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Speaker 2Hey, you're listening to the Jasmine star show. A podcast for entrepreneurs was that weird. I was supposed to say, Hey, Hey, but it came out, Hey, Hey, and half of me wants to start over again. And the other half of me is like, girl, just own it. You don't have to have a, Hey, Hey, every day you can have a, Hey, Hey, you know, so if you're having a hay head day or welcome to the club, you're listening to the Jasmine star show a podcast for entrepreneurs who are looking for practical advice. In honest conversations, while building the business of their dreams. I am so happy you're tuning in today. And for those of you have been around the block with me. Thank you. Big shout out to.com view who left a five star review. She said, this lady brings her a game. Listening to her feels like you made a valuable investment of your time. Yes, today y'all, we're going to be talking about investments in different ways. So I have to give a shout out to solve VW who writes the information you provide is very helpful and valuable. I really appreciate you. And shout out to five star review, Gentry Quinn. I love learning from you and your guests. Jasmine, please don't ever stop doing what you do. Your passion and love for what you do is contagious and motivating. Heck yes. So speaking of contagious and motivating and good investments of your time and a great deal of appreciation. My guest today is Stacy Lindsey , a multimedia journalist writer, media consultant, and speaker. Now she's formerly the articles editor at goop, but today Stacy is the editorial director of the conscious investor, a weekly digital magazine that uncovers the world of impact investing philanthropy and social and environmental impact, which she helped. CoLaunchpad you guys, I am obsessed with this conversation with Stacy and it's all about taking what you have and getting started with impact investing. Now, if you're not sure what that is, don't worry. I didn't know what it was either. An I am just all kinds of inspired, not just to leave an impact because I'm already trying to look at ways to smartly invest money. What if I could do both better yet? What if we could do both? I left this conversation feeling so inspired and educated on how JD and I can put our money where our hearts are. So if you're interested in how you can make a positive difference in organizations that are important to you, Oh , you're going to love this interview. Let's listen in Stacy . Thank you so much for being here. I appreciate you. I appreciate you. Oh, there aren't any words how much I appreciate you. Thank you for having me. Thank you. I have to say that it's been, I've been creeping on you for about goodness now, four or five months. We met originally back in December, randomly at a dinner in Los Angeles. And I had the opportunity to talk to people. And you were sitting seated, goodness, probably at the opposite end of the table. But you had such this positive energy. You were smiling the whole night. It looked like everybody around you is having fun. And I was like, who is that woman? Like, she's radiating, like I want to talk with her. And I made my way across the room. We were so kind, it was so wonderful. We ended up connecting over Instagram and now we're here. So thank you for making time. Absolutely. And I think it's such a beautiful story too , because we know this, but it's such a good reminder. Energy is a real thing. Yes . It's so profound and you can feel it just as we did across the table and way before words are spoken. And I just think it's really neat. When you get to know yourself more, you kind of attract the people that you want to meet more in your life. They just start coming into your life. And it's just, it's amazing. And I felt the same way too, when we didn't have a long conversation that night, but I just thought, wow, I want to have, you know, continue to have conversations with her. So Jasmine and here we are here. We're having those conversations. Now I want to let everybody know that we are going to be keeping this conversation with . I like to think as like a woven, like a woven tapestry, we're going to be talking about a lot of different things. And the goal is for us to like loop it all back around because I want it to be value driven, but I also want it to have like a bigger purpose. Now I will start off by openly saying I'm fascinated by everything you're doing. And I love that you have deep insights into content that resonates online because you are the editorial director at the conscious investor. Now for people who don't know, the conscious investor is a weekly digital magazine that uncovers the world of impact investing philanthropy and social environmental impact. Now you also, co-founded this amazing digital magazine and you are also as if your life isn't busy enough. You're also the contributing articles editor at goop. Yes. Okay. So you are an editor who really understands content from both the creation process and the submission process. I'm going to start off by saying thank you for sharing your insights. And if you'd allow me, I would love to read a piece of copy from the conscious investor Instagram account. Can we start there please? Thank you. Okay. It says time and again, psychologists have shown that the pursuit of meaning in one's life is the real key to happiness and health. Having a sense of purpose can literally add years to your life. And one simple step you can take to act with meaning in all aspects of your life, which includes investments and finances. When I read that post, I was like, man, I love this because it resonated with me. And it leads me to ask due to your vast experience as the contributing articles editor at goop contributing the fact that you are a co founder , like I am dying to know how do you know when content will truly resonate with your audience? You never really do. And I think it's a beautiful, beautiful question. I think what I have learned, which is what I call my North star in my career
Speaker 3is I ask and I seek to answer the questions that really resonate with me. And that's always just serve me. And I have felt that if I have this deep seated, intuitive gut feeling that I want to unpack something, if I want to unpack a certain story, a certain topic, topic, whatever it may be, I'm going to follow that. And I feel like when I follow that, then hopefully it does stick. You know, the readers come around and it resonates because I can't be the only one. I think that's interested in this topic or wants to know this answer. So it's a beautiful question again. And I just follow my gut. It's taken me a long time. It is a real beautiful privilege to be able to say that I could do that now, because earlier on in my career, I couldn't do that. I had to take the stories that were given to me or when I was a news or local reporter, you know, if it bleeds, it leads. If it was know , follow that and you know, the most salacious story, or you had to go follow him , forbid the murder or whatnot. When really, I thought, you know, the story is actually the one over here. We should be telling you. Don't really get to say that sometimes when you're in the news, but I've gotten to a place now that I just, I listened. I listened to my heart and my gut sounds kind of cliche, but I swear it leads me in the best direction. And you know , that's what I find that usually resonates. Oh , okay. So you are able to look at something. No. How do you know when you're looking at something with that, a writer has put something out and you say, wow, this person, he just gets it. Like, what are the, some of the similar qualities between some of the pieces that you read and like, wow, this is what, the thing that most readers are finding compelling. Yes. I think, well, one thing that we do have from the backend standpoint, meaning we have something in digital media now that we didn't have like say even 10 years ago is we had, we have a feedback loop, which is pretty amazing. So we didn't have that when we had just newspapers and literally you would toss the newspaper in front of somebody's house and they pick it up and to read their paper, but you wouldn't know what was resonating, what wasn't now obviously with the beautiful worldwide web we have, we can see how long somebody actually stays on an article. You know what headlines are getting their attention. So we have that feedback loop. We can see what's resonating or what we think is resonating for me though. I am all about accessibility and it doesn't matter what it is. It doesn't matter what the platform is. I want something that doesn't talk down to me. I want something that meets me where I am, and that's really what I aim for. And that's the work that I seek out too . It doesn't your work is that example to you, the way you connect with people, you're meeting people where , where they are. You're inspiring them. You're edifying them, but you're not talking down to them. And I, I have such incredible immense respect for media for journalists in general. But I have to say that I have struggled being a woman I've struggled with kind of classic women's publications. Or I rather, I did struggle with them through my teen years because I felt like they always made me feel like I was missing or I wasn't enough, or this is what I had to do to fix myself. And they weren't meeting me where I, where I was and where I was and where I am is just a human being, doing my best. So I just try, I am attracted to that type of media. And then I just try to create that media to it. Jen , it's just accessible. Oh, okay. I love hearing that you are working on creating the type of content that you desire and you are the editorial director at the conscious investor. Can you talk a little bit more about the goal of the conscious investor? Yes, definitely. That was a true, true passion project in our guts too. So I co founded that with my dear colleague and friend Eva Jez Hari, and even I met several years ago, we originally met because we were collaborating on a story for goop, beautiful part of the story too, which is I love. And I always listened to this gut kind of instinct is she just cold reached out, which is so fantastic because every really, you know, when I've made some of these really good connections with people in my life, I thought, you know, I just have a feeling about that person I'm going to reach out. And she actually did that to coop , which was amazing. We got in contact and we ended up collaborating on a story specifically about impact investing. Now at the time I thought, what the hell is impact investing? It didn't mean anything to me. I had just started reporting on some financial stories for goop, but I didn't know what the term was. And I honestly, I thought right away, this is something that's again, not accessible to me. I'm a scrappy journalist. You know, I try to be smart with my finances, but I don't have the income. I don't have the funds to really invest. So, okay, I'll explore this. When I started exploring it with her, I realized this is amazing. This is actually a paradigm shift where yes, it's talking about money. It's talking about using your investment, using your capital to do good, but it's also talking about how we can all do good in the most sort of small, almost banal ways. And that can even just start with how we consume changing our habits, you know, that can have impact. So even I have had this really beautiful conversation. We collaborated on two pieces for goop, and then we just kept talking and we developed a strong friendship too. And we thought there's so much the work that she does is so profound. I mean, she really is . She says she walks the talk and she goes to East Africa and India and visit these companies that she's actually investing in. And we just started creating just from our guts organically, this magazine. And that's how it came to be. I love this. And so can you explain impact investing like I'm five dads ? Yes. Impact investing is impacting capital with the purpose to do a environmental or social good while also getting a financial return. So when you impact in something, of course, the goal is always to get your capital back or get your CA more capital back. That's the point of investing, but when you're impact investing, you also want to get a measurable social, environmental return as well. So for instance, let's say you're to invest in a company that is providing clean water to a community in , uh , East, let's say we're Wanda, for instance, and just kind of thinking of a random example, there are measurable ways to explicitly show that that company is providing clean water and has impacted X amount of lives in that village in Rwanda. And then on top of investing in that accompany , you know, you'll get a return back. So it's actually just really a new or say more recent way to kind of push doing good forward because before money it's interesting money is a very convoluted thing and it is , um, kind of causes people to chase a little bit or to get nervous or to think, Oh gosh, money's very taboo. And I want to talk about it, but money, you know , money is the way the world goes round. It is we do live in a capitalistic society. So you can do a lot of good with money. If you just kind of start, start to rethink where you invest it, but also spinning off of that, which is so fascinating for me is Eva approaches it from the, she has a financial background. She did work on wall street. I approach it from a totally different perspective. I do not have a financial background. Again, I'm a scrappy journalist, I'm a writer, I'm a researcher. I'm always the curious one. And I thought this isn't for me. And I'm realizing this is for me because you don't have to have tons of money in it. You can be an impact investor by even just changing your habits and kind of going slow. Okay. But can we tap here for a second and fascinate you because a lot of our listeners, our business owners and many business owners specifically in the first one to five years, like their focus is I just want to turn a profit, right? So is impact investing for them? Is it, or is it really for larger businesses who are wanting to make a difference, like a higher profit margin? Like who is this really for? It's a really, really great question. It is, it is truly for everybody. And that's one of the reasons, another reason why we want us to start the conscious investor is to start actually peeling back the layers and start answering these questions because these are all questions that I have as well. It is for everybody. It is again, and using that word accessible a lot, but it is accessible. You can becoming impact investor, even if, you know , with a couple hundred dollars, if you want to start investing in a company, or if you're a much larger corporation, of course, if you have more capital to put towards something, you'll probably most likely make a Mo a bigger, measurable impact faster, but across the board, large corporations, smaller corporations, individuals with limited means individuals with robust means it's, it is truly for everybody. So what is like an average ROI return on investment? If somebody comes to you and says , okay, I have $500 and I can choose to do impact investing, or I could choose to do normal investing, like on wall street. Like why would, other than other than I'm doing more social good, like dollar to dollar, what are we really talking about here? So I love that you're asking this. So I just want to say that I'm not , um, take this with a grain of salt, of course, because I'm not a certified financial manager, you know, I guess I'm the one asking all these questions. So I'm just finding out what the research shows and I can actually send you reports and studies after this, if you, if you're interested in the research them in the show notes. Yeah. It's fascinating that 90, at least 90%. So that's more than 90%. They actually perform as good or outperform traditional investments. Wow. You know, if you could give me a specific example, I would love to call on an expert to give you another , uh , you know , a specific example to kind of show you, but like these, again, these reports and studies, it's amazing, but yes, they , um , impact investing more than 90% performing just as good or outperforming. So it's because you know what it is, it's the way of the future. This is we, can't what I'm hoping impact investing is today 10 years from now, when we're going to be having another conversation, that's just going to be normal investing. Same with everything else, too. You know, a good analogy is the skincare business. That of course, how many years ago when we started realizing, wow, there's these nasty things in our face cream called parabens . You know, we didn't know it at the time we were just saying , I was, and we realized, wow, methyl Paramin really bad linked to skin cancer. Then companies started taking it out. Then they started realizing there's other ingredients to started taking it out. Now, I feel like we're at this amazing time again, using the skincare analogy where clean and green or conscious candy or whatever you want to call, it is more the norm. It's actually kind of a bigger deal to use a product now that still has some of those ingredients and they're out there, you know, and they're performing, they're doing their thing, but the clean skincare world is actually more normal. So moving that's happening when it comes to money, hoping it kind of across the board, you know, I'm hoping that just becomes more the norm because we're looking at a world, you know , we're living in a world right now and we're looking at a world that is profoundly changing and it's up to us as they could to continue to change this way, or is it gonna continue to change? You know, are we gonna shift it? It's going to change for the better. And of course what we're experiencing right now to humanity across the board. I mean, it's unveiling things that we probably never expected , um, inequality , um, inefficiencies in healthcare , environmental disasters. So we need to start in every facet of our lives. We really need to start looking at how can we actually do something, you know, weather , whatever we are doing, how can we do it in a way that's going to actually impact this issue and help it? I'm actually fascinated. Can I ask, I'm going to ask a personal question. So he's yeah . You have probably met hundreds of thousands of people through your interactions at group . We've probably collaborated on hundreds of stories. Why, like, why did this become so important to you? Why was the awareness about impact investing? W what, what resonated on such a deep level that you said, I want to co-found the conscious investor? What happened there? It was the first time that I have felt in my whole entire adult life where I actually personally felt like this is a way I could start to make a difference. And it's something that I have been very frustrated by. And again, use the word, struggle, my whole professional career and my whole adult life. I've always wanted to do something that would move the needle a little bit, but I thought, you know, it's not going to be big enough. I, my voice isn't big enough, whatever it is, or people aren't going to take me seriously. It's really the reason why I got into journalism. I just feel like storytelling is really kind of what makes the world go round and what's what fuels the world. But I still just kept feeling like I was running into a wall. Like I would tell this story, but it wouldn't really maybe make the dent that I was hoping it would make. And maybe it did. And this is just my perspective. I'm hard on myself. I think the, this story started cracking open for me more though when I was full time at goop . Cause I was on staff full time for just about three years as the articles editor, before I became a contributing editor. And that was when I started realizing, wow, I am in this incredible working at this incredible company, of course, with the most incredible founder CEO, Gwyneth , she's amazing. I have access to the most amazing to meet the most amazing people interview the most amazing people. And I really covered the spectrum in regards to different types of stories. When I was at goop full time travel, I did lifestyle stories about interior design. I did stories on financial health. I did stories on women entrepreneurs and it was the social impact entrepreneur stories that really, really lit me up. And so it just started kind of putting those pieces together, like, wow, this story, for some reason, like I could do 50 more of those in one day. And cause I get, I get tired when I work on a story. Cause I put a lot of, I call it heart equity, take it very, very, very seriously. And those were the stories that I just thought I want to do. Another one of those. I want to do another one of those. And of course goop is multifaceted. So we couldn't just do social impact stories. We all had to kind of carry all the editors, had to carry a mix of different, different beats. But that was the really the thing is that connecting with Eva on that story and doing some other social impact stories. I launched a vertical, a franchise, I should say at goop called the good Samaritan and doing that was a lot about what people working in the social impact world. And if I just wanted to do those stories all day long. So it was ultimately that, and it was when I made the decision, cause I never wanted to leave goop full time . It's absolutely a fantastic place, but it was just that a gut feeling I thought, Oh gosh, you know, there's stuff that I need to do. And in order to be able to do this, I actually had to leave. I couldn't stay full time and I've just followed my gut finally. And I thought, I'm going to take this leap. It's scary. But so I credit to my, really my time they're showing me the way
Speaker 2I love this. And though I know that you're a storyteller and I know that you've had like these moments and stories that you've written. Is there one that sticks out that was pivotal in your perspective shift or your desire, or like that pushed you to say, you know what, I'm working at a great company and I love it. And the founder's amazing, but I need to do this. Was there one, or was there like a series of som like what's a story that just sticks out to you
Speaker 3cath you know? Oh gosh. Yeah, there are so many, I think it's the, it's always the story. Mostly about female identifying entrepreneur who went against the expectations. So one exact cause there's, I mean, there's probably like a top 10 list that I have or ones that really gave me goosebumps. One that was more recent. Uh , probably several months ago I interviewed this woman named Jennifer Justice and she is incredible. And she started somebody called the justice league. And gosh, she worked for, she's an incredible attorney based in New York. She worked for Jay Z for, I don't wanna get this wrong. I think about 15 years, maybe a long time. And I thought, wow, this woman was what you would think at the end. She was at the absolute height of her career working for one of the most powerful people in media. And she ultimately decided to take a leap and start her own thing. That's profound. I, and, and again, going against the expectations, cause I can only imagine some people going, Oh my gosh, you're going to lead this. Then go to start this who leaves Jay Z and Beyonce, you know like, but when I see VAT, I mean , I remember I was interviewing her . I was sweating. Cause it was so excited . You just, the coolest is somebody that you have to, I'll say she has to be on your radar. She's amazing. But that story, I thought, wow, going against like truly, truly, truly walking that talk and just go , you know, forming your own path. And she did it and she ultimately did it. It really give women a voice. Now she represents women and helps get them better business deals and better contracts. And all of that, her work is profound, but those stories, I just, those get me, I mean to no end. And then, you know, I did, I mean, I've been lucky to do a piece on Lindsay. Adario, who's this incredible war photographer and she's traveled all over and she's done intensive photo-journalist pieces on women living in the Taliban. And I think Holy moly, I mean, this is a woman who has put her life at risk every day to deliver people, content that they need to know if it wasn't for her, we wouldn't know a fraction of what was going on. So that too, I just think if I'm healthy and well and able to do my work, you know, I, that is my contribution because somebody else like her is out there, risk is I'm not risking my life. You know, I'm very safe and I've got a great community. She's out there doing that work like that propels me to get up every day . Just I know when, when there are women like that out there doing their thing, I love it. So women like Jennifer women, like Lindsey , are there certain characteristics that those women possess that we could start mapping desires or behaviors or personality traits towards that? Not looking to the side, looking ahead. That's what I've learned. And that's what I keep trying to tell myself too . They are not looking to their right to go, Oh, well I'm making up a name, but Sally Smith did it this way. Maybe I should do it that way. No , no. To say that they have it, but no, they're just moving forward because that's the most important, important thing, because it goes two ways too . You can look to the right and to the left and constantly be second guessing yourself. You can also be looking to the right and the left looking for either accolades or looking for the critics, you know, and kind of like gauge what you should do next, according to the critics or the people who are saying nice things about you, neither one mean anything. They come up to me for instance tomorrow and say, Stacy , I read that piece. It was fantastic. Thank you. Yeah, that feels great. That feels amazing. But the same day somebody can come up to me and say, you should not be a writer. It was terrible. I hated it. Kind of both. What's my duty. My duty is just to keep moving forward. You know, I'll be gracious and I'll say, thank you for reading, of course, but I have to keep moving forward. And I've learned that because all the women, people, but women that I admire have done that. And I just think that's, and it's so hard to do. And it's harder to do now more than ever, because we have so many distractions. Of course we have so many different ways to compare ourselves to other people. Of course, the default social media, but we've always been nature by doing it. I just think it's, you know, before social media existed, it was almost in existence. In other ways we just need to keep moving forward. And so that's, those are the, that's the ultimate trait that I really value and look up, look, you know, look up toward ,
Speaker 2uh , I love this, I love this. I love this. And I think it plays like a parallel. So if we find that these characteristics of these women that are changing the world that are creating amazing impact, how can someone find a cause that they're passionate about to make investments in ? Like, is there a database of some sort like, do you Google your way through the deal?
Speaker 3Yeah, it's a really, that's the other of the so many facets that this unveiled that is one of the really fun parts because ultimately where this starts is discovering your values. It's such a cool exercise and I've been doing it with myself consistently and I invite everybody to do it. So ultimately to find , let's say, and it's a scene too , if you want to just donate money to a charity and you think, where do I even start? I don't even know to where to begin, you know, or if you want to become an impact investor or even if you want to, as I said, start at the consumer level and just start supporting smaller brands that are helping, you know , uh , advanced women. It starts first of all, with having a conversation with yourself and kind of looking at your just general tendencies, what, what types of stories get you excited? What types of movies get you excited? What artists intrigued you? That's one place to start. Well, how do you like to spend your free time? That's a really big one too . Do you like to spend your free time outdoors, hiking? Do you like to spend it inside reading about, you know, iconoclastic women? Do you like to spend it with a bunch of friends? Like what is really, really important to you? And you'll actually, it's really amazing. Even looking at your social media feeds to looking at the people that you follow, looking at, the things that you tend to post, that you like , that the posts that you there's themes there, there's so much information there also to start looking at, what do you enjoy about your job? What do you not like about your job? What do you wish your your day to day had more of what, what do you wish it had less of, again, unpacking that information and you actually start, it's amazing and you actually start realizing, wow, I didn't even realize it, but on my social media, I follow let's say, and I'm giving another arbitrary example. I follow like 10 trans makeup artists. The trans community is actually really important to me. I'm going to start looking into that more especially trans rights, transgender rights are really important to me. I'm going to start looking at companies that support trans people. And I'm going to start looking at ways I can maybe invest that'll advance, you know, that conversation. So, or you can look at wow, a lot of the stuff that I'm into it again has environmental. You know, the , the national parks are really important to me because every summer my partner, I go on a trip to a new national park and we want to go outside and heaven forbid climate change. We might not be able to do that someday . So I want to start actually looking at companies that better the environment , um, lower carbon footprints. So that's just one way, just kind of looking at your tendencies, looking at your patterns and you start to see themes in your life and then the other, the next step that's really interesting is again, it's really important is you don't because again, I don't, I , I'm not somebody who is sitting here going, I'm just going to throw $10,000 at that company and invest in it. I hope to be there one day. I'm not there one day, but how can I start to become an impact investor in that company? You can actually just start by emailing the company and asking them about their practices because it's more than just investing in money. It's actually about working to see, okay, to support a company that has practices that you believe in. Do they promote people of color? Do they, are they inclusive? Do they promote women on their board? Are they inclusive with their hiring? Do they treat their employees? Well? What are their packaging practices? Do they just use copious amounts of plastic or do they actually consider using different, you know , packaging methods, all these ways, and even just an email inquiring kind of the practices behind the company is a way to start a conversation and to get involved in that is a way to make impact. I could go on and off . No, I love this. Okay . But like, so if somebody is listening and says, okay, I want to start impact investing. Where does she go? Yeah, yeah, no, that's really one. I'll give you a resource. Cause there's a lot of different places I will say. Um, actually I asked go to the conscious investor.co cause we have w we are building, building, building that, but we have a lot of resources there. I would say one place to start going. It's called gin , G I N. And it's a network. It's the global impact investor network. They have a plethora of resources. So that's one place to start. Another place to start is actually start looking at communities and networks. And there's actually really a budding amount of those across the world too, is great. And what these are kind of like the same thing. When you have business networks where you can meet or , um, YPO, you know, young professionals networks, there are a lot of impact investing networks. One in particular is called beyond capital, which is what Eva, usre my , the co founder of the conscious investor. She started that with her husband and it's an impact investing fund. You can actually start, you've been coming ambassador for $1,500, but you also can meet other impact investors across the world to learn, to learn more. And it's just a great way that, and then another way to though, is to simply if you do, if you have an expert that helps you with your finances , um , certified financial planner, for instance, somebody maybe who has helped your parents or your spouse, or just for you personally, whatever it may be. Or if you're looking into that start asking them, that's the huge step to say, Hey, actually I want to really look into organizations that are really helping the environment, or I want to look into organizations that are B corporations. And that's a really big thing. It's a be a certified B corporation is a company that it's a very, very, very rigorous certification process that a company has to go through, that they have to prove all of their practices are aligned with the environment and with social good. It's pretty amazing. So, you know, if a company is be certified there again, walking the talk, but starting that conversation with a , uh , with an expert, a financial expert.
Speaker 2Okay. So, you know, the entrepreneur in me is just like, wait a minute, there's a gap in the market. I want the conscious investor to become like the linchpin that gets, you know , instead of contributing to a fund, like having like some sort of like algorithm based, serving it up based on your interests . Like we need to have a conversation. That's what we need
Speaker 3[inaudible]
Speaker 2yes, yes. Okay. So we'll just, as we start late tying things up, one of my favorite articles in the conscious investors titled finding purpose in your money. And this could really hones in on the fact that where we put our money as people and as business owners, we'll either have a positive or a negative effect. How can our listeners ensure their money is having a positive impact in the world? Is this just really going back to what you've said is like, do you a little bit of homework to know
Speaker 3it is, there's a million analogies for this too . Nowadays we are facing a plethora of decisions of options, no matter what. So if it's how we invest our money, or if it's the type of soap we're gonna buy, we are inundated with options, kind of a cool thing, but kind of not too , it's overwhelming. The onus is really on us as people with how we use our money and how we use it to spend how we use it, to invest it's on us to become really discerning people, you know, discerning capitalists members of a capitalist society. I should say, start doing the research. And I know it's probably not a totally satisfying answer because it does require work, but it's asking questions. It's some digging, maybe about a new company. Let's say again, you're like in the market for a new pair, a new pair of jeans. I don't know why not, if you, if you're not sure what kind of jeans you want to get, why not doing a little , do a little research and see, Oh, actually this company uses recycled cotton and they actually use nontoxic dye . And they actually seem to be actually promoting a lot of women on their board. Just do some digging as opposed to this company that's still using polyurethane, you know? And then that goes down the supply chain because that's linked to X, Y, and Z. So it just really starts from just, just taking a beat. That's the thing, just taking a beat and kind of taking a breath and then doing some homework. And then, you know, it's hard sometimes, unfortunately you don't know right away if you're spending your dollars. I mean, if you're, if you are making an actual impact investment, you should be getting a measurable report back that measures the social impact that you make. But just on us, just as like everyday citizens kind of day to day, it's just about, it's just a matter of doing some homework, doing some digging. I'll give you a cool example too, is that I did, this was actually a story for goop, but one company I have loved this company for a long time. Um, I have no investment in this company at all. Just totally loved. It's a shoe company called Frida Salvador. And I'm just like, I just like their styles, you know, for years they were just kind of create , create these really cool sort of , um , neutral Oxfords. And they're awesome. I reached out to them totally cold Turkey several years ago and just said, Hey, I love what you're putting out there. Cause they just seem to have a really cool messaging around the company. I just wanted to know them. One of the founders, Megan wrote me back personally. She's Oh my gosh. Thank you so much. This is amazing. I'd love to, you know, grab a drink or grab coffee sometime cut to , we ended up having coffee. I ended up learning so much about their business. Ended up traveling to Spain with Megan and then the other co founder , Chris to actually see how their shoes are made. And it was so cool to learn that this company, again, walks the talk, they treat their employees so well they're everybody, all their shoes are handmade in Spain. Everybody there is like their family. They use incredible, all incredible resources, leathers and , and um, different materials for their shoes. It's it's amazing. Cause they just peeled back. They just opened, opened the curtain and just showed me. And I thought, wow, this is really a company that's doing good things. And that's the other thing that you'll notice is that when you reach out to these companies and I know some companies are bigger than others, but the ones that are doing good things they want, they want you to reach out to them and ask you questions. Cause they've got nothing to hide.
Speaker 2I could not be more excited about how simple this is. So for anybody who's listening and feels intimidated by the fact that impact investing might not be for you. If you like, you are going to spend money period, you are going to be buying shoes or clothing or makeup. If you are going to be conscious investor, it would just like Stacy had said to take a beat and then choose where you get to spend the money you were already going to spend. And then we speak to the opposite. End of the spectrum. People are investing actively on behalf of their personal lives and their business. Why not reallocate a few of the funds and be really conscious about contributing to a fund. We're talking to your investor about that. So all of this, like we started off at the beginning of talking about what makes content resonate with an audience because you've been on both ends, you are contributing, you're a writer, you're a creator, but you also were bringing in ideas and really sorting through stories. And then all of a sudden that led you to where you are now, like standing in your purpose and empowering other people to be really conscious about what they're doing and how they're spending their money. So as we close, like what are the three things you want listeners to know when our conversation ends? Like when we get off and they say, wow, what is that?
Speaker 3Yeah. Oh, that's so beautiful. Thank you for asking me that every single thing that you do makes an impact. Everything we do makes an impact. So knowing that, and it can be good or bad. And so it's up to us and we can, we have immeasurable amounts of abilities to make positive impacts. And that can even just go down to giving somebody a smile on the street, or it can go to sending a company that you like, and you want to support a really nice email, even if you don't have the funds to invest in that company. You know, sending them an email saying, thank you for what you're doing. So let's say that that's number one. The biggest number two, always, always, always listen to your gut because every Simon single time I have good things that happened. And every time I haven't, you know, major learnings , um, gosh, what does number three? I feel like I've got 90 days to pack into number three. Uh, but I think that number three, I would say from the journalist in me and the content creator in me would say words and messaging is so powerful. So if you're, if you have a writer in you, you know, and there's something that you're passionate about or a cause that you want to support or anything you want get involved in, just get it out, don't keep it inside. You know that it's a disservice, get it out there, whether it is with a social media post , putting a post up on Instagram, whether it's actually helping somebody else maybe with , with their endeavor, but like get don't hold anything in, get it out because that is what is feeling the world. And so many of us second guess ourselves, or we think, Oh gosh, and I am speaking my truth because this is what I have struggled with for so long. Who's gonna listen to me, you know, or my voice isn't loud enough that person's voice is loud enough. No , you have to have to get it out. It is so important. And there's just an infinite amount of ways to get it out there. But that's all of our duty and all of our service to do that.
Speaker 2Girl, you could just, you can just walk away right now. Like you just brought the church down. Thank you for preaching your truth. Thank you for being here. How can people find you online and continue the conversation?
Speaker 3You, you bring it out in people you are truly there. Aren't when I'm a writer in there. Aren't words. Just, I want to thank you because thank you so much for showing up and thank you for being real and again, and thank you for being accessible because it really, you are making such profound, positive, impactful waves . So thank you and thank you for all your questions. And I am , um, I am a reluctant social media user, but I am getting better at it. Please find me because I really I've been proud of myself lately. I'm at , um , I'm on Instagram, Stacy Lindsey , and then you can find some of my work and other things I'm interested in at Stacy Ann , a N N lindsey.com . And of course the conscious investor dot C O if you're interested in learning more about impact investing in social good,
Speaker 2I am so thankful that you are here. And if you're listening right now, please drop a little love to Stacy so that we can cajole her out, out from the kid , the writing cave and onto the Instagram land. Thank you again for being here. Thank you for the good that you're putting out into the world and thank you for the impact and legacy that you're leaving. I appreciate you. I appreciate you. Thank you so much. And there you have it. Buttercup. The biggest thing I learned from Stacy in this interview is that impact investing does not have to be overwhelming, scary, or be a huge portion of your income. It's just following your gut and purchasing from businesses or donating to a charity that you believe in. It's simple. Now the question is, are we going to do it? Are you feeling inspired to put your money where your heart is? Well, I would love if you tagged Stacy and I on your Instagram story at Jasmine star and at Stacy Lindsey , and let us know how you will start impact investing, taking one small baby step, such as simply donating $10, a hundred dollars or a thousand dollars to your favorite charity is a step in the right direction. If you're going to walk this path with us, I wanted to cheer you on. And I know Stacy would love to hear from you too, because it's amazing to connect with others who want to leave this world better than we found it. I'll see you on Instagram.
Speaker 1[inaudible] .