Latest / QUESTION EVERYTHING / How to Recognize Opportunities In Unexpected Places: with Aurora James (Wildflower)

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How to Recognize Opportunities In Unexpected Places: with Aurora James (Wildflower) · QUESTION EVERYTHING

0:04
Speaker 1: Big things happen when you're pretty, pretty bold, pretty clever,
0:08
Speaker 1: pretty strong. I'm Danielle Robe and each week my guests
0:12
Speaker 1: and I have conversations that.
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Speaker 2: Put a new spin on pretty. This is pretty smart courage.
0:21
Speaker 1: Courage is something that can show up in a lot
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Speaker 1: of different ways. Sometimes it's an act of nobility, like
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Speaker 1: telling someone powerful something they don't want to hear to
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Speaker 1: help out a friend. Sometimes it's a personal risk, like
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Speaker 1: when Rosa Parks said she wasn't moving from her seat.
0:35
Speaker 2: On that bus.
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Speaker 1: And sometimes it's an act of intentionality, like saying no,
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Speaker 1: disappointing others because you have your eye on a goal.
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Speaker 1: And to be courageous, you can be any one of those,
0:49
Speaker 1: but to be a courageous woman it usually requires all
0:52
Speaker 1: three of those things. Courage is taking that first step
0:56
Speaker 1: into the unknown, and to be a courageous woman usually
1:01
Speaker 1: means that you have somehow been able to throw out obligation, expectation,
1:05
Speaker 1: and guidelines. It's something I hope I would be able
1:09
Speaker 1: to conjure up in me. I think I would for
1:12
Speaker 1: an act of nobility. I have a thing for an underdog,
1:16
Speaker 1: but to throw away obligation, expectations, societal norms.
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Speaker 2: I'm just not sure.
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Speaker 1: I have a streak of traditionalism in me, and I
1:24
Speaker 1: don't know where that places me necessarily on a scale
1:28
Speaker 1: of courage. What I do know is that when I
1:31
Speaker 1: see a woman who lives courageously, my eyes lock in.
1:36
Speaker 1: I want to know her story. Our guest today has courage.
1:44
Speaker 1: Aurora James was once asked by Anna Wintour, the editor
1:47
Speaker 1: in chief of Vogue, are you going to be an
1:50
Speaker 1: activist or are you going to be a designer?
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Speaker 2: Her answer, respectfully, I think I can be both.
1:58
Speaker 1: When we talk about someone leaving their mark on the world,
2:00
Speaker 1: those conversations are often ripe with hyperbole. How do you
2:03
Speaker 1: really go about changing an industry or becoming a beacon
2:07
Speaker 1: of reinvention? We say it about people all the time,
2:10
Speaker 1: but what does it actually take to be the change
2:14
Speaker 1: you want to see? It takes courage. There's a quote
2:19
Speaker 1: I heard recently by Sue Hadfield. It takes courage to
2:23
Speaker 1: examine your life and decide that there are things you'd
2:26
Speaker 1: like to change, and it takes even more courage to
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Speaker 1: do something about it. Aurora James is redefining what it
2:33
Speaker 1: means to be a major player in the fashion industry.
2:36
Speaker 1: She's the founder of brother Velli's, a black owned and
2:39
Speaker 1: female led luxury brand. She also founded the fifteen Percent Pledge,
2:44
Speaker 1: a call to action for retailers and corporations to devote
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Speaker 1: fifteen percent of their shelf space to black owned brands.
2:51
Speaker 1: The fifteen Percent Pledge made a real impact. Her efforts
2:55
Speaker 1: there have created a pipeline worth over ten billion dollars
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Speaker 1: to black owned businesses. Aurora details how she did all
3:03
Speaker 1: this in her new memoir called Wildflower. So Yeah, she
3:08
Speaker 1: shares the highs because they're interesting, but she has the
3:12
Speaker 1: courage to share the hard stuff too. In eating disorder
3:16
Speaker 1: a very complicated relationship with her mom, she even talks
3:20
Speaker 1: about the time she was arrested for street racing. Aurora
3:24
Speaker 1: is rewriting the rules of what it means to have
3:26
Speaker 1: a sustainable fashion line, but her ultimate goal doesn't have
3:30
Speaker 1: anything to do with glamour or awards. It's to create meaningful,
3:35
Speaker 1: real lasting change for people in the US and beyond.
3:46
Speaker 1: So I usually never ask this question because I think
3:50
Speaker 1: it's a little basic. However, I cannot find mention of
3:54
Speaker 1: this anywhere in your book or online, So I want
3:58
Speaker 1: to start with the title of your memoir, which is Wildflower.
4:02
Speaker 1: And I want to know why it was significant to you.
4:04
Speaker 1: Why'd you choose that title?
4:06
Speaker 3: Yeah, thanks for asking. So I had a really tough
4:09
Speaker 3: time choosing the title, and I kept going back to
4:11
Speaker 3: this experience that I had with my mom when I
4:14
Speaker 3: was little. We used to make these things called seed bombs.
4:17
Speaker 3: Do you know what that is?
4:18
Speaker 2: No?
4:19
Speaker 3: Okay? So we would take wildflower seeds and we would
4:22
Speaker 3: put that with clay and dirt and we would roll
4:24
Speaker 3: it together into these little balls, and then we would
4:27
Speaker 3: have them in the car when we were going on
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Speaker 3: road trips or just driving around. And whenever we would
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Speaker 3: see like an abandoned piece of land it just looked
4:34
Speaker 3: like it needed a little bit of love or something,
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Speaker 3: we would yell seed bomb, and we would throw a
4:38
Speaker 3: seed bomb out the window into a field and we
4:41
Speaker 3: would know that in a couple of weeks there would
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Speaker 3: be flowers that were blooming there. And I think for me,
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Speaker 3: it's about really the idea of seeing the opportunity in
4:55
Speaker 3: like the ugly parts and ugly places, right, or the
4:59
Speaker 3: places that have been forgot are left behind, and also
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Speaker 3: just knowing that like you can bloom in unexpected places, right,
5:08
Speaker 3: and you can rely on the world to give you
5:10
Speaker 3: what you need if you are showing up in the
5:13
Speaker 3: space that you're meant to be in, right, and that
5:16
Speaker 3: it's not always going to be pretty, it's not always
5:18
Speaker 3: going to be as planned it and sometimes the wind
5:20
Speaker 3: might carry us into a totally different location than what
5:23
Speaker 3: we originally planned on. But if you can just be
5:26
Speaker 3: in alignment with things and be true to yourself no
5:31
Speaker 3: matter where you are, I think that that's where the
5:33
Speaker 3: beauty is.
5:35
Speaker 1: That's a beautiful answer because as you were talking about it,
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Speaker 1: I also was thinking that you plant seeds in places
5:43
Speaker 1: and don't see them bloom for years, because activism is
5:48
Speaker 1: a long game, and so there's also this sort of
5:51
Speaker 1: metaphor there.
5:52
Speaker 2: It feels like the investment.
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Speaker 3: Absolutely and a lot of times you have to be
5:57
Speaker 3: planting seeds for other people.
5:59
Speaker 2: Yeah.
6:00
Speaker 3: Right, It's like a lot of those seaboms we threw
6:02
Speaker 3: out of the window, we were never going to see
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Speaker 3: those flowers like actually come to bloom. Right. But how
6:08
Speaker 3: much of what we put out in the world do
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Speaker 3: we do for others versus ourselves? Right, Like, we need
6:13
Speaker 3: to think about that too. It's not just about us
6:15
Speaker 3: as individuals. It's also about our community, and I think
6:19
Speaker 3: that's where a lot of the beauty is for me.
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Speaker 1: I really liked learning about your childhood and you said
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Speaker 1: that fashion was a great unifier in your house growing up,
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Speaker 1: which was different from me because I didn't have that
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Speaker 1: at all. So I wanted to know what you learned
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Speaker 1: from the women in your life about fashion and the
6:39
Speaker 1: ideas that you took with you that either inspired your
6:43
Speaker 1: own fashion or some that some ideas that you came
6:45
Speaker 1: up with on your own.
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Speaker 3: Yeah. So my grandmother had like a very particular relationship
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Speaker 3: with fashion. She was like ultraw, waspy and like loved
6:53
Speaker 3: an Oscar de laurent To look, do you know what
6:55
Speaker 3: I mean? Loved Carolina Herrera flower prints, Like she was
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Speaker 3: that girl all you know, like big earrings, like roller
7:02
Speaker 3: sets in the hair, like lots of blush, Like she
7:06
Speaker 3: would apply blush in this like furious way that like
7:09
Speaker 3: swept like across her cheeks and like up to the
7:11
Speaker 3: hair right by the ears a little bit. So her
7:14
Speaker 3: hair was like this brilliant gray white, but like right
7:16
Speaker 3: by the ear sometimes would be a little bit pink
7:18
Speaker 3: from like the blush residue strokes. And you know, for
7:22
Speaker 3: her fashion was just this like very fabulous, glamorous, Like
7:25
Speaker 3: she never wore jeans a day in her life, so
7:27
Speaker 3: it was really like, you know, what do you wear
7:30
Speaker 3: to church on Sunday? You know? And I thought that
7:34
Speaker 3: she was like particularly wealthy or anything like that. But
7:37
Speaker 3: she would buy a dress and have that dress for
7:39
Speaker 3: twenty thirty years, you know, and like have it in
7:41
Speaker 3: her rotation to take good care of things, men things,
7:44
Speaker 3: and really be thoughtful about how those things looked on her.
7:47
Speaker 3: And she would put on a dress and she would
7:49
Speaker 3: just hold herself differently, you know. And so when I
7:53
Speaker 3: would watch fashion jobs with her, she would be like
7:56
Speaker 3: really transported by how beautiful it was or how the
7:58
Speaker 3: women on the runway looked and how they presented themselves
8:01
Speaker 3: in it, how they embodied the designs right versus my mom,
8:06
Speaker 3: who like never wanted to shave her legs or like
8:10
Speaker 3: conform to anything that felt like it was part of
8:12
Speaker 3: the patriarchy, would be like, well, what is this designers?
8:15
Speaker 3: What is their sociopolitical message that they're making with this
8:18
Speaker 3: fashion show? You know what I mean? Like, Oh, what
8:20
Speaker 3: was the location, what was the venue? Why did they
8:22
Speaker 3: choose that? Oh? Who was in the front rope. Lauria Steine,
8:25
Speaker 3: I'm fascinating, you know. It was like a very different
8:28
Speaker 3: lens of which we would watch our own little version
8:32
Speaker 3: of the Super Bowl.
8:34
Speaker 1: It's so interesting because you've really melded the two together,
8:38
Speaker 1: which is very cool.
8:40
Speaker 3: You know.
8:40
Speaker 1: I was kind of surprised to learn that you weren't
8:42
Speaker 1: a great student always, because you strike me as somebody
8:46
Speaker 1: who's just excellent.
8:48
Speaker 2: All the time, so it was kind of interesting to learn.
8:51
Speaker 1: But you said that when you were in school you
8:53
Speaker 1: felt underestimated. And I saw yesterday this beautiful clip from
8:58
Speaker 1: the Kelly Clarkson Show and the fawns from Oh my gosh.
9:01
Speaker 3: I don't even know that person, say, I know you're
9:03
Speaker 3: talking about though.
9:04
Speaker 2: He's like the most kind man. Every time I interviewed him.
9:07
Speaker 2: He has a wise word.
9:08
Speaker 1: And Kelly said, you know that her daughter was being
9:11
Speaker 1: bullied for not being being able to read well, and
9:14
Speaker 1: he said into the camera, you know, just because you
9:18
Speaker 1: learn a different way doesn't make you any less brilliant.
9:21
Speaker 1: And it caught fire on the internet because I think
9:24
Speaker 1: we're finally starting to talk about different ways to learn
9:27
Speaker 1: and different different intellects, different brilliance. There's so many different
9:32
Speaker 1: ways to be smart, And so I wanted to know,
9:35
Speaker 1: as you reflect on that feeling of being underestimated, what
9:39
Speaker 1: do you think helped you overcome that most?
9:45
Speaker 3: You know, I think my mom shows up as a
9:46
Speaker 3: pretty complicated character in this book, right, but I will
9:50
Speaker 3: definitely say like her, like she was always like she
9:53
Speaker 3: would be very curious about my teachers, Like she would say, oh, like,
9:58
Speaker 3: how did they decide to try to teach this lesson?
10:03
Speaker 3: You know, like she would help me understand that they
10:07
Speaker 3: were using their own process, right, Or she would be like, oh,
10:10
Speaker 3: what did you learn today? Like the straw that broke
10:13
Speaker 3: the camel's back from you in high school was history
10:16
Speaker 3: class because I actually didn't agree with how they were
10:19
Speaker 3: teaching history. And my mom taught me this incredible Nigerian
10:24
Speaker 3: proverb growing up where she said, until the lion has
10:28
Speaker 3: a historian, the hunter will always be the hero till.
10:32
Speaker 2: The lion has Oh wow, right, and so like, oh.
10:38
Speaker 1: My god, that is like that has completely informed your
10:42
Speaker 1: life totally. That gave me chills when you said it
10:47
Speaker 1: totally because you're trying to be a voice for some
10:52
Speaker 1: of the lions.
10:53
Speaker 3: I think so.
10:55
Speaker 2: Yeah, I think so too.
10:57
Speaker 3: You know, And so for me, like she would be like, oh,
11:01
Speaker 3: like you know, what did you learn today in science? Right?
11:06
Speaker 3: And it's like okay, like is that up to date?
11:09
Speaker 3: And like is the person that's teaching you science a
11:12
Speaker 3: believer her in science? And when you're in like grade nine,
11:15
Speaker 3: you're like, mom, what are you talking about? Like you know,
11:18
Speaker 3: like I don't know, and she's like, you should ask them.
11:22
Speaker 2: Your mom is really interesting, Like she.
11:25
Speaker 3: Would be like, don't trust the source automatically, like who
11:28
Speaker 3: validated this source for you?
11:30
Speaker 1: You know, I can't believe she would say that when
11:32
Speaker 1: you were so young. It's like you to think about totally.
11:36
Speaker 3: Even she sometimes would say something to me and she'd
11:39
Speaker 3: be like, but don't trust me, be like oh my god.
11:44
Speaker 3: Or like I would be like mom, like can you
11:47
Speaker 3: like bring over like a chair or something? And she
11:49
Speaker 3: would be like, what's the chair?
11:51
Speaker 2: Yeah?
11:52
Speaker 3: And I'm like that object over there, like bring the chair,
11:55
Speaker 3: you know, And she's like, oh, well I this and
11:59
Speaker 3: I'm like, yeah, she's I understand that that's a chair
12:01
Speaker 3: to you, But was that the intention behind the person
12:04
Speaker 3: that actually designed that object? I'm just curious, you know.
12:08
Speaker 3: And it's so fascinating because now it's so silly at
12:10
Speaker 3: the same time, Like I have this chair in my
12:13
Speaker 3: kitchen that like is a chair, but like you actually
12:15
Speaker 3: can't really sit on it because it's a design object.
12:17
Speaker 3: And it reminds me of like my mom and these
12:21
Speaker 3: conversations about perception, right, and like you can put one
12:24
Speaker 3: thing into the world and have a plan for that thing,
12:28
Speaker 3: an idea for that thing, but how another person receives
12:31
Speaker 3: it is completely different. And so often in communication, you know,
12:35
Speaker 3: and people get really hung up on my grandmother in
12:37
Speaker 3: this book because she's the one that teaches me the
12:38
Speaker 3: N word. But like so often in communication, you have
12:42
Speaker 3: to listen to what people are actually saying, like what
12:45
Speaker 3: I could say to you. And I was having this
12:47
Speaker 3: conversation with someone astray who said something to me and
12:49
Speaker 3: I was like, wait, like are you actually saying that
12:52
Speaker 3: to me? Or are you saying this a completely other
12:54
Speaker 3: different thing.
12:56
Speaker 1: I took a Kabbala class one time, and the rab
13:00
Speaker 1: I says that he teaches everybody this communication tool. It's
13:03
Speaker 1: very therapeutic too, that you repeat what you think the
13:07
Speaker 1: other person says and then you say, did I understand
13:10
Speaker 1: you correctly? Because half the time they'll say, like can
13:13
Speaker 1: you pick up eggs and chicken from the grocery store
13:17
Speaker 1: and somebody's like, Okay, I'll pick up cheese and eggs.
13:19
Speaker 2: From the grocery store.
13:21
Speaker 3: Right, totally, totally, No, it's so fascinating and it's I
13:24
Speaker 3: love that you had that experience. I also had that
13:26
Speaker 3: experience at Cabala class with my mom that she me
13:29
Speaker 3: to Kala Cluss.
13:30
Speaker 1: Yeah, oh my god, I need to meet your mom
13:33
Speaker 1: if she's coming to any of your book talks.
13:35
Speaker 3: I'm sure she probably will. I'm sure she probably will.
13:38
Speaker 3: Let's hope, let's hope. No, that's a popular question.
13:41
Speaker 2: So how do you feel about identity?
13:43
Speaker 1: Because the forward or the intro to your book, like
13:46
Speaker 1: the synopsis I received before I got to actually read
13:49
Speaker 1: your book, felt so much about idea.
13:53
Speaker 2: I'm obsessed with identity.
13:55
Speaker 1: Honestly, it's pretty controversial now because everyone's like, do we
13:57
Speaker 1: talk about it?
13:58
Speaker 2: Do we not talk about it?
14:00
Speaker 1: Can you share with everybody a little bit about your
14:02
Speaker 1: background and how you feel about identity?
14:05
Speaker 3: Yeah? Sure. I'm so curious about how you feel about
14:08
Speaker 3: identity as well, because it's like, it really is such
14:11
Speaker 3: a personal thing.
14:13
Speaker 1: Right, It's like the lens through which I see the world.
14:16
Speaker 1: Honestly in a lot of right, right, And.
14:20
Speaker 3: I mean I think that's also how I feel about it, right,
14:23
Speaker 3: And then there's also other identities that people can ascribe
14:26
Speaker 3: to you, which is part of the reason why I
14:30
Speaker 3: also wanted to write this book, right to like be
14:33
Speaker 3: my own historian and share my own experience of how
14:38
Speaker 3: I've been seeing the world and how I metabolized some
14:40
Speaker 3: of these things that happened around me, because it's like
14:44
Speaker 3: it's all really complicated. It's like, yes, like I'm a
14:46
Speaker 3: black woman, I'm also a white woman because my mom
14:49
Speaker 3: was white. Right, Like I'm American, I'm also Canadian, I'm
14:53
Speaker 3: also Ghunayan, I'm also like.
14:57
Speaker 1: Of Earth, you know, Belright, do you consider yourself like
15:05
Speaker 1: connected to Jamaican identity?
15:08
Speaker 3: Yeah? Right, Like also that because I went to school there,
15:12
Speaker 3: right for so many, like very formative years of my life.
15:15
Speaker 3: So so and then there's a lot of people who
15:16
Speaker 3: actively refer to me as as Jamaican, and I feel like,
15:20
Speaker 3: I feel like Jamaica is a huge part of my
15:21
Speaker 3: identity as well. Right, I've spent more time there than
15:24
Speaker 3: Ghana and technically getman. So we also talk a lot
15:27
Speaker 3: about like chosen family versus biological family as well, like
15:31
Speaker 3: my mom was adopted at birth and and you know,
15:34
Speaker 3: I'm an only child, and so there's you know, a
15:37
Speaker 3: chosen family is a big part of my life too.
15:40
Speaker 3: And I mean identity is. Yeah, it's a complex topic.
15:44
Speaker 3: Tell me about tell me about your relationship with it.
15:46
Speaker 3: I'm so curious.
15:47
Speaker 1: I think I've always seen everything through the lens of
15:50
Speaker 1: gender in a lot of ways, and in the last
15:53
Speaker 1: few years that's probably been widened for me because of
15:57
Speaker 1: a new understanding of what gender is in the world.
16:01
Speaker 2: But I do.
16:05
Speaker 1: I kind of see, like politics, pop culture, all of
16:08
Speaker 1: it at the intersection of gender, race, and religion always,
16:14
Speaker 1: and it's why I love pop culture, because I think
16:16
Speaker 1: those are really complicated topics, and pop culture gives us
16:20
Speaker 1: a water cooler way of exploring them.
16:23
Speaker 2: I think we saw that really well in Jenner.
16:27
Speaker 1: In so many ways, we were never talking about transgender
16:30
Speaker 1: rights in this country before then.
16:33
Speaker 3: So no, no, no, we really weren't, not at the
16:38
Speaker 3: scale that we are now. And it's really fascinating. And
16:41
Speaker 3: it's also so people's pacing. Like I was on a
16:43
Speaker 3: plane the other day from Charlotte, North Carolina. Oh, where
16:48
Speaker 3: was it?
16:48
Speaker 1: It?
16:48
Speaker 3: Was going from the Cayman Islands to Charlotte, North Carolina. Okay, girl,
16:55
Speaker 3: I was sitting next to these two men who were
16:58
Speaker 3: just dying to engage in conversation and some of the
17:01
Speaker 3: language that they were using, you know, first of all,
17:04
Speaker 3: I was like, Okay, there's like I'm about to spend
17:06
Speaker 3: a lot of emotional capital in this conversation, right, But
17:10
Speaker 3: here we go, because sometimes, you know, you get sad
17:13
Speaker 3: in a middle seat for a reason, you know, like
17:18
Speaker 3: we have like there's such a learning curve right for people,
17:22
Speaker 3: and what people are and aren't exposed to in their
17:25
Speaker 3: daily lives plays such a huge role on their ability
17:29
Speaker 3: to understand things and how they have their own comfort
17:34
Speaker 3: in their own lives really informs their fear or lack
17:39
Speaker 3: thereof as well, And fear plays such a huge role
17:43
Speaker 3: and acceptance. And it's just like all so incredibly complicated,
17:48
Speaker 3: and I try not to I don't know. I have
17:51
Speaker 3: a lot of friends that are just like, oh my gosh,
17:54
Speaker 3: like I can't believe that this person said this, you know,
17:58
Speaker 3: like they just are the worst. And I'm like, I
18:02
Speaker 3: don't think they're the worst. I think they're probably confused. Right.
18:07
Speaker 2: I feel very similarly to you.
18:09
Speaker 3: Yeah, I think that there's like probably some conversations that
18:13
Speaker 3: could be had. I think there might also be like
18:15
Speaker 3: a learning moment in it for me, because obviously that
18:18
Speaker 3: person hasn't been getting the information in a way that
18:21
Speaker 3: makes sense to them, right, And I love to talk
18:24
Speaker 3: to people who have the difference of opinion. Listen. I
18:27
Speaker 3: was also vegan for ten years. I talk a lot
18:29
Speaker 3: about that experience in the book, like what it's like
18:32
Speaker 3: to be vegan and then end up working with so
18:34
Speaker 3: many you know, animal products, and and what my decisions
18:38
Speaker 3: were there and how that relates to sustainability for me,
18:42
Speaker 3: and what it means to try to enforce like a
18:44
Speaker 3: vegan agenda onto like small groups of tribes in africad
18:50
Speaker 3: Like why that's crazy, but like is maybe cute, like
18:53
Speaker 3: if you can chop at araine in La, you know
18:56
Speaker 3: what I mean, Like we love that girl, you know,
18:58
Speaker 3: but it doesn't work at the same way the Almo Valley.
19:01
Speaker 3: And so these conversations are complicated, right, Like I'm not
19:05
Speaker 3: saying that being vegan is bad, of course, like I
19:08
Speaker 3: should probably be vegan again, but I am saying that
19:11
Speaker 3: it might be complicated to be vegan in the Almo
19:13
Speaker 3: Valley of Ethiopia, right, and.
19:16
Speaker 1: It could be complicated to be Ethiopian in anywhere. Honestly,
19:21
Speaker 1: Like there's I think there's a lot of nuance to
19:24
Speaker 1: these things.
19:25
Speaker 3: Absolutely, and people are we don't like to leave a
19:28
Speaker 3: lot of space for nuance these days. We want things
19:32
Speaker 3: to be right or wrong, black or white, this person's
19:34
Speaker 3: good or bad, And I'm like m we all fall
19:36
Speaker 3: in the spectrum, you know.
19:38
Speaker 1: I think after hearing you say that, that's why I
19:41
Speaker 1: felt so connected to your writing. I think memoirs, in
19:45
Speaker 1: a lot of ways oftentimes will and it's it's a
19:49
Speaker 1: publishing thing. It's not necessarily the writer, but publishers want
19:52
Speaker 1: to take away, yeah, you know, and sometimes the takeaway
19:57
Speaker 1: is just the lived experience and it's not like a
20:02
Speaker 1: you're a badass.
20:03
Speaker 3: You know.
20:04
Speaker 2: I liked that you had so much nuance.
20:07
Speaker 1: You talk about some early exposure to the fashion industry
20:11
Speaker 1: through modeling, and you write that it struck you as
20:14
Speaker 1: a system designed to keep women down and reinforce that
20:17
Speaker 1: they are always replaceable. Yes, that hit me, And I
20:23
Speaker 1: don't know if I'm personalizing this, because in what I
20:25
Speaker 1: do as a TV host, you're always replaceable and they
20:29
Speaker 1: you know, actresses I think have the same thing. But
20:32
Speaker 1: I think regardless of industry, if you are a young,
20:36
Speaker 1: ambitious woman, there's this idea of being grateful for the job,
20:41
Speaker 1: grateful for the experience. And I interviewed Jamel Hill a
20:45
Speaker 1: few months ago and she said that gratitude will keep
20:49
Speaker 1: you from getting a paycheck and I never forgot it. Wow,
20:54
Speaker 1: So I want to hear what you think about that
20:58
Speaker 1: replaceable factor. Is it shown up in other ways for you?
21:02
Speaker 1: Did that feeling as a model show up later in
21:05
Speaker 1: romantic relationships?
21:07
Speaker 3: Definitely?
21:09
Speaker 2: Really?
21:10
Speaker 3: Oh my god, I feel like it shows up all
21:12
Speaker 3: the time still. I mean, and it's complicated too, right,
21:15
Speaker 3: because like there can only ever be one final rose,
21:19
Speaker 3: Like these natives are like, you know, not only are
21:23
Speaker 3: we replaceable, we actively have to be in competition to
21:25
Speaker 3: not get replaced.
21:27
Speaker 2: Yeah, right to be the one.
21:30
Speaker 3: And to be the one. And I think that that's
21:31
Speaker 3: like superdy bird damaging because when you feel that way,
21:37
Speaker 3: and also if you feel like you're in competition with
21:40
Speaker 3: other women, you're going to start leaving parts of yourself
21:42
Speaker 3: behind right to be able to run the race faster.
21:46
Speaker 3: It's like, okay, like what part of myself. Can I
21:48
Speaker 3: just sacrifice in order to lighten the own load of
21:51
Speaker 3: who I am as a person? Right, instead of showing
21:54
Speaker 3: up in the space with my full set of needs,
21:57
Speaker 3: I'm just going to abandon some at the door to
21:59
Speaker 3: be more digestive, all right, I'm just gonna get like
22:02
Speaker 3: thinner to take up less space. I'm going to do
22:05
Speaker 3: all of these things to strip away just to be
22:07
Speaker 3: like a little bit easier to hold, right.
22:11
Speaker 1: Yeah.
22:12
Speaker 3: But it was actually like a guy that was telling
22:15
Speaker 3: me this quote yesterday that was attributed to Glorious Steinum
22:18
Speaker 3: that we couldn't figure out if it actually was her,
22:21
Speaker 3: but it was women need men like fish need bicycles.
22:25
Speaker 2: Like we don't at all? Is that the point? Yeah,
22:32
Speaker 2: that's funny, I know.
22:34
Speaker 3: And I was like, uh, I don't know if that's
22:36
Speaker 3: true or not, but like I love the concept that
22:39
Speaker 3: I could be true. I mean, wasn't like for Guya's Steinup.
22:41
Speaker 2: Perhaps it is true, right, Yeah, I think there's a
22:46
Speaker 2: power in wanting and not needing.
22:49
Speaker 3: Yeah, I agree with that too.
22:51
Speaker 1: Because I do think that there's like a wave of
22:53
Speaker 1: feminism that upsets a lot of people where it feels
22:57
Speaker 1: like man hating and that's not it.
23:00
Speaker 3: No, listen, here's the whole thing. I actually love men
23:05
Speaker 3: a lot. Okay, And the other day I like span
23:09
Speaker 3: out this whole theory where I was like, oh, guys, like, actually,
23:12
Speaker 3: I've decided I have a whole new strategy for how
23:16
Speaker 3: I want to parent. And my friends were like, oh, fabulous,
23:20
Speaker 3: like what is it you know? And I was like, oh, well,
23:24
Speaker 3: I think you know. What I would prefer to do
23:28
Speaker 3: is actually create embryos with five of my favorite men
23:33
Speaker 3: and have five children with each a different man. And
23:38
Speaker 3: the ask would be that each of those men co
23:42
Speaker 3: parent all five of the children.
23:45
Speaker 1: You know, Oh, so they don't parent their own, they
23:48
Speaker 1: all co parent five.
23:50
Speaker 2: That is fascinating. Also kind of like a science experiment.
23:55
Speaker 3: Is it getting like weird and like Elon Musky because
23:58
Speaker 3: that was not the goal.
24:00
Speaker 2: No, I think it's.
24:02
Speaker 1: It's sort of interesting too, because I forgot who said
24:06
Speaker 1: this to me one time, but there was a guy
24:08
Speaker 1: who was like, I want to procreate with five or
24:11
Speaker 1: ten different women because I want to see what like
24:14
Speaker 1: every ethnicity of me.
24:16
Speaker 2: Would look like oh wow, like oh my god.
24:19
Speaker 3: Yeah that's fascinating though yeah, yeah, I don't know. It's
24:23
Speaker 3: kind of is just like you know, my friend was like, oh,
24:26
Speaker 3: is it because like your dad died and so now
24:29
Speaker 3: you just like want five dads for your own kids.
24:31
Speaker 3: It's like a backup plan one, two, three, four, and five.
24:34
Speaker 3: And I was like maybe. I mean, you know, I
24:36
Speaker 3: think what's more interesting is just letting the mind wander,
24:40
Speaker 3: like what happened when you like hit unsubscribe for a
24:44
Speaker 3: second from the white pick up fence and just like
24:47
Speaker 3: let your mind wander. Because also, like I love a
24:51
Speaker 3: platonic relationship, like I I mean also love a non
24:56
Speaker 3: platonic one, but like my platonic male friends or so
25:01
Speaker 3: important and special and amazing, and I feel like I've
25:05
Speaker 3: gotten them all as like these bright, brilliant gifts from
25:08
Speaker 3: the sun that are just like in my life and
25:11
Speaker 3: feed me in so many amazing ways, right, And I
25:15
Speaker 3: sometimes I'm like, oh my god, like you would be
25:17
Speaker 3: the absolute best father, Like I don't know why you
25:21
Speaker 3: haven't done that yet, right, And they obviously have their
25:24
Speaker 3: whole host of different issues which I don't have to
25:27
Speaker 3: wait into because I'm not their romantic partner. I'm just
25:29
Speaker 3: their very good friend, right, So I don't know. For me,
25:32
Speaker 3: I just like the idea of allowing space for my
25:36
Speaker 3: mind to wander, because I've spent so many years like
25:39
Speaker 3: subscribing to just like these specific things that are also beautiful.
25:46
Speaker 2: I feel very similarly.
25:47
Speaker 1: I think I grew up and felt like there was
25:49
Speaker 1: one way to do something, and you grow up, and
25:54
Speaker 1: even in journalism, you're supposed to ask the question who
25:57
Speaker 1: wrote the piece and who was it written for, so
26:00
Speaker 1: that you can understand the bias in it. And it's
26:05
Speaker 1: kind of beautiful when you can open your mind and think, well,
26:07
Speaker 1: what if this wasn't the rule, who wrote the rule?
26:09
Speaker 2: Could we do it a different way?
26:11
Speaker 3: Right? Exactly? Totally.
26:13
Speaker 1: So, speaking of rules, you were arrested for dangerous driving
26:19
Speaker 1: when you were in college. Yeah, And I only bring
26:22
Speaker 1: it up because I feel like it spurred a very
26:24
Speaker 1: poignant moment where you learned about justice at a pretty
26:28
Speaker 1: young age. So it actually led to a court appointed
26:31
Speaker 1: job helping women in an organization called Dress for Success.
26:35
Speaker 1: But I'm wondering if you can kind of share that
26:37
Speaker 1: story for everybody.
26:39
Speaker 3: Yeah. Sure, So I picked up this very dangerous habit
26:44
Speaker 3: of street racing. It was very fast and the furious,
26:48
Speaker 3: pretty embarrassing. My car was pink did I write that
26:51
Speaker 3: in the book. Did i'd make a visual of the car? Oh?
26:53
Speaker 2: Yeah, it was very descriptive. But why did you get
26:56
Speaker 2: into it? I think have you explored that in therapy?
27:03
Speaker 3: No, I probably need well, yes, I mean a little bit,
27:06
Speaker 3: I think, to be honest with you, and it's like
27:08
Speaker 3: a little bit dark. But I think I was just
27:10
Speaker 3: really like fumbling with my own mortality. Yeah, you know,
27:14
Speaker 3: I think I was just like trying to take my
27:15
Speaker 3: life into my own hands in some way. And I
27:17
Speaker 3: think I was trying to like outperform men. I think
27:21
Speaker 3: I was trying to like prove to them that like
27:24
Speaker 3: they needed to stop underestimating my power.
27:27
Speaker 1: You know, that's really that's huge. Do you feel that
27:35
Speaker 1: way in other areas of life? Like if you're in
27:37
Speaker 1: the gym, do you want to run faster than the
27:39
Speaker 1: guy next to you on the treadmill or no, No,
27:43
Speaker 1: you're you're kind of over that.
27:45
Speaker 3: Yeah, I think I'm over the I used to be
27:47
Speaker 3: like fiercely competitive, and I think I'm kind of over
27:51
Speaker 3: that now. Like now I'm like, okay, like you're running
27:53
Speaker 3: on the treadmill, can I just pause mine and you
27:55
Speaker 3: can take this next lap for me? You kind of thing. Yeah,
27:59
Speaker 3: but yeah, I think at that time, I just I
28:06
Speaker 3: think it was exactly that is, this is my therapy session,
28:10
Speaker 3: thank you. I think it was. I think it really
28:12
Speaker 3: was about this idea of just like wanting to to
28:16
Speaker 3: prove to men that like I did have my own
28:20
Speaker 3: power right and I actually could beat them even with
28:24
Speaker 3: like less experience and like less sharp tools.
28:27
Speaker 1: What I find fascinating about that is ultimately you land
28:32
Speaker 1: in a jail cell and it's all of these other
28:36
Speaker 1: women that fight for you. And I got chills reading
28:41
Speaker 1: it because it's these other women who you just met
28:45
Speaker 1: who are also in jail yep, who are screaming and
28:50
Speaker 1: rioting for you.
28:52
Speaker 3: Totally totally.
28:54
Speaker 1: So for people who haven't read the book, correct me
28:57
Speaker 1: if I'm wrong, the synopsis of the stories I understood
29:00
Speaker 1: it is that you weren't told why you were put there,
29:05
Speaker 1: and so they all start fighting for you.
29:08
Speaker 3: Yeah. So basically, so, I had taken up street racing
29:11
Speaker 3: and was unfortunately racing everywhere I was going, and I
29:16
Speaker 3: got pulled over on my way to school, and then
29:20
Speaker 3: I and then I got pulled over again and like
29:22
Speaker 3: kind of just decided maybe not to pull over, which
29:25
Speaker 3: was where the where the big fail comes in there.
29:29
Speaker 3: And so I got arrested, and then I was putting
29:31
Speaker 3: put in a holding cell, and then I was moved
29:33
Speaker 3: into like a larger jail, and I was given a
29:35
Speaker 3: phone call, but I called my roommate and she didn't
29:37
Speaker 3: answer the phone. So sort of no one knew where
29:39
Speaker 3: I was, and it was unclear to me with what
29:41
Speaker 3: I was getting charged with or what the process would be.
29:43
Speaker 3: And I didn't get the do process that I was
29:45
Speaker 3: supposed to get, and so I was just like in
29:48
Speaker 3: this cell somewhere, I didn't even really know where anymore,
29:54
Speaker 3: and I was just crying for hours and hours and
29:58
Speaker 3: hours and hours. And then yeah, a couple of women
30:00
Speaker 3: in the cell just asked me what the hell was
30:03
Speaker 3: going on, and then the other women in the cell
30:06
Speaker 3: block overheard and kind of made a riot until they
30:10
Speaker 3: sent someone to actually figure out what was going on
30:12
Speaker 3: with me.
30:14
Speaker 2: I was pretty powerful.
30:16
Speaker 3: I'm very lucky, and I learned what happens when women,
30:21
Speaker 3: even women who have been completely discounted, decide to raise
30:26
Speaker 3: their voices in unison and ask for something to happen.
30:30
Speaker 1: The unison part is so powerful for women. We saw
30:34
Speaker 1: it with the Me Too movement.
30:36
Speaker 3: Yep, yeah, yep, yep, yep. And they spend so much time,
30:40
Speaker 3: by the way, trying to lock us up and silence us,
30:44
Speaker 3: and it terrifies people when women join forces and start
30:53
Speaker 3: speaking their needs. Right.
30:56
Speaker 1: I think about some of the most influential social activism
31:01
Speaker 1: groups in the country over the last few years. I
31:04
Speaker 1: think like the movement Me Too and Times Up at
31:07
Speaker 1: one point was influential. Mom's Demand Action has made the
31:10
Speaker 1: most progress for gun violence out of anybody. Women are
31:14
Speaker 1: really powerful, especially collectively, and.
31:17
Speaker 2: We've seen it.
31:18
Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah, totally.
31:21
Speaker 1: So you talk about early job at gen Art and
31:24
Speaker 1: you say people in fashion did not seem happy. We're
31:29
Speaker 1: going to get into your sort of experience in fashion
31:32
Speaker 1: in a deeper way, but can you elaborate on what
31:36
Speaker 1: you felt from them?
31:38
Speaker 3: Yeah, oh man, it seemed like and of course it
31:44
Speaker 3: wasn't everyone, right, but a lot of the people that
31:48
Speaker 3: that I was intersecting with just felt like they were
31:51
Speaker 3: on this grind and it was kind of unclear as
31:53
Speaker 3: to why. You know, it didn't feel like they were
31:59
Speaker 3: being totally filled by the work. And then some of
32:03
Speaker 3: the people who did seem like they were were being
32:05
Speaker 3: fulfilled the things that were fulfilling them were also not
32:10
Speaker 3: things that I valued or knew would fulfill me as
32:12
Speaker 3: a human. Does that make sense?
32:16
Speaker 2: That makes complete sense.
32:18
Speaker 3: Yeah.
32:19
Speaker 2: So your company, brother Velli's, is a label that stated
32:22
Speaker 2: made in Africa was a foreign concept to people, and
32:26
Speaker 2: you aim to change that. So when something is made
32:29
Speaker 2: in Africa, what meaning does that hold for you?
32:32
Speaker 3: I think for me it was this whole idea within
32:34
Speaker 3: fashion of like, Okay, made in Italy is valued, made
32:38
Speaker 3: in France is valued. But that's kind of it, right,
32:43
Speaker 3: And so to me when I was actually traveling in
32:47
Speaker 3: Africa and looking at these artis and communities and watching
32:50
Speaker 3: them and their craft, I was like, wow, like this
32:53
Speaker 3: is just as intricate as what they're doing in Paris, right,
32:57
Speaker 3: and why are we not holding this in such high
33:00
Speaker 3: regard or even you know, I work a lot in
33:03
Speaker 3: Mexico now as well, and like the way that they
33:06
Speaker 3: work with leather and then weave leather and tan leather diet.
33:10
Speaker 3: It's just like so beautiful, right, and the quality of
33:13
Speaker 3: some of those materials are on par with you know,
33:17
Speaker 3: weuvuton right. But it's like, Okay, what is the unconscious
33:20
Speaker 3: bias that like keeps us from valuing, you know, things
33:25
Speaker 3: that originate in one place over over the other. And
33:27
Speaker 3: I think for me, knowing that so many things that
33:33
Speaker 3: we hold dear in fashion actually and concepts and ideas
33:36
Speaker 3: and styles and patterns and trends actually originated from indigenous
33:41
Speaker 3: communities in Africa or other parts of the world, like
33:44
Speaker 3: you know, was really fascinating, and I wanted to find
33:46
Speaker 3: a way to like elevate that and involve them in
33:48
Speaker 3: the conversation.
33:49
Speaker 1: It's so clear to that fashion and activism run parallel
33:52
Speaker 1: in your life. Was there a pivotal moment in which
33:57
Speaker 1: you realized they had to be tandem.
34:00
Speaker 3: I think it was around like women's reproductive rights, because
34:04
Speaker 3: I think for me as someone whose mom has had
34:09
Speaker 3: an abortion, and as someone who's elected to have an
34:12
Speaker 3: abortion myself, and have thought about all the ways in
34:16
Speaker 3: which my life would be different if I hadn't made
34:18
Speaker 3: that decision for myself, right, And I listen, I'm the
34:21
Speaker 3: first to understand that it's not the right decision for everybody,
34:25
Speaker 3: and hopefully no one ever has to make that decision, right,
34:29
Speaker 3: But I believe that women should have that option. And
34:31
Speaker 3: I think for me, when some of those rights were
34:37
Speaker 3: being threatened several years ago, the first inkling that I
34:42
Speaker 3: had that some of those rights were being threatened, it
34:45
Speaker 3: just seemed so obvious that I was going to need
34:47
Speaker 3: to communicate to my customer base like, hey, like, this
34:50
Speaker 3: is how I'm feeling, this is what I want to do,
34:52
Speaker 3: this is what I'm thinking we should do. This is
34:54
Speaker 3: how I'm going to donate it proceeds from our sales.
34:57
Speaker 3: And with a lot of my colleagues in fashion, I'm
35:00
Speaker 3: having so many conversations where they were like, oh my god, no, like,
35:03
Speaker 3: we get so much revenue from you know, certain red
35:08
Speaker 3: states that may have a different agenda there, like we
35:11
Speaker 3: cannot you know, advocate for Planned Parenthood or any of
35:14
Speaker 3: these other organizations because it would just be so bad
35:17
Speaker 3: for sales. And I'm like, oh, I don't feel that way,
35:23
Speaker 3: Like like, to me, it's okay to lose those sales, right, like,
35:27
Speaker 3: because actually I know that the majority of my customers
35:32
Speaker 3: want that kind of access. And now that I feel
35:35
Speaker 3: like I've built a platform largely on like their support,
35:40
Speaker 3: it would be so disingenuous to not turn around and
35:43
Speaker 3: support them with the platform that they've helped give me.
35:47
Speaker 3: So if it means that we get a thirty percent
35:49
Speaker 3: drop in revenue, Like it's okay, because I need to
35:53
Speaker 3: stay honest to what got me here.
35:56
Speaker 1: I feel very similarly to you. I want to state that,
36:00
Speaker 1: but I think the argument I hear all the time
36:03
Speaker 1: in contrast to that is businesses small or large can't
36:07
Speaker 1: afford to make that decision.
36:10
Speaker 2: What do you say to that.
36:13
Speaker 3: Yeah, I think that that's an individual It's an individual choice, right,
36:19
Speaker 3: Like in a lot of ways, one could argue that,
36:22
Speaker 3: like my business for other valleys hasn't been able to
36:24
Speaker 3: accord to make any of the decisions that we've made,
36:27
Speaker 3: which is also, by the way, like why we're not
36:29
Speaker 3: the size of Michael Cores. You know. It's like there
36:33
Speaker 3: are certain things that I design that I'm only ever
36:37
Speaker 3: going to be able to produce a small amount of.
36:39
Speaker 3: And for some people they would be like, okay, well,
36:42
Speaker 3: then you need to change your design so that you
36:44
Speaker 3: can make you know, fifty thousand of these things. And
36:47
Speaker 3: I think for me, I'm like, no, Like I don't
36:50
Speaker 3: want to because that's not what the mission is, right,
36:54
Speaker 3: So I think it really depends on you know, what
36:59
Speaker 3: your goals are in terms of success, and even for me,
37:02
Speaker 3: and I think it's like kind of clear in the
37:04
Speaker 3: book because I talk about like a lot of the
37:06
Speaker 3: financial struggles I had when I was launching the business,
37:08
Speaker 3: like I had to pick up doing other work on
37:10
Speaker 3: multiple occasions in the early years of the business just
37:13
Speaker 3: to make sure that I could like cover, you know,
37:16
Speaker 3: the expenses that I had at different points. And they think,
37:21
Speaker 3: you know, thank goodness for social media, because I remember
37:24
Speaker 3: one time there was another designer who said to me,
37:27
Speaker 3: like we were at the CFDA, we were doing a
37:29
Speaker 3: talk or whatever, and she got up and I had
37:32
Speaker 3: someone had just asked me a question about direct consumer
37:35
Speaker 3: sales and how I was using social media to drive
37:38
Speaker 3: traffic to our website and you know, try to drive
37:41
Speaker 3: more more sales and direct consumer and she got up
37:44
Speaker 3: and she made this like really mean sort of statement
37:48
Speaker 3: about like how she was a real designer and like
37:51
Speaker 3: she shouldn't be expected to have to like parade outfits
37:54
Speaker 3: around social media, like you know, and it's just absolutely ridiculous.
38:00
Speaker 3: And I was like, okay, like I'm happy for you,
38:05
Speaker 3: like I'm happy for you that you don't that you
38:08
Speaker 3: don't have to do that, but like in my case,
38:10
Speaker 3: like I actually can't afford to advertise right now, so
38:13
Speaker 3: I have to use any means that are around me
38:16
Speaker 3: that's essentially free. And if I had, you know, the
38:22
Speaker 3: privilege to not have to do that, then like that
38:26
Speaker 3: would be fab you know, but that doesn't happen to
38:28
Speaker 3: be like my experience. So we all have different levels
38:32
Speaker 3: of comfort and things that we're willing to do not do.
38:35
Speaker 3: And at the same time, like if I wasn't willing
38:38
Speaker 3: to do any of that, you know, unsocial at all,
38:42
Speaker 3: then maybe I would be less willing to you know,
38:47
Speaker 3: alienate some of my customer base by posting about reproductive justice. Right,
38:52
Speaker 3: So there's trade offs.
38:53
Speaker 1: Sometimes I also feel like, what a privilege not to care? Right,
38:57
Speaker 1: It's like in politics, in social justice and all of it.
39:00
Speaker 2: It's it's what a privilege?
39:03
Speaker 3: Oh totally. I was talking to this other guy the
39:04
Speaker 3: other day who like worked in crypto and he was like,
39:07
Speaker 3: he was like, who is the vice president again? And
39:11
Speaker 3: I was like, wow, crazy.
39:15
Speaker 2: Yeah.
39:16
Speaker 1: I actually had a few I'll never forget this. I
39:18
Speaker 1: had a few friends when Trump was elected. I was
39:21
Speaker 1: so upset and they were like, it's fine, like if
39:24
Speaker 1: you know, like, if you need an abortion, you'll be
39:26
Speaker 1: able to get one, and I was.
39:27
Speaker 2: Like, what kind of mind? Like, that's so wild to me.
39:31
Speaker 1: I vote for the person who has the least amount
39:36
Speaker 1: of rights, not my own interests, right, totally, it's bizarre.
39:41
Speaker 3: Yeah, that part's like really brutal.
39:45
Speaker 1: I think back to your financial struggles. I really enjoyed
39:48
Speaker 1: that part of the book. Not that you struggle, but
39:52
Speaker 1: I was surprised to learn all of the setbacks you
39:56
Speaker 1: faced with your line, and you detail that you faced
39:59
Speaker 1: a lot of it because of.
40:00
Speaker 2: A bad contract.
40:02
Speaker 1: But all during that time, Beyonce and Rihanna are wearing
40:05
Speaker 1: your clothes and you're too scared to tell anybody that
40:08
Speaker 1: you're having all of this financial strain, which is how
40:12
Speaker 1: it goes right. It's like a fake it to you
40:14
Speaker 1: make it thing, and then once you make it, you
40:16
Speaker 1: can talk about.
40:17
Speaker 2: It really if you so choose.
40:20
Speaker 1: You strike me as somebody who wants to walk through
40:23
Speaker 1: the world with authenticity. I feel like your inside's not
40:27
Speaker 1: matching your outsides at that point in time.
40:29
Speaker 2: Must have been really painful.
40:32
Speaker 3: Yeah. I think it also came back to like what
40:35
Speaker 3: the the idea of success is? Right? Like for me,
40:38
Speaker 3: it wasn't ever with Brother Belly's about financial success. It
40:43
Speaker 3: was really about, Okay, how do we share the work
40:45
Speaker 3: that these artisans are doing and make sure that they
40:47
Speaker 3: can stay employed? And that was what was happening, right,
40:51
Speaker 3: And so that part of the eccuasion, the part that
40:53
Speaker 3: I set out to do, was the part that was
40:55
Speaker 3: super successful, right. And the other part, like the financial
40:59
Speaker 3: part where I'm supposed to making money or like paying
41:02
Speaker 3: my rent, like that part was like the part that
41:05
Speaker 3: wasn't working right. And so I think like focusing on
41:10
Speaker 3: what the goal was for me and the execution of
41:13
Speaker 3: that goal was what was really bringing me the most joy,
41:15
Speaker 3: and the other part felt like a ransom.
41:19
Speaker 1: So in twenty twenty, you started the fifteen percent pledge
41:23
Speaker 1: with an Instagram post. Yeah, and you said at the
41:26
Speaker 1: time that companies were absolutely clamoring to participate in social entrepreneurship,
41:31
Speaker 1: which is not the answer. So what is the magic
41:35
Speaker 1: to the fifteen percent pledge?
41:37
Speaker 3: So I think for me, there were a lot of
41:41
Speaker 3: retailers at that time that were just like making donations, right.
41:45
Speaker 3: We saw that a lot, and I think, you know,
41:47
Speaker 3: a couple of days after George Floyd died, there was
41:50
Speaker 3: a friend of mine called me and we have a
41:52
Speaker 3: major retailer and she was like, they just donated ten
41:54
Speaker 3: million dollars to the NAACP. And I was like, that's cute.
41:57
Speaker 3: You know, it's a lot of money. We love that.
41:59
Speaker 3: But like, if your friend makes a racist comment, you're
42:02
Speaker 3: not like, oh my god, Jack, that was so racist,
42:04
Speaker 3: like make a donation, right, Like you actually are like Jack,
42:08
Speaker 3: like that was racist. Let me talk to you about why,
42:10
Speaker 3: you know, and you kind of try to unpack the
42:13
Speaker 3: ideology that informed the statement that he made. And I
42:16
Speaker 3: think what I was kind of saying to her was like,
42:19
Speaker 3: you know, if we want major retailers or major corporations
42:22
Speaker 3: at all to really kind of step into racial justice
42:26
Speaker 3: in a meaningful way, they need to do it with
42:29
Speaker 3: the thing that they're good at, right. And she was like, well,
42:32
Speaker 3: what does that mean? And I was like, well, in
42:33
Speaker 3: the case of like the retailer that she was calling
42:35
Speaker 3: me about, I was like, you know, and listen, I
42:37
Speaker 3: had been reading all these crazy statistics. There's over forty
42:40
Speaker 3: percent of black owned brands were expected to close as
42:43
Speaker 3: a result of the pandemic. Ninety percent didn't get access
42:47
Speaker 3: to the first round of PPP money. And I said
42:51
Speaker 3: to her, you know, black people are almost fifteen percent
42:54
Speaker 3: of the population. Major retailers should commit fifteen percent of
42:57
Speaker 3: their shelf space to black owned businesses. Right. I knew
42:59
Speaker 3: that black owned businesses really the heart of the black community,
43:02
Speaker 3: and they knew that they were dying out. And she
43:05
Speaker 3: was like, WHOA, Like, I don't think that they're going
43:07
Speaker 3: to do that. And I was like, okay, well you
43:09
Speaker 3: can just tell them like that. That's what I said,
43:11
Speaker 3: and we got off the phone, and I really just
43:12
Speaker 3: sat down and thought about what would happen in the
43:15
Speaker 3: American economic landscape if major retailers started making that commitment. Right,
43:20
Speaker 3: thought about venture capital and you know, at that time,
43:24
Speaker 3: only thirty nine black women had ever raised a million
43:26
Speaker 3: dollars in VC money, which is so crazy, and.
43:30
Speaker 1: I honestly still hasn't gone up that much. I just
43:32
Speaker 1: interviewed Winnie Harlowe because she was one of those women,
43:34
Speaker 1: and the number has not increased.
43:37
Speaker 3: Well, yeah, it's like it's just over two hundred now,
43:40
Speaker 3: but it's still like very low. You know, when you
43:43
Speaker 3: think about it, it's like Adam Newman from We Work
43:46
Speaker 3: has raised more money than like all the black women combined.
43:48
Speaker 3: And it's a formility house. But so so yeah, I
43:52
Speaker 3: was just thinking about that landscape and how it could
43:55
Speaker 3: really shift if these major retailers across the country started
43:59
Speaker 3: commit in that way, right like venjor Capple would actively
44:02
Speaker 3: be seeking them out, and it would really turn the tables.
44:06
Speaker 3: And so I wrote all of that down in the
44:08
Speaker 3: note section of my phone, which I think is where
44:10
Speaker 3: most of our brilliant ideas sort of hibernate, and I
44:14
Speaker 3: screenshot it an hour later, and I posted it to
44:16
Speaker 3: social and I tagged a bunch of retailers that I
44:18
Speaker 3: thought would do a really good job at taking the
44:21
Speaker 3: idea of the fifteen percent pledge. And so that was
44:23
Speaker 3: a Saturday. I stayed up overnight on Sunday with my
44:25
Speaker 3: web designers so we could launch a petition on Monday
44:28
Speaker 3: at noon. By like Tuesday or Wednesday, I think we
44:31
Speaker 3: have like one hundred thousand signatures. And on Wednesday I
44:35
Speaker 3: registered to become a nonprofit and on day ten, Sapphora
44:38
Speaker 3: became the first major corporation to commit to the idea
44:40
Speaker 3: of the fifteen percent pledge. And since then we've announced
44:44
Speaker 3: twenty nine pledge kickers and they all signed multi year
44:48
Speaker 3: contracts with us nords from for examples, A ten year contract.
44:51
Speaker 3: So every quarter we get together with them, we do
44:53
Speaker 3: a little audit, we make a recommendation of black owned
44:55
Speaker 3: brands it makes sense for their shelves that are amazing products.
44:59
Speaker 3: And through those contractual commitments. Right now in the process
45:02
Speaker 3: of reallocating over ten billion dollars of annual revenue a
45:08
Speaker 3: year to black owned businesses, and we've onboarded over six
45:12
Speaker 3: hundred onto the shelves of our pledge takers.
45:15
Speaker 1: With such foundational change, not just a donation, like you said, right,
45:20
Speaker 1: like that changes the course of how people do business
45:22
Speaker 1: in the future too. I can't believe that you went
45:25
Speaker 1: from an Instagram post about corporate accountability to running one
45:30
Speaker 1: of the fastest growing nonprofits in America.
45:32
Speaker 2: It's unbelievable.
45:34
Speaker 3: It's crazy, right. And what my favorite, one of my
45:36
Speaker 3: favorite parts in the book is how I talk about
45:39
Speaker 3: this group of like anonymous volunteer women that we had
45:43
Speaker 3: in the beginning, right, And those women to me feel
45:45
Speaker 3: like the same women that were in that cell block
45:47
Speaker 3: with me, right, because it's like, how do we do
45:52
Speaker 3: this toget? How do we get Okay, we've decided what
45:54
Speaker 3: we feel like needs to happen here, right, how do
45:57
Speaker 3: we raise our voices in the unison and get this
45:59
Speaker 3: job actually done.
46:02
Speaker 1: It's beautiful. Anna Wintour said, you found a way to
46:05
Speaker 1: bring grassroots activism seamlessly into corporate America. The people that
46:10
Speaker 1: listen to Pretty Smart are such dreamers and doers, and
46:15
Speaker 1: they like, it's such a beautiful community.
46:17
Speaker 2: Everybody stands for something.
46:20
Speaker 1: For people who work in their respective fields and want
46:23
Speaker 1: to incorporate activism into their own work, what do you
46:27
Speaker 1: say to them?
46:29
Speaker 3: Oh my gosh, So a few things. One is roll
46:32
Speaker 3: with your passion, Roll with what you know. Roll what's
46:35
Speaker 3: that thing that's like, you know, the py under your mattress,
46:39
Speaker 3: what is that the princess and the piece or that's
46:41
Speaker 3: like very specific reference.
46:42
Speaker 2: Like I love that though up at.
46:44
Speaker 3: Night, you know what I mean. And think about the
46:48
Speaker 3: ways in which like business as usual is holding us
46:53
Speaker 3: back instead of pushing us forward, and challenge those things
46:57
Speaker 3: like to me constantly, Like one of the hardest things
47:00
Speaker 3: for me now is like not to just be constantly
47:02
Speaker 3: like throwing myself into other industries and being like, how
47:05
Speaker 3: can we rethink this? How can we rethink this? How
47:07
Speaker 3: can we rethink this? And there's so much opportunity for
47:11
Speaker 3: change and growth, and there are so many people that
47:14
Speaker 3: are actually also craving it, right, Like I get all
47:17
Speaker 3: these women all the time who are like, oh my god,
47:19
Speaker 3: I want to put my job and like come work
47:21
Speaker 3: at the fifteen percent pledge, and I'm like, well, I
47:22
Speaker 3: would love that because we're hiring. But at the same time, right,
47:26
Speaker 3: you may be exactly where you need to be to
47:31
Speaker 3: impact it and affect a huge amount of.
47:33
Speaker 1: Change right in exactly what you're doing now, in exactly
47:37
Speaker 1: what you're doing now, and the fact that you're even
47:40
Speaker 1: thinking that way, like.
47:42
Speaker 3: Is the first step.
47:44
Speaker 1: I was so struck by how great you are at
47:46
Speaker 1: saying no to things. Oh incredible, I'm working on it.
47:51
Speaker 3: Okay, Okay, is.
47:53
Speaker 2: There anything that you wish you would have said yes to?
47:56
Speaker 2: Looking back? And it's okay if the answer is no,
47:59
Speaker 2: oh it's yes.
48:00
Speaker 3: The answer is definitely yes. It's a little off topic,
48:04
Speaker 3: but I think like probably yes to like more exploration
48:09
Speaker 3: of people. I think I've been like pretty pretty like
48:13
Speaker 3: guarded with myself and my level of vulnerability that I've
48:16
Speaker 3: been able to be like I have I have close friends,
48:19
Speaker 3: and I also oddly feel like my social media community
48:22
Speaker 3: is also my close friends. But I feel like with
48:25
Speaker 3: just randomly meeting some people, sometimes I'm like still like
48:29
Speaker 3: pretty guarded. And I think like that's also extended to partners, right,
48:34
Speaker 3: And I think that like it's okay to like, you know,
48:38
Speaker 3: touch a hot surface and get burned sometimes, like you're
48:40
Speaker 3: going to be able to heal.
48:42
Speaker 1: That's really brave of you because you're facing all of it.
48:46
Speaker 3: Thanks. Yeah, It's like I think I'm at a different
48:50
Speaker 3: point in my life right now where I'm like actually
48:52
Speaker 3: want to fall in love with someone that I know
48:54
Speaker 3: it won't work out with.
48:55
Speaker 2: Really, Yeah, I've never heard anybody say that.
49:01
Speaker 3: Yeah, because it doesn't have to be about this end
49:06
Speaker 3: that we're envisioning, right, Like the real trick, I think
49:11
Speaker 3: is about being truly present, like in a moment with
49:15
Speaker 3: someone Like that's what loves about. It's not about projecting
49:17
Speaker 3: these ideas of the future onto another person.
49:21
Speaker 2: Oh my god, you're making me emotional, You're right.
49:24
Speaker 3: You know. So it's like, how do you like full
49:27
Speaker 3: body fall in love with someone that, like you know,
49:30
Speaker 3: is not going to be your person at the end,
49:35
Speaker 3: but you just can love them like holy for who
49:38
Speaker 3: they are in that moment and see them and see
49:41
Speaker 3: them and not try to change them into being your
49:44
Speaker 3: forever person, like see them, fall in love with them
49:47
Speaker 3: fully knowing they're not your forever person, and that you
49:49
Speaker 3: guys are going to break each other's hearts because you
49:52
Speaker 3: don't want to let that other person compromise.
49:55
Speaker 1: Have you ever felt fully known in a relationship? No,
50:00
Speaker 1: are you craving that?
50:01
Speaker 3: I don't know that it's possible.
50:04
Speaker 1: I used to crave it so much, and I realize
50:08
Speaker 1: that you can give it to yourself. I never thought
50:10
Speaker 1: that was possible.
50:12
Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah, you know. I was talking to my friend's.
50:15
Speaker 2: Therapist, like at a dinner. How do you get to
50:20
Speaker 2: your friend's therapist?
50:22
Speaker 3: Yeah? I was like, I want to talk to her
50:23
Speaker 3: on the phone, like can I call? You know, I
50:25
Speaker 3: like have questions, And she was saying to me this
50:27
Speaker 3: whole thing about like sometimes in the beginning of love,
50:33
Speaker 3: the body and the mind and the heart wants to
50:37
Speaker 3: go to this place that's almost like a womb like
50:40
Speaker 3: state where you believe that the other person just like
50:42
Speaker 3: intuitively understands you and all of your needs in the
50:45
Speaker 3: way that like the umbilical court and the womb just
50:49
Speaker 3: provided all of the nourishment and the right heat and
50:52
Speaker 3: the right environments and conditions for you to like grow
50:54
Speaker 3: and be and bloom and know. Right, like the womb
50:57
Speaker 3: and your mom are the first thing that over fully
51:01
Speaker 3: totally know you and give you exactly what you need.
51:05
Speaker 3: And so sometimes in the beginning of the relationship, like
51:08
Speaker 3: that trigger happens within us and we're looking to replicate
51:11
Speaker 3: that experience again from the womb, and we make these
51:14
Speaker 3: assumptions that people are going to like know and understand
51:17
Speaker 3: parts of us that like they wouldn't, but we just
51:21
Speaker 3: magically think that they're going to know because we're going
51:23
Speaker 3: back into that place, right. And I think that that
51:28
Speaker 3: can also be really hard on people because it's like, well, no,
51:30
Speaker 3: like they're they're not your womb, right, Like you have
51:33
Speaker 3: to be able to voice your needs, and I think
51:35
Speaker 3: with women, like like we're so quick to not want
51:38
Speaker 3: to be able to voice our needs. Right, even me,
51:41
Speaker 3: I'm like leaving my needs at the dot, you know,
51:44
Speaker 3: like just like it's okay, but.
51:46
Speaker 2: Like it's even really small, like like what movie do
51:49
Speaker 2: you want to watch tonight?
51:52
Speaker 3: Totally totally please. The other day, I got looped into
51:55
Speaker 3: watching a three hour art house French art house film
51:58
Speaker 3: at the theater and I wanted to die.
52:01
Speaker 2: Oh no, oh no, there.
52:05
Speaker 3: I was like, I'm just going to fall asleep because
52:06
Speaker 3: I actually like I don't want to watch this.
52:09
Speaker 2: And I hope he was really cute.
52:12
Speaker 3: Thankfully he was. Yeah, that was I was the only
52:14
Speaker 3: saving grace for it.
52:16
Speaker 2: Auly.
52:17
Speaker 3: Yeah.
52:17
Speaker 1: So one of the last chapters of your book is
52:19
Speaker 1: called Planting Seeds.
52:21
Speaker 2: It felt so so well titled what seeds are you planting?
52:27
Speaker 3: Now? Oh my gosh. I hope that this book is
52:31
Speaker 3: a seed, right. I hope this book can be my
52:35
Speaker 3: own seed bomb and you know, spread to different people
52:40
Speaker 3: and help them see themselves in the pages in different ways. Right,
52:46
Speaker 3: Because while it is my story, I also feel like
52:49
Speaker 3: it's so many of our stories because it touches on
52:51
Speaker 3: so many things that I know that we've all felt
52:53
Speaker 3: at different times, right, And it might play out a
52:57
Speaker 3: little bit differently, but ultimately, like we all have complicated
53:00
Speaker 3: relationships with their moms.
53:02
Speaker 1: Right, you know your book made me feel like that
53:06
Speaker 1: was okay?
53:08
Speaker 3: Yes, thank you good It is okay.
53:12
Speaker 1: But I interview a lot of people who they'll email
53:16
Speaker 1: me after our interview.
53:18
Speaker 2: They don't care about talking about their spouse.
53:20
Speaker 1: They don't care talking about like they'll break news with me.
53:24
Speaker 1: They will email me and say I said something about
53:28
Speaker 1: my mom that I shouldn't have said. Can you take
53:30
Speaker 1: that part out? There's some things it's so interesting.
53:35
Speaker 3: That's interesting. M h yeah, listen, because like we also
53:39
Speaker 3: just don't want to give women space to just be women. Right.
53:42
Speaker 3: We have to be a mom, we have to be
53:43
Speaker 3: a wife, we have to be a girlfriend, we have
53:45
Speaker 3: to be a glass ceiling breaker, right, and.
53:48
Speaker 1: There's something about the imperfection that we're not willing to acknowledge.
53:53
Speaker 3: Yeah, but that's so limiting for all of us, right,
53:57
Speaker 3: Like it's so limiting for all of us. It's sort
54:00
Speaker 3: of like, well, after I launched a fifteen percent pledge,
54:02
Speaker 3: and because I was like working in business, whenever I
54:05
Speaker 3: would do a photo shoot, like people would try to
54:07
Speaker 3: get me to wear a blazer and I'm like, I've
54:10
Speaker 3: never worn a blazer like almost ever.
54:14
Speaker 2: You know, that is so funny, It's so funny on
54:17
Speaker 2: so many levels.
54:20
Speaker 3: You know, it's fascinating.
54:21
Speaker 2: Well, you were part of the girl Boss era, right right, right,
54:26
Speaker 2: and you're a wildflower. You're not a blazer wearing gal.
54:30
Speaker 3: I'm not a blazer wearing gal. And We've never really
54:33
Speaker 3: been photographed like before. It was like, you know, always
54:36
Speaker 3: like these like prairie dresses and stuff like lace long dresses.
54:39
Speaker 3: That was everyone was pulling these looks. Then suddenly the
54:43
Speaker 3: pledge happens and I'm like in a suit like an Oramani,
54:48
Speaker 3: I'm like, what is happening here? No, we don't have
54:51
Speaker 3: to do this. You don't have to force me in
54:53
Speaker 3: this box for my message to actually be digestible and
54:57
Speaker 3: valuable and valuable. Right, mom doesn't have to lose who
55:01
Speaker 3: she is as a woman in order to be a mom.
55:05
Speaker 1: I started with a basic question. I'm gonna end with
55:07
Speaker 1: a basic question. If if people take one thing away
55:14
Speaker 1: from your book, what do you want it to be to.
55:18
Speaker 3: Find success on your own terms? And I know that's
55:21
Speaker 3: very Pollyanna, but I think like that's how we get happy, right,
55:29
Speaker 3: is when we have our own definition, because otherwise, like
55:35
Speaker 3: you're just going to keep going and going and going
55:37
Speaker 3: and pushing and pushing. Right, And it's life is about
55:40
Speaker 3: the journey, not the destination. It's always like you know,
55:45
Speaker 3: one your one job away, your one relationship away, you're
55:48
Speaker 3: five pounds away. You're always like we're always waiting to
55:52
Speaker 3: be happy, you know, and we need to seize that now.
55:57
Speaker 3: And also like we need to do everything that we
55:59
Speaker 3: can and to support each other as women, because they
56:01
Speaker 3: say in the book, like stumbling is evidence of momentum. Right,
56:06
Speaker 3: So when you see someone stumbling, help them, help them, right, and.
56:12
Speaker 2: Go out of your way to help, go out of.
56:14
Speaker 3: Your way, and like odds are good that they're going
56:17
Speaker 3: to help you. But by the way, even if they
56:19
Speaker 3: don't next time, that's okay because a lot of the
56:22
Speaker 3: times you help people for helping yourself.
56:25
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's so interesting when I take calls with people
56:29
Speaker 1: that are like looking for career advice, I often find
56:32
Speaker 1: myself needing what I'm telling them, probably more than they
56:36
Speaker 1: need it.
56:37
Speaker 2: There's always a lesson learned.
56:39
Speaker 3: The teacher always learns more than the student.
56:42
Speaker 1: Yeah, okay, I do a rapid fire at the end
56:45
Speaker 1: of every interview. So a black designer that you think
56:49
Speaker 1: everybody should know.
56:50
Speaker 3: About, Christopher John Rogers.
56:52
Speaker 2: Oh so good, oh good, so good. A movie that
56:58
Speaker 2: you turn on when you're sad.
57:00
Speaker 3: Great expectations, really I know. Yeah, Gnath called r Ethan
57:06
Speaker 3: Hawk so fascinating. I can't tell this story the way
57:09
Speaker 3: it happened I can only tell you this story the
57:11
Speaker 3: way I remember it. You ever noticed that every single
57:13
Speaker 3: thing in that movie is green? You have to watch
57:15
Speaker 3: it again. Every single thing in that movie is green.
57:19
Speaker 2: What do you mean?
57:20
Speaker 3: Everything in the movie is green? Everything she wears, every
57:23
Speaker 3: object in the film, everything is green.
57:27
Speaker 2: I have to go back and watch.
57:29
Speaker 3: You gotta watch. It's fascinating and it just shows like
57:35
Speaker 3: how sometimes we don't even really have any understanding of
57:37
Speaker 3: what the heck is going on, and how much can
57:40
Speaker 3: like slip by us and what we want to see
57:43
Speaker 3: and what we don't want to see that part.
57:46
Speaker 2: Yeah, a place that you haven't been yet that you
57:49
Speaker 2: want to travel to?
57:50
Speaker 3: Japan?
57:51
Speaker 2: Ooh, that's good.
57:53
Speaker 1: A life enhancer that you wish you knew about sooner.
57:57
Speaker 3: Ooh, that's a very good one. Maybe like fish oil.
58:05
Speaker 3: It's real godsend for my skin, hair, and nails.
58:08
Speaker 2: Oh mega threes.
58:10
Speaker 1: Yeah, totally the best gift you've ever given a goodbye.
58:16
Speaker 2: What do you turn to when you need a dose
58:18
Speaker 2: of nostalgia?
58:19
Speaker 3: Oh? Playlists?
58:23
Speaker 2: Your best negotiating tip?
58:25
Speaker 1: Start high, it's true.
58:30
Speaker 3: Yeah.
58:30
Speaker 1: A book that changed your life? Something you think everybody
58:33
Speaker 1: should read.
58:35
Speaker 3: Oh my gosh, Everything by Belle hooks.
58:39
Speaker 2: Yes, I retweet that.
58:42
Speaker 1: Yeah. So I felt I was so excited to interview you,
58:47
Speaker 1: but I felt like once I read your forward that
58:50
Speaker 1: we were meant to meet because a huge line in
58:52
Speaker 1: it is you say question everything. And about a year
58:57
Speaker 1: and a half ago, I launched a card game of
58:58
Speaker 1: questions titled Questions.
59:00
Speaker 3: Oh my gosh, I.
59:02
Speaker 1: Love that, and I pull on at the end of
59:05
Speaker 1: every interview. So since we're virtual, you'll just tell me
59:08
Speaker 1: when to stop.
59:09
Speaker 3: Oh my gosh, I love this, and you need this
59:12
Speaker 3: deck of credits.
59:12
Speaker 2: Okay, stop, okay.
59:14
Speaker 1: So I always feel like books come to people when
59:16
Speaker 1: they're meant to and anytime I pull a card, it's
59:20
Speaker 1: so that people get the one they're meant to get.
59:23
Speaker 2: Do plants thrive or die in your care?
59:26
Speaker 3: That was the question? Yeah, Oh my god, wow, they
59:35
Speaker 3: die and are reborn in my care. So this this
59:40
Speaker 3: one that's behind me, Like, I don't even know how
59:42
Speaker 3: well you can see it, but all of the leaves,
59:48
Speaker 3: every single leaf dropped off of it like ten days ago,
59:55
Speaker 3: and over the last ten days it is literally I
59:59
Speaker 3: can't even like my assistant was like, what happening? Every
1:00:04
Speaker 3: single leaf has grown back like rapid fire.
1:00:10
Speaker 2: Did you put it in sunlight or what did you do?
1:00:13
Speaker 3: No, it's been in the exact same place, on the
1:00:15
Speaker 3: exact same water schedule the entire time. And it's like,
1:00:18
Speaker 3: sometimes parts of you have to die so that other
1:00:20
Speaker 3: parts can be reborn.
1:00:24
Speaker 1: I love how you're so metaphorical in the most beautiful way.
1:00:28
Speaker 3: I love thank you so much, Thank you so much.
1:00:31
Speaker 1: This is something I ask everybody, and it's intentionally broad.
1:00:34
Speaker 1: So whatever comes to you. What is the smartest decision
1:00:37
Speaker 1: you've ever made.
1:00:39
Speaker 3: To not let my friends doubt about the idea of
1:00:43
Speaker 3: the fifteen percent pledge that day stop me from being
1:00:47
Speaker 3: vulnerable and posting that ask very publicly online.
1:00:51
Speaker 1: I'm sort of enthralled by what you've built because I
1:00:53
Speaker 1: think so many of the amazing organizations and groups that
1:00:57
Speaker 1: were started in twenty twenty during Black Lives Matter have
1:01:01
Speaker 1: not been able to cut through, and it's not their fault,
1:01:05
Speaker 1: but yours has been so impactful.
1:01:08
Speaker 3: Thank you, Thank you so much. I really appreciate that.
1:01:17
Speaker 2: Before we leave each other today, I wanted to leave
1:01:19
Speaker 2: you with this.
1:01:20
Speaker 1: Aurora was so kind and invited me to her book
1:01:23
Speaker 1: launch in Los Angeles, and she read a little excerpt
1:01:26
Speaker 1: from her memoir. It was one of my favorite parts
1:01:30
Speaker 1: of the book, and we didn't necessarily get to cover
1:01:32
Speaker 1: it in the interview. And it is just it's so us.
1:01:37
Speaker 1: It is so pretty smart. It's all about lifting each
1:01:41
Speaker 1: other up. And she provides some beautiful imagery of.
1:01:45
Speaker 2: Geese, which I didn't expect. I'm not sure if that's
1:01:48
Speaker 2: what you expected.
1:01:49
Speaker 1: So without further ado, here's Aurora on how we can
1:01:55
Speaker 1: really create community.
1:01:57
Speaker 4: I promise myself that I would be more articulate what
1:02:00
Speaker 4: I need and moving forward, especially if I planned on
1:02:03
Speaker 4: blaming anyone else for my feelings. At the end of
1:02:05
Speaker 4: the week, I also learned about geese. These fly in
1:02:08
Speaker 4: a V formation to make it easier for the flock
1:02:11
Speaker 4: to move forward. The birds in the back use the
1:02:13
Speaker 4: momentum generated by the wings of those flying in front
1:02:16
Speaker 4: of them. Each bird cycles through the pattern. The one
1:02:19
Speaker 4: in the front eventually wins up in the back, floating
1:02:22
Speaker 4: on the currents created by the work.
1:02:24
Speaker 3: Being done by others in the front. It's an instinctual
1:02:28
Speaker 3: mechanism that helps these lighting the load for one another.
1:02:31
Speaker 3: The concept clacking.
1:02:32
Speaker 4: You hear when these are flying is the back of
1:02:34
Speaker 4: the flock cheering on the ones in the front who
1:02:37
Speaker 4: are work in the hardest. And if at any point
1:02:40
Speaker 4: a goose has an issue and starts to drop out
1:02:43
Speaker 4: of the bee, two others will drop with that tired
1:02:46
Speaker 4: or distressed bird, so they will always be able to
1:02:48
Speaker 4: carry that bee. They will stay together in a miniv
1:02:52
Speaker 4: of three until that goose recovers or dies.
1:02:55
Speaker 3: If it passes away, the other two will wait for
1:02:58
Speaker 3: another formation of geese and join their This practice made
1:03:02
Speaker 3: so much sense to me. We're meant to be in community,
1:03:05
Speaker 3: and sometimes it's critical for us to carry the load
1:03:07
Speaker 3: for one another. It is also impossible to go very
1:03:11
Speaker 3: far alone.
1:03:12
Speaker 4: We traveled best with the momentum of others, and our
1:03:15
Speaker 4: voices are best heard in a chorus. I did not
1:03:18
Speaker 4: realize then how the flight patterns of peace would guide
1:03:21
Speaker 4: the biggest choices of my life.
1:03:24
Speaker 3: So I just wanted to say