely answered it. Yeah, that discovery, that disc and and like you said, COVID allowed you that realization of like, whoa, yeah, you need that air mask, right? You need to put that mask on yourself, or you can't.

SPEAKER_04 46:02

And I experienced what it was like to do it alone, and I realized how much more powerful it is to do it with others and to really feel connected in you know, um this effort to um be better for towards ourselves and be better towards our community. And like so that is why all of our programs, you know, we have sessions, we have workshops, we have training courses, it's all in groups, it's all sitting in circles. Some of them are virtual, virtual circles. But you know, um we don't need any more apps, we don't need any more disconnection, we need more connection, we need people kneeling in even more to, you know, smiling in front of each other and just being like, you're not alone. Like this is freaking hard. This is insane.

SPEAKER_02 46:56

I I asked my team last year for every do we every year we do a staff retreat and I asked them, and like the previous retreats is like we did lunch and we like we're all corny. It's nice, it's nice. But then last year, because things are so heavy and we had just as an organization one universal child care, and we were at the all of us at the brink of burnout because it took so much energy to get to that victory that after legislative session, I knew that we needed something more substantial, but I also didn't want to impose my idea of what is enough or like what could be good. So we surveyed the team, and then the top three options uh were a um what do they call we a scream room? Oh my god, I've never scream and you break things. Oh yeah. Or you like have the hammer and you scream. Yeah, yes. And then um I love that. And then which exists in Connecticut, I had no idea. And then there was an option of archery, like an adventure, totally, uh team building woods thing. Yeah. Uh what we ended up where we landed was we did a duo combo of an escape room with some moments where you can break stuff in this escape room. And then we also did Krapalu, which was we did a full, I don't even know what to call, like yoga meditation, mindfulness, retreat. Oh, wow. It was beautiful. Like this combination of um, I had never done anything like that with coworkers where you specifically take time out where part of the day you're in silence and in community with no expectations or conversation, but you're sharing space. Um and then the so the way the Krapalu uh their sessions, and then the other part of the day was being mindful to yourself, doing like a sound bath, doing guided meditation. I we came back, it was just uh two days, you know, between the we came back refreshed. I couldn't, I couldn't so stuck to this idea of in previous jobs where our retreats were we're stuck somewhere for two days to talk about work strategy sessions. Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 49:19

And I like strategizing the whole conference room with fluorescent light. No, I mean, but even just it's so first of all, good on you to take, I know you're saying just two days, but that's two days. That's like a serious investment of time. And I just am really impressed. But I also am kind of laughing because you know, some so much of what we do around awareness building is like you said, the example of archery or escape room. Like those also are mindfulness. Like you are being present, you are being very hyper aware of like, I'm not thinking about something that happened in the past, I'm not thinking about all the worries of the future. Like, you know, we talk a lot about just thinking about the practice as you're walking your dog, or thinking about, you know, I I right now in this season of life, I have a five-year-old and a two-year-old next week. But you know, when I'm rocking my children to sleep or giving them a hug, that's like a chance to take a deep breath and like regulate myself and just like actually remember like no, this is not a crisis, like I'm okay. We are safe, we are healthy. And, you know, for some people, just gardening for some people, and so like that is just you know, that's the work of just like really recognizing and taking, you know, um stock of you know, that this can be integrated into your lives and those two-day retreats when you're lucky to have them are so meaningful and so important. And also just the connection between your team, like that's incredible.

SPEAKER_02 50:51

The connection was yeah, uh, I was surprised how much you can learn about someone that you think you know well because you're you know working in such close spaces so frequently um with a small team, and and non most nonprofits are tiny. So like it's not like you get lost in a multitude of uh of employees. We know each other pretty well. We see and talk to each other every day. And seeing them out of the element of work was a completely different perspective. Yeah. I I there was this moment in the escape room, the end of the escape room, where you had to uh you had to slant like crack a sphinx in order to get the mystery key. That was so ridiculous. Oh, it's so ridiculous, but like my reaction is like, I don't don't break it. I don't I don't want to get in trouble. And then another coworker's like, break it, break it. And then you know, like it was hysterical, the reactions of like um, you know, the stepping up and stepping back, the who's leading and sharing space. Um like laughing, being mind laughing, being mindful of are you scared? Um, are you uh claustrophobic? We got you. Like those little moments and different, different out-of-the-setting, uh being out of the setting of work and doing something together that's that's unique.

SPEAKER_04 52:10

It gives people a chance to take on a different role and what yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 52:13

There is no, you know, who's in charge, who's not in charge, we're all in charge.

SPEAKER_04 52:18

Right. Yeah, I love that. Ugh Yeah, no. It's um it's it's a special.

SPEAKER_02 52:24

Which is life, right? Yeah, we fit ourselves into these boxes of uh someone has to tell us what to do. This is how you do it. But a lot of the solutions that that are are the most successful are solutions that are creative, that are un not anticipated, solutions that definitely did not, uh that solution was most likely not the the the iteration in the beginning. It's a it's a it ebbed and flowed, and maybe it's a temp version of what it could have been by the end of it. Um yeah, there's no uh cut and paste version.

SPEAKER_04 53:04

No, no. Oh my gosh. This is this has been so lovely. Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 53:10

Like,