Why I do what I do
I believe we are fundamentally interdependent. As Thich Nhat Hanh said, we “inter-are.”
The direct experience of interdependence is sublime, sacred, and awe-inspiring. It calls us to become our best self in service to others.
That is the heart of my work.
As I witness the multiple crises humanity faces, I am moved to take action. I am deeply disturbed by the rise of right-wing ideologies in the United States and elsewhere. We are literally doing violence to ourselves.
After much discernment, I felt called to support the wisdom journey of people in situations of wealth. My career has prepared me for this calling. I have deep compassion for, and insight into, the unique challenges wealth brings to personal growth. I also understand social change and highly complex systems. I love standing at the intersection of the inner life and public life.
The world needs leaders whose heart-minds are as complex as the crises we face.
I can help you become that kind of leader.
My story
I studied world religions in college. I learned that humanity’s wisdom traditions all point to the essential oneness of all things.
I was extremely fortunate to have a direct, embodied experience of interdependence while volunteering in Guatemala. In recent years, additional spiritual journeys have shown me how the Life Force is within all of us, like mighty waves crashing on Lake Superior’s North Shore. I’ve discovered the roots of my self-limiting patterns, such as codependency. I have discovered new depths of self-agency, courage, and contentment.
My college experience with interdependence has guided my career. I’ve also been inspired by Joseph Campbell’s call to “follow your bliss.” Throughout my adulthood, I’ve sought to match my inner calling with work that would help create positive social change.
After starting my career in nonprofit advocacy, I found my way into philanthropy. I eventually became a Director for Susan Buffett, Warren’s daughter. I used Living Systems design principles to accelerate personal growth in community leaders, foster difference-making trust among them, and create significant community impacts.
It was an honor to do this work, and I am humbled when people tell me the results have been lasting.
Woundedness and wealth block trust
My people-first, “gentle action,” philosophy contrasted with typical philanthropic strategies that create dependence and dysfunction…but rarely meaningful change.
I came to see that financial resources, great ideas, and incredible talent are like nutrients in an ecosystem (thank you, Victor Hwang and Greg Horowitt). In order to be truly valuable, these nutrients must flow quickly and easily. Just as a disconnected ecosystem does not mature, positive change does not happen without free-flowing resources.
Trusting relationships are what allows nutrients to flow between people.
Unfortunately, wealth can hinder openness, trust, and flow. This is why money is so often ineffective at creating positive change. Unhealed wounds cause people with money to act through self-protecting coping mechanisms. Their power is often sought by people with their own unhealed wounds and self-protecting defenses.
It’s nearly impossible to systemically create authentic, mutual relationships under these conditions. The “nutrient” of money ends up being used like fertilizer. It may create short-term activity, but does not build the necessary, nutrient-rich soil needed for real change to last.
Often, money ends up flowing like water into sand: nothing grows.
I observed this painful, opportunity-minimizing pattern during my career in philanthropy. I also experienced it through my own unresolved wounds.
It’s natural to be insecure. But your fears are transmitted to those around you,
and they drag down your ecosystem. They create fear in others.
They make people stop talking and sharing with you, and each other.
They freeze innovation.
~ Victor W. Hwang
Personal healing
In my childhood, I learned it was best to avoid conflict, to subtly manipulate situations to get my needs met, and to be seen only if I did something to get applause. I became highly sensitive, found comfort in solitude, and looked externally for validation.
This became a type of inner algorithm I took into adulthood. It was the mental framework through which I made meaning and navigated life. I wasn’t very aware of it or its effect on me, but it helped me build a successful career.
I walked my own path, believing that life experience and pluck should be valued more than degrees or awards. I didn’t realize how much I was driven by fear, grief, regret, and disappointment. I believed I wasn’t “enough” and feared I would be found out as an imposter.
We inter-are with all life…trillions of non-human cells in our body
are even more numerous than the human cells. Without them,
we could not be here in this moment. Everything relies on everything else —
whether a star, a cloud, a flower, a tree, or you and me.
~ Thich Nhat Hanh
Finally, my childhood strategies broke under the weight of adulthood. I had used alcohol, work, and codependency to avoid tremendous grief, shame, and taking responsibility for my own life. In one dramatic year, my marriage and career disintegrated (blog).
My only way forward was to see and take responsibility for the trauma-based childhood patterns that controlled my behavior. In the coming years, I lost 40 pounds and stopped abusing alcohol. I became a mindfulness coach, teacher, and author. I remain on a journey of coming home to myself, to believing that I belong and that I am enough.
The healing journey I’ve experienced is not unique to me. I see now that my journey unfolded in phases. I’ve found this to be a helpful for describing a sequence of development many of us experience.
I’m eager to share what I’ve learned to support others. I want to contribute to a thriving, creative, peace-filled future for Life on Earth. I’m strategic. I want to contribute where I can uniquely make a difference.
I want to know my efforts are effective and useful.
Matching Wisdom with Wealth
Through all of this, I came to understand the deep connection between the inner life and social change. I gain insight inot challenges wealth brings to personal growth, and the paradoxes that come being in a situations of wealth.
When I was a foundation employee, many people treated me differently, because one day I might help them access a grant. At times I felt like a walking ATM machine. I’ve never had so many people think my ideas were so great! I also experienced the reality that abundant financial resources are frustratingly inadequate for creating real change. I watched as the value of each dollar was decreased by personal challenges and broken relationships that limited what was possible.
When I no longer worked for a foundation, people stopped treating me differently. But for someone with personal wealth, it isn’t so easy walk away. Their life circumstances have many benefits, but also unique challenges.
All people are on a developmental journey from a simple, self-focused consciousness to one that is more complex and all-encompassing. This is a shift from immaturity to wisdom all humans have the opportunity to make as adults.
Wealth complicates this journey in unique ways that can be at times tragic.
But when wealth is matched with wisdom, I believe it can be a tremendous catalyst for social change. Relatively few people have a large influence on the ecological, social, economic, and political contexts all humans live within. When someone with influence is acting from a place of being “creative, resourceful, and whole,” many people benefit.
In this way, matching wealth with wisdom can be a powerful source of healing in our broken world.
Please join me.
The crises we face are putting Life on Earth at risk. We all need to develop the wisdom to see and act from our true interdependent nature.
My superpower is helping people transform their self-limiting patterns, so they leverage their full self (not their wealth!) to create positive change.
If this resonates with you, let’s talk.
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