Micro-Dosing Wellness + A Year-End Reflection - Jon McCoy, Becky Endicott, and Lindsey Fuller
7:40PM Dec 12, 2024
Speakers:
Becky Endicott
Jonathan McCoy
Lindsey Fuller
Keywords:
Impact Uprising
wellness focus
micro-dosing wellness
professional development
community care
self-care practices
somatic exercises
stress management
work-life balance
burnout prevention
team growth
personal growth
wellness resources
professional accountability
sustainable work culture
Hey, I'm Jon.
And I'm Becky.
And this is the We Are For Good podcast.
Nonprofits are faced with more challenges to accomplish their missions, and the growing pressure to do more, raise more and be more for the causes that improve our world. We're
here to learn with you from some of the best in the industry, bringing the most innovative ideas, inspirational stories all to create an Impact Uprising. So
welcome to the good community. We're nonprofit professionals, philanthropists, world changers and rabbit fans who are striving to bring a little more goodness into the world.
So let's get started. Becky, special episode.
Special episode. We are wrapping up this year, and we are wrapping it up with love and a special guest and some healing,
Yeah, and this year has been a year y'all. I mean, do you feel that? I mean, it's a wrap on 2024, we're looking back, and there's been 92 podcast episodes this year. Launch of Impact, Uprising, impact up gatherings have happened this year, two of those dozens of cities around the world have gathered in community. We've met new friends, and you know what we also did? We launched an amazing limited series with the one and only Lindsey Fuller, who were so overjoyed to be our special guest, surprise guest on today's wrap up episode, we had an intro and Lindsey though, and give a little bit of love, but how she came into our world and really change so much for us in this community.
Yeah, I think I want to, like, just tell the community that we're shifting a little bit. Because if you've hung around us at any length of time, you know that we do these wrap up episodes and we start to break down through lines and trends and things that hung with us, things that episodes that really tracked on social media and in conversations and community. But this year, we really, really wanted to focus on your wellness. We wanted to focus in on giving you this exhale as you close out 2024 and you take this great big inhale in for 2025 not because you have fear, but because you're you are entirely regulated, because you are ready, because you can be ready for 1-1-25 it is a whole new ball game, and when you go into it centered, we know this work is going to feel better for you, and the output is going to be better for all who benefit. So yes, this is the longest you have to say.
So good.
Yes, that Lindsey Fuller is in the house, and there is no one who takes our hand more warmly, lovingly, and I'll say also with the firm hand. And we love that about her. As someone who is a straight shooter, I value that she has been a co-conspirator, a co-dreamer. And then we were able to bring the series Gather at the Well to life, alongside Lindsey and her team. And so I'm gonna kick that to you, Jon, because I feel like you and Julie have been instrumental in bringing Gather at the Well to the fore.
I mean, as The Teaching Wells vision, it was Lindsay's vision of a team of like, how do we take these ideas and share them out in a bigger conversation? And so I remember us talking at ImpactUp that night to just say, What starts here? We don't want it to end, but how can it really ripple? And so we're, we're becoming more aware every day that we do not have all the answers, but I believe we can find answers in community about surrounding ourselves with people with different lived experience, with different expertise that can come in and be the shepherd alongside us to help us kind of create a new way. And so we love doing work with people that are in the work, that are doing the work and The Teaching. Well, isn't just teaching from their platitudes, although they could totally do that, and we'd be here for it. They do it from a place of like we're actually messily have worked through this, and we can come with our experiences of trying to lead this way in our own cultures and our own team, and we're just here to share this outward. And so this podcast is brought to life. How do we microdose wellness, together in community and for ourselves to take care of ourselves so we can, like everything you said, Becky, walk into 2025 with a new way kind of about our work. So friends, I feel like we've teed up Lindsey so well, but there is something you said, Lindsey, I love that we're not even letting you talk yet. Oh my gosh. Episode 513 you came into our house because we wanted to talk about retention. We wanted to talk about, what do we do? We look around our sectors burnt out. We're struggling. And what Lindsey is such a great teacher in this is that the firm hand here is she says, before you want to jump ship, look around and see if we can tend the soil together. That is a quote that will hang with us for all time.
Definitely one of the most quotable quotes of all time, like on this podcast, for sure.
Yeah, because we thought so much about it, like, personally, of like, how that hit us that, you know, sometimes we we want to fight through this together. We we see the light in each other, maybe on our team or in our community. And it's like we really want to be torch bearers of not just running away, but running into and having these harder conversations to really work through things together. And so Lindsey coming in with Gather at the Well, we're talking about a lot of the messy stuff in the middle, and she has unpacked this over five or six weeks. So without further ado, oh my gosh. My friend Lindsey, get in this house. Welcome back to the podcast.
Thank you so much. I'm loving that messy in the middle. That actually is a whole alliteration bar. Yeah, I'm so glad to be with you all, because we typically talk about, there's, there's a middle path. We usually don't see it. We often don't orient towards it. But when you think about any kind of binary, like, do I leave or do I stay? Like, probably there's a something in the middle, which is, I'm going to help to revolutionize the culture. We're going to paradigm shift it. We're going to turn it upside down. We're going to rewrite the rules for how to do work in a more balanced way. And, yeah, I'm just grateful to be here messy in the middle. I love that.
I like messy in the middle better than my hot mess express that I usually use. And the alliteration is not quite as good there.
Met us in the middle too. I mean, this is where we're at. Y'all, when we talk to Lindsey, we're also talking to the incredible team of The Teaching Well, it was just an honor for us to really elevate that team. And there's so many experts that are embedded that work together as a unit, too. And so I got a shout out ReBe, specifically. Rebecca Bernard. She has been a thought partner in bringing this series to life, and while she's not on the mic today, she is very much integral to all of this coming to be. So Rebe, we're giving you a shout out. She's coming on the podcast in January too.
Yeah, she's a pole blessing. That's our director of innovations, and I refer to her as actually my podcast doula. I don't know if y'all know that, but she is the podcast doula. She has been just instrumental in helping me embark on arguably the most vulnerable initiative that I've taken on professionally. And so without her, like, this isn't possible.
Yeah.
Well, we love you, Rebecca, I gotta, we're gonna start like loving on teaching. Well, we gotta give a shout out to Marisol, to Alia. I know Selna has helped us in the past. Just thank you so much for what you do, and I love that we're going to set some time today and actually talk about, how do we all contribute to how wellness is incorporated into our organization and our lives? Because I think that was one of the biggest takeaways from the podcast series, is that everything truly starts personal. So I'd love for you to just chat about, you know, what you're thinking through and navigating this year, this, what this series has brought up for you, you know, and Linds, as you've gone through this process, and I want everybody at home to be thinking about this. Jon, get ready to answer. But like, what is this stirred up for you? And what are we navigating? And what did this do for you Lindsey, being on the others I mean being on the actual host mic, and what are you seeing?
Yeah, you know, and Marisol and I often share about this publicly, but I'd say the hardest part of working at The Teaching Well is that you're surrounded by mirrors who are also deeply committed to their own healing journey, right? And so what that means is like you can't hide anymore. Even if you wanted to mask, you really can't, because there's just the most incredible group of people, I think about the African philosophy of Ubuntu, but just I am, because we are, like coming to The Teaching Well was an intervention for my life. I've shared that with you all before. It just has really forced me to reevaluate the relationship I have to work and to recommit to myself and my family and my long term longevity. So I think that the level of accountability that just working at a wellness organization has brought forward, right? Like I can't fake it. I'm on the public stage. It's bad for the brand if I'm burnt out, right? Which was evidently what I needed.
For all of us, literally true.
It is bad for the brand. And so I didn't realize it, but I really needed that level of professional accountability to get healthy and to stay disciplined with my wellness journey. But I'll say that launching Gather at the Well took it up a notch. The accountability got real, real, right? Because, like, I'm publishing the receipts of our efforts to truly be a human centered organization, so that that's been a really interesting process. I also think what one of my largest takeaways was, I had this hunch, we needed a podcast that teaches. We don't need more thought leaders. We need change leaders, and we need scaffolding and instruction for how to do that in our organization within the specific contexts, and that idea now was really solidified. It's just true, like folks are constantly asking us, but how do we do that? And these aren't trade secrets. They're not trade secrets. They're nothing that we should be hoarding and saving just for our own organizations, if you've figured out a way to sustain and retain your team, shout it from the mountaintops. Why wouldn't we all want that information to be public? So I think that's something I'm really sitting with.
Well, I appreciate you leaning into I mean, we've talked about how vulnerable of a space it is. I mean, you also did a so this was a solo podcast, and y'all, if you're listening, saying, What is Gather at the Well, like, zoom back. It's dropped in feed over the last like, 10 weeks, every other week, on Wednesdays.
It will change your life. I'm not even being facetious with that. It has truly changed me.
And we're hearing from our community all the time, like, how it's all about this micro dose of wellness. So it's like, how do we find these small moments, these 1% shifts that actually do add up over time. You know, like putting in the actual work to to get to a better place.
So, you know, one other thing I have really been grappling with and and when and how to share this, but I'm facilitating this whole podcast for y'all on microdosing wellness and actually across the first several episodes, I hit a burnout window, and I want to share that. I want to share that with with anybody who has been following and listening and participating and joining us in community, because it doesn't matter that I'm the executive director of a wellness organization, right? I too, can succumb to over-extension and to the real consequences of fatigue and chronic stress, and so that was a part that was hard for me. I really wanted to always be authentic and true, and that's why episode two, which has gotten a lot of shine, talking about the stressors of travel, that was so personal in that moment, because I did six flights in six weeks, and by the end of it, I was exhausted. And yes, we did all the could someone else go? And is this really based on my position and role. You know, were these trips that were absolutely mandatory, and they were and I was so run down trying to talk to others about micro dosing wellness. And what I'll say is, over episode three and four, I managed to climb back out, and that is the power of micro dosing wellness, right? It's like I hit a point of exhaustion and I knew what worked for me, and I built myself, SST, teachers, self, your support team, your right, student support team, but really for yourself. And I built an intervention plan, and I adhered to it. I roped in who needed to be involved, and I climbed back out all of that happened during these recording windows. So it's
Had no idea, couldn't tell, which tells me, you know, that micro dosing wellness can be that big of a game change, because while we're being vulnerable, you know, I've had an incredibly difficult year, personally and at home. And ironically, this series hit at a time when I needed it the most, and I've recently found out that I am ADHD and maybe on the spectrum somewhere, and I have realized my whole life has been so much masking that I wasn't even aware I was doing and so this knowing thyself while trying to know how to raise your children, while knowing how to put some boundaries in place as a working professional and a working mom, and I will tell you all in 100% honesty the week after impact, up in October, there were three weeks that I probably didn't work more than three hours a day for almost a month because I was that burned out. I was that personally, emotionally and mentally exhausted, and I just laid, I literally just laid on my couch, I went for some walks, I spent time with my dog, I read, but mostly I just laid y'all and I breathed and I did talk therapy, and I have so much better as we are recording this now, because those little microdosing. moments matter.
Yeah, that low key sounds like a macro but that a little bit sounds like more of a macro intervention. But when you think about one month out of how many years?
Yeah, 45.
Like, that's what, right like, that's the thing. And what would be true if we had community and and professional and maybe even government support to be able to engage in an intervention before we have kids just just like dream with me for a moment doing work differently and doing adulting differently, like what you're naming, the amount of late stage diagnoses that are coming for millennial. And what is it Gen X?
Gen X, baby.
Yeah, the amount of clients that we have and colleagues that I have that are currently being assessed and evaluated while trying to raise children, I'm like, how do we get a little pre intervention before we start building tiny humans and caring for them. We need to get our own lives. And that's kind of the essence of this podcast series too. Is like, get your org right before you go out to do service work. Get yourself right as a leader before you're trying to lead others right. Do the work first. It's me, we, world.
I'm loving this Convo because I mean, taking you a little BTS over here. You know, our family's been on a full time family road trip since last,
BTS, behind the scense.
Not the band, or maybe both. Like last December, we've been full time travel with, you know, we're seeing all these national parks and,
Happy anniversary.
Yeah, thanks, it's coming up. But blending the life and the family and like this dream slash goal together with the career goals and aspirations and then the personal and like, kind of the lack of personal space this last year has been like this perfect storm of all these things coming together and what's bubbled up for me, and I learned this summer spending time at the Plenty retreat. So shout out to Jeff shuck Jennifer Mulholland, thanks for having us out for the Plenty retreat. It was about, you know, conscious leadership. It was really meditating on this idea of like we have one life, and not like in a YOLO sense, although that's a whole different conversation, but like, we have one existence. And something I love about the way you teach Lindsay is that we're not trying to say, what does professional Lindsay over here do? It's like, it's we show up in our messiness as humans, and especially talking to leaders. You know, this last episode, when you talked about the me, we world, you know. How do we lead through macro events like a really contentious election or really whatever's happening in your community that's really a hot bed, and you wake up the next day and you're there to lead, you know? But you also have to acknowledge, like, we've got to take care of our own soul, human first, so we can actually go outward from there. And I think this all just kind of like threads together, and it's very counter to how I spent the first half of my career thinking, Okay, I wear khakis to work and I act this certain way, and then at home, I, you know, have these other pieces, but it's got to tend to ourselves, because the same human moving from whatever we're facing during the day into how we walk into the home at night, and how we show up on the weekends too. And I just think that there's something that's moving toward a life that I want to be in, you know, like of having one life and realizing that so that's that's really been prevalent for me, and it's just come together with everything that you've taught through this series. So thank you for that.
Yeah, I feel like, you know, one realization I had when I transitioned to The Teaching Well was that I was convinced I wouldn't have a long life, which you're like, sorry, everybody that's listening, but I was just, I was convinced of it, no, but I was just like, You know what? It's just this. I have too much trauma. I have the stress. If you look at the research on trauma like it does impact your lifespan, right? I'm just like, and I was in this place of wanting to shift from victim to survivor, which is a theme in my life. Whenever I feel weighed down, I want to reorient to my agency, which I talk about a lot in the podcast series. So one thing I was like, I need to figure out how to heal some of the deeper trauma wounds. But I also can't always, you know, go on a month long retreat to another country without my kids and like, we're surrounded by therapists, and just like girl, heal all the child wounds, it's just it's not going to happen. So that the concept of micro dosing wellness, which really started several years ago, a personal musing that I then started to name in The Teaching Well, was like, how do I build a life I don't need to heal from, which later evolved to us helping build professional cultures we don't need to heal from. But how do I extend my life? Like what, what is in the locus of my control? Like, how do I want to eat? How do I want to sleep? How do I want to be in relationship to movement, right? How do I want to nurture relationships that that really pour in the just pull out. I actually just saw this quote the other day, because y'all know I've been talking about the lies they tell with self care and what self care is, and that it's always just like this capitalist pursuit, but I saw this quote that said, removing your presence from places you don't feel loved, valued or respected is top tier self care.
Whoa, okay. Say it again. Say it again.
Removing your presence from places that where you don't feel loved, valued or respected is top tier self care. There you go. And I was like, yeah, right, like some of these relationships, my relationship to work, but also the workplace I was in were not creating the conditions for embodied self care, and I can keep doing collective care, but I actually need both. So Jon, I just think that what you're what you're naming, and when I look back at my one life, the desire to not have regrets, right? Like composting that mom guilt, finding some balance, not a 50/50 because that's the other thing I've learned about myself and articulating my experience currently at The Teaching Well, I love work.
Yeah, me too.
But, I, but I also I feel like that's a little bit demonized at this point, like folks are like, Oh, that's so unhealthy. And I'm like, No, I actually just love and am passionate about serving my community. I love to wake up and love to work. I love who I work with. I love the work I get to do. I love it so much that sometimes it doesn't feel like work, which means I have an extra responsibility to find boundaries for myself, because I enjoy what I do so much, and I want my children, and I've told them, find what you love to do that helps your community. And I'll be proud no matter what your profession is. You know, you know,
something that stuck out to me, because I want to get into some of these, like big takeaways that we've taken from the show, is that I just kind of alluded to that we have one life. And you know, I think because I live in such close proximity to my family, so if you didn't know, we're living in a 28 foot Airstream and traveling the country together. So I've become acutely aware of like since your keynote, specifically, but what called out to me that I didn't need to be 42 to understand this is that when you don't have rest modeled to you, you know, you show you grow up, kind of doing the same thing that maybe you, you know, inherited. But this is a chance to say, starting today, like, how do I start to relearn some of these things? And so it really stuck out to me what you shared that day of like, this is our chance to actually be that change, the simple shift of, you know, Sundays are a different kind of chill around here, you know. And we can have those slower times together. And I don't want my kids to think that I just literally was connected to the laptop, and I'm saying, Get off your screen at the same time, you know.
Okay, all right, come on, Jon, this is a testimony, yeah, and I might invite all the folks listening, like, after that keynote. I mean, that keynote was a whole intervention too, okay, therapeutic invitation. I was like, Oh, I didn't know I needed that. But what I've been reflecting on since is, what are the five to 10 things I want my children to be able to say mama always did, or mama showed us how, and I've been praying and meditating on that ever since that keynote, right like, you know, Mama napped, she she showed us how to rest. Mama loved to take care of her community. She worked hard. Mama and Daddy chose each other and stayed in love. They fought to stay in love. Like, when my girls are like, ew, Daddy's kissing Mommy, I'm like, good. Know that I'm in a love filled relationship, and that's what I want for you too, right? So I've just been really meditating on this and praying on this. And, you know, I think that, like, we're 42 so is it too late, right? Or, you know, it's not the new year. I think it's so toxic New York, New Year's resolutions, and the culture of, like, gotta wait till the first of the month, yeah? And it'll be like, the fourth of the month. And we're like, I'm gonna restart eating healthy on the first Okay? And you're like, you got like, 26 days left, okay? But, like, I was just telling my husband yesterday, like I am an athlete. I played multiple varsity sports, I went to college, and that was, like, a part of what I wanted to do as well. And I've really lost my relationship with fitness for fun. I don't want to feel like it's a punishment. I walk past my peloton, which I begged him for, and I'm like, Hey girl, see you never and I don't use her because I've realized I miss like going to classes and being in person and and coming home sweaty. And I want that to be one of the things that my girls say is like, Mama moved her body and she had fun doing it, not that there's a relationship with like weight or body image or fitness, that's punishing, right? So, yeah, I just it's the beginning of December, and I'm going to purchase a couple of classes and try it out before my new year resolution, because that doesn't matter. That's a false start. I want to micro dose right now how I move my body.
Okay. Can we riff for a second about another takeaway from this series that's really cut through to me is the power of the somatic. Okay? This is so Lindsey Fuller, who you've come in and literally created pauses in this in this podcast. If this is a new term for you. It was new to me. It's just like these Mind Body practices that we can target to areas that we're feeling stressed or tension, literally, where are you feeling it in your body? And there's some somatic practices that can help bring awareness embodiment and feeling better, like moving forward for the rest of the day. And so I gotta lift this, because this has stuck out so much that I keep hearing this in our community too. I was talking to Amina Mohammed, the founder of Cameras for Girls, just like last week, or maybe the week before, and she says, Oh my gosh, I've been loving Lindsey's podcast so much. And what stuck out to me is these, like somatic pauses, and it's something that I've realized is something really easy, I can add into just how we show up in meetings. And so when she's working with the girls in Uganda, creating these like moments for teaching and whatnot, they take pauses now to have a somatic pause, whether it's breath work or whether it's the pauses, Or, my personal favorite, the ocular reset, which is like, so great. Like, how do we move into adding these into places where we all just need that moment, that breath, and I think you're teaching this in such a beautiful way. So just had to lift that.
Yeah, I appreciate that. And I'll just add, when I came to The Teaching Well, it was actually a place of uncertainty or insecurity for me. I'm like, Oh, this is a group of healers, right? That's what we've done in the industry. There's like, the in crowd and the out crowd, the folks that have done it for long enough and have their certifications, yeah, have been blessed right by, like, someone's Auntie's cousin's, like, greatest healing curandera. And I'm like, I love that for you, I first of all had to come in and and really research, because I was like, am I? Like, I don't have any experience. That's what that was a lie. Prayer is a somatic and I've been praying for a long time, right? Like my body movement, some of the trauma healing work I did with progressive muscle relaxation, I had been doing for years. I just hadn't been healing out loud. And so I had this whole grappling with, like, am I somatic enough, right? And coming to the podcast, I'm sure there are somatic experts who go to silent retreats and no knock I love that for them, and have been certified for over a decade, who might be like, I don't know. She made that up. You know what? So many of them I have. And actually, I'm kind of proud of that, not in a ego way, but more of a
Accessible.
Like, you know
I found something that works for me? Yes.
And like, don't we want people to innovate and play and practice and be messy in their healing? Like, why are we trying to rank people's expertise? So to any of the somatic experts out there, I honor you, and I, I, I believe in the work, and also I'm going to get it wrong, and that's more of what I think we need modeled. Then go and spend 1000s of dollars on a certification also do that. But I don't have concrete somatic receipts. I just have experience and evidence of my own healing.
Like the first 20 seconds that I met you, you asked if you could start our relationship off by doing a somatic exercise. And I knew in that instant after I we were done breathing, I was like, we're going to be good friends, because I just think that setting the tone in that way. And I'm talking to you leaders right now, setting the tone of a meeting, setting the tone of a zoom, where it's not about how we're going to just pile drive into this task list of things that we need to take care of. It's like, whoa, whoa. How are you doing? Let's level set. Let's make sure everybody's okay. And lens, I just sit here and think about like the listener at the end. You know, listening to this podcast right now, and I want to be really tactical for them. They're in the middle of year end, they're getting ready for a new year. What are three simple practices you might recommend to help people start the new year in a more grounded state for their well being next year? What do you have?
I mean, there's so many, right? But first of all, like, shout out to all the sleep groupies. Become a study of your own sleep. You are not getting enough sleep. You are not getting good enough sleep unless you're Marisol Pineda Conde, my deputy director, who, like, literally lays down and she will wake up in the same position. And I just love that for her. But. If you have sleep envy of anyone in your life, I would say, study your sleep. Figure out what you need to do. Sleep is vital. And I would add in that same vein, so many of us set goals around fitness and food for the New Years, and that's wonderful for me. I'm like sleep and hydration. I just, I don't feel like we talk about them enough. So do your thing. But I would just say there are some basic health tenants that we all need to recommit to, and we need to start having much more frank conversations about what's happening when we are experiencing, experiencing exhaustion, yeah, and how to climb out of it. I would say that audible exhale is just critical. And I am so pleased that my five year old, in particular, Aaliyah, has really taken to this. So we'll be in the car. She's like, ah, let's make a noisy exhale, everyone. And we're like,
I love that,
because that natural pressure valve release is just so good. Yes, affirm her. I see you queen. So I would say audible, exhaling and sighing across your work day when you're in commute real time, when you're in a moment of stress, critical. And then I think for me, I've just really benefited a lot from tense and release or working with the hands, right? Like so isolating the place on your body where you recognize hold stress, right? Whether it by because you're using it so much like your hands, or if it's your neck, it's your shoulders, it's your feet, it's your forearms, and actually customizing your somatics to target that location. And if you put all that together and you're out, you're a hydrated queen that is well rested, you can make noisy exhales, and you have a couple somatics to target your stress areas, I think you're going to experience a radically different you, and I love that for you,
Yup.
I mean, so good Lindsey, and I shared that I've gotten to be witness to watching this whole thing get recorded, and get to see the messy, like construction of this. And so it's beautiful to me to watch you talk about, not only like your family, because you light up your team, where you light up your co-conspirators, like there's so much love in that, in those different units, but I'm cap I'm really caught with how you pour into PD as a result of that. And I think professional development to me used to seem like this very transactional thing, like whatever I wanted to learn, we would go to a conference, and then maybe we would hear about it from if someone on our team went but the way that y'all live and breathe and move as a team. At The Teaching Well, is like PD is part of your like, the way you show up, and I love how you know you. It seems like you're a growing organism together. And I think that's just so beautiful. And it's really like reset in my mind, what I think healthy PD professional development looks like on a team. So I wonder if you'd riff about that, because I think y'all are really amazing at it.
Yeah, if it could have been an email, then just have it be a memo.
Please.
Please. It's, it's giving webinar. I'm just like, how many people show up? And the staff meeting is actually like a list of updates. So I just think, what inspires me to stay and to grow in both the social sector as well as in education is that I'm a forever learner, right? That I value not only teaching but also being a student. And so when we get to learn and grow together, it's hella fun. I just, I don't, I don't know how else to describe it, other than like I have the distinct honor of witnessing my team's professional and personal growth, because we build human centered explorations and practices into our professional development. Who I am working with today is not who I was working with four years ago, not because they weren't here, but because they are literally growing, healing, loving, learning. It is. It's so dynamic, and so some of the technical elements, right? Or that we we do. We spend three hours a week nine to 12 on Tuesdays, we rotate who does somatic openings and check ins. We do have a cadence, right? So if you want to know more about that, hit us up. But there's, there is an org update on the first one, and then we have multiple focus areas that we study each year together to learn and grow, and we try and make sure there are a lot of different voices and multiple modalities. So we're in breakout rooms. We are doing scenario analysis, we are recording videos. We are analyzing and doing consultancies around client pain point. It's, there's so much that we're doing together, and it makes us better. And I love it.
I mean, do the math that is like 8% of your work week or something. I mean, you know, like, that's a solid chunk of every week dedicated to learning and growth in community like that is amazing.
And I would even say it shows, like I can see the evolution of your team and I and I think that's what I want to make sure that I say right here, because I feel like I was aging through my 20s and my 30s and part of my 40s, but I don't know that I was growing, if you know what I mean. And so I was learning new things, but I was not self actualizing. And I think that there is something about if you want to be a human of evolution, if you want to grow and get better every day, if you want to live your to Jon's point, one most essential, one most vibrant life. Then there has to be this active output and activation of growth and evolution, and the fact that you have worked it as not a check the box as, oh, this is is going to help us breathe, physically, metaphorically, emotionally. I just think it's amazing.
Well, that was a whole bar, and we need to write up and do an interpretive dance on that. But I will say I talk to EDs and board members specifically in the social sector that think I'm nuts for dedicating that much time and paying my people to be off the floor. But not only does it reinforce our org culture and relationships, because as a hybrid, mostly remote organization, this is the glue to our team, but it also provides incredible amounts of sustainability, not just for myself as the leader, but also for my supervisory team, because it gives a weekly touch point to recalibrate, to align, to ensure that folks aren't in long suffering around questions or curiosities or pain points, that there is a felt safety net of support and rigorous development. And that is retention. It is decreasing work for me, it is making my job more effective, and it is making my teammates jobs more effective. And when we experience that level of efficacy, why would we leave? Why wouldn't we double down for our clients in our community? Right? We're getting better results because we're pouring into ourselves and each other, and that feels, that feels like something I want to get behind and stay behind so I will.
And, stay in the work. Yeah, tend that soil, that's it. And, and I just think that you talked earlier, Jon about, you know, what starts here ripples. And I think when you have a mentality of pouring into your team in that way, and into yourself without guilt, without shame, when you can embrace that, that is going to ripple. And I don't just mean in the moment, I think that that is going to pay such dividends to you. It is core value number two for us, which is playing the long game, because we want you in this work, as long as we have your vibrancy here. But I also believe this is community is everything. And we talked at ImpactUP: PAUSE, that this is community care and embracing wellness for yourself and your team is building this community of care. And as we're winding down, I got to give you the first right to jump in here and give your one good thing Linds. But as we're kind of putting a bow on all of this, how would you tie up this series, this experience, this moment that we're standing in, into a one good thing?
It's so hard.
to say goodbye.
Okay. I'll just, I'll start with an unpopular belief, but I promise I'll get to my one good thing. One of the ways I know I'm in the healthiest work culture I have ever been in is that it's making my personal relationships a little tricky. What I mean by that is not that I'm toxically spilling in my personal life because of my workplace stressors, but actually the caliber of my teammates, their commitment to themselves, but also to my healing and the ways that we heal out loud as a collective, have raised my standard and my bar around what I expect relationally from others, and so if you're not absolutely cheering when you hear a you know a colleague is like I went to therapy. I had a major break. Through. I'm not going to spill all of it, okay, professional authenticity, but, but I'm going to share this. And here are the concrete behaviors that I'm doing now. And this is all the lightness that I feel my health has improved. Our team, literally, like shouts, screams, dances, affirms. I'm finding that a lot of teammates in The Teaching Well are turning to each other to share these major life wins, and some of us aren't getting that level of healing cheerleading in our personal lives, and we deserve it, and I, I demand it now, and so I just want to name that we talk a lot about the indicators of unhealthy workplaces, and maybe there's a follow up series here. But what are actually the pro social, positive indicators of workplace well being, and how do they ripple into your personal, professional and broader lives? We'll talk about that later. But I think my overall one good thing, kind of, you know, linking back to the other podcast episode where we said maybe before you leave, because you assume the grass is greener, you can stay in tend to the soil. I think we need to find the messy middle. That's how we started this, this episode, right? Yeah, but I love the idea of a sabbatical. I love the idea of being able to completely shift every system. I love more the idea of micro dosing, wellness and finding the messy middle. Last year, we started piloting something called a supervision sabbatical. It is literally the idea that we can take rest and break from a responsibility, a duty or a an initiative inside of our organization. It doesn't mean you need to leave the org. It doesn't mean you're getting demoted. It doesn't mean you need to take a pay cut. It means I've micro dosed wellness, and yet I still feel out of balance, and this one particular part of my work is what is contributing the most to my stress and fatigue. I need a break from that in lieu of, I need a break from working altogether, in lieu of, I need a break from this job in lieu of, I need to leave this profession or this company. And I would love to invite all of us to figure out innovative ways for the messy middle to live, for us to micro and macro dose wellness and to be able to embed sabbaticals across our life without having to upend the company's health. There's just a different way forward. I feel like we are on the verge of figuring it out together, and my one good thing is just when we choose each other, we can do hard things and that likely there is a middle path, something we haven't identified yet, that when we put all of our brilliance together, we can figure out a way to stay in the work make the impact we want and and love our life while doing it.
Holy heck. So good. Jon, how you gonna come alongside that one?
I'm not following that.
I quickly grab it and put the steering wheel so I wouldn't have to go next.
You know, mine's very simple, but it's something that stuck out to me this whole series is that proactivity is the way. And I think, you know, everything feels like very reactionary we're trying to solve for today's crises. And like, I think this series gives a window into how much better like, life could be if we just took stock of, like, what are we trying to build to? What is the life that we're trying to build to? What are the relationships we want to build to, and be taking the proactive steps to get there, and not feeling like the defeat, but feeling like the what's possible. And maybe that's your optimist friend over here that likes to kind of sit on this side of that, but I just think it's the way, you know, and I just think that you've laid out so many guides and so many resources in this series. So my one good thing also is, if you haven't listened, like, go listen to the five episodes. Hopefully you'll have some some time over the next few weeks to like, we're not dropping a bunch of episodes. We're not adding to the overwhelm here on the We Are For Good feed. Like, queue these up because there's something proactively that you can do, and especially thinking about the new year ahead, that could result in compounding long game kind of effects for you and your life.
Come on proactivity. We love the proactivity. It's like, it's refueling your tank before you're completely on. E.
That's it.
Yeah.
It's like sustainability snacking so you don't get hangry and burnt out. Okay.
Yeah, Well, okay, B you bring us home.
No, I'm sad I went after you, because that was so strong, but so good. And I'm so glad that you can that we're telling and talking about this in such a holistic way. I'm so glad that we can come into this space, and I can look at my two friends and say thank you for creating the safe space for me to talk about my crap and your crap, and we're all, you know, sifting through it. And I hope you listening right now feel as much that you're around this hearth you know that we are in right now, because my one good thing, really, I'm bringing up the moment that stuck with me the most out of this series. I think it was in the first episode Lindsay, where you were talking about liberatory leaders. And in my mind, I'm tattling on myself again. I was like, Oh yeah, I think I'm one of those. And as you're going through it, I was like, Oh crap. I got some work to do, because you might know what that means to be a liberatory leader for yourself and but Lindsey saying, what is the evidence that you are if you have no self care, if you're taking no sick days, if you're taking no time off, if you're not modeling that which you are trying to receive for your staff, then you got some work to do. And friend, that was my cue that I've got to do something different. And I saw this beautiful quote from C.S. Lewis I wanted to share with everybody. And he says, if you're on the wrong road, progress means doing an About turn and walking back to the right road. And in that case, the person who turns back soonest is the most progressive person. So I'm telling you right now, if you feel like you're on the wrong road, which I feel like I've been navigating ever since We Are For Good, turned on this this power switch and turned this podcast mic on, because the more you listen to other people, the more you start to listen to yourself. You will feel the shift you will feel growth, not aging, but growth. I'm in the middle of it, and I am telling you friends, that once we start to be the action to Jon's point, that we can start to bring others with us to Lindsey's one good thing that is when the shift begins to really make a difference, personally, intergenerationally, I think, culturally. And so I'm just asking you to join me on that progressive travel, to turn back to where we need to go and start from there.
I just took my tambourine out.
Little triangle. Let's go.
That's the Black church reference. Sorry y'all. With the whole testimony.
I'm learning, guys, I'm just grateful to be doing it alongside all of you. I love you dearly. And this work is a journey, and I know I want to stay in it. You all want to stay in it. You listening. I hope you want to stay in it, because we need you, but we need you to be healthy and we need you to take care of yourself to do so let's do that in 2025 if you haven't started already.
Okay as we wrap up, we got to point to some of these resources, because we've already pointed you to the podcast. If you've not listened, check it out on the feed, or go to, weareforgood.com/gather. You can find all the episodes there. But Lindsey, y'all's team has been building resources like you, the scaffolding we talk about like y'all are not only teaching. You're giving us like playbooks, documents, PDFs,
The meeting, the wellness meeting, and your meeting agenda is such a good takeaway. Yes, we'll link to that.
Yeah, at the teachingwell.org/blog, you will find a blog that matches each of the episodes, as well as embedded resources, like freebies, PDFs you can download. We also have a free somatic video on our digital mindful toolkit page. So if you are someone that was like, okay, I'd like to see more of this. There is a full resource for you to share with your team with embedded check in questions. You don't have to plan anything. You just have to believe enough in getting yourself and your team well, and we've got your your back. So keep visiting us online.
My friend. I mean, our hearts are full. This community has not only just rallied around this, it's been balm to this community, thank you for your work, for your vulnerability, your team's precious time pouring into this project. We're just so grateful to be in this together. Appreciate you.
Love you dearly. Happy New Year to all of you out there. Take care of yourself, build in some rest over the holiday period, and yeah, start working on that new path of wellness for yourself and for others. We believe in it, and we believe it can literally change everything.
