How do I feel?
I feel pretty good about this year. It was a year of many changes. Deciding what to say NO to in my business. Deciding what to say YES to.
It was also a year of many exciting adventures. Going roller skating! Taking up tennis again! Watching some incredible movies. Writing more poetry. Journaling and getting to 1 million words in 750words! Hiking up waterfalls. Hiking up a coastal mountain. Making valentines for my friends in encaustic monotype. Getting into deep relaxation, naps and hammocks. Teaching in person in Portland and making new relationships here. Exploring tidepools. Making lots and lots and lots of art! Throwing most of it out! Helping a friend look back on her first year in office and celebrating her accomplishments and key realizations with her.
AND I feel good about all the travel! Going to Bellingham! Going to Reno, NV! Going to Toronto! Going to Minneapolis! Going to Atlanta! Going to NYC! Going to Vancouver! Going to Seattle! When I’m moving, I feel like I’m doing something enjoyable with my life.
Destiny cards wise, It’s my first year in the crown line with the 10 of clubs for the next 12 years, AND the 8 of diamonds for my 6 of clubs for the next 12 years. I’m excited about this, and I plan to do everything I can with the opportunities that are given to me. I already have business travel scheduled for 2019 to San Antonio and Florida.
What did I learn?
I read a BUNCH of books on leadership and learned a lot about leadership. Such as “Adaptive Leadership” and “Leadership on the Line” by Heifitz. “In the Company of Women” by Heim, and “The Psychology of Executive Coaching” by Bruce Pelletier. This one has had a major impact on me, and I learned so much through it that I blogged about it and I went on the radio and talked about it, TWICE!
I learned about bias as well, by reading “So You Want to Talk About Race” and “Well, THAT Escalated Quickly” and “The Body is Not an Apology” and “The Power Manual by Cyndi Suarez.” I hope to keep learning about this over the next few years.
I learned that I have internalized misogyny and I worked to counter it by elevating the awesome female bodied and female identified people in my life through my two online conferences, through interviews on my website, seeking out new women to support and elevate, going to my friend Della’s international women’s day event, and giving away coaching time to women, as well as giving my career and fundraising books away to women at my speaking engagements. I also gave away resume and cover letter editing to women in need, or at a greatly reduced price. I reached out more to my female relatives, and checked in with them. I wanted to be faster in getting back to women and being more on point with my own friendships, working to treat my female bodied and female identified friends as the queens they are. And I made an effort to cultivate new female friendships.
I learned about graphic data visualizations that I used in my annual report masterclass, I’m quite pleased about that. I think it really helped the people in the masterclass be more creative with their work.
I learned that I also want to be more open about my spirituality in my everyday life. I have tried to hide it in the past and that just isn’t working for me anymore. I did more readings for human design and the destiny cards this year officially, and I want to do more of that. I also learned more about my gene keys and how they apply to my life. I’m going deeper with them.
I learned that sometimes I avoid things that really need to be dealt with and the longer I don’t deal with them, the WORSE the situation gets. Like Taxes. UGH. Finally dealt with those.
What new skills do I need to gain?
I need to learn to pass off work more easily. When I passed off the work of finding more speaking gigs to a friend, the speaking gigs started coming in!
I also need to learn how to effectively manage amazon ads and google ads for my business. So I am going to pay my friend Vanessa chase to teach me how to do this.
I need to learn how to really follow a plan or have an accountability partner to help me follow my plans.
I want to learn how to do a research report, and I want to learn how to be a better partner.
I want to learn how to be a better leadership coach. I want to learn what my true weaknesses and strengths are and how I can best use these day to day.
I want to gain the skill of selling a business, namely the nonprofit leadership summit. My friend Della offered to help me with this.
I want to become a better bias trainer. So I’m studying and practicing this right now.
How did I grow?
I grew emotionally. I started to get comfortable with being uncomfortable. What does that mean? I went to an emotional intelligence workshop and learned a new tool that will allow me to communicate more effectively when something needs to change.
Through this process I learned that I am conflict avoidant and actually talking about my needs and what I feel will bring me greater happiness. I am practicing this now with a certain someone and that is going well so far. I learned I am very quick to be dismissive when I feel my needs are not being met, when I really do need to share slowly when I am getting frustrated.
In April I lost my best friend to a move to Bellingham. We still talk but I need more people here. So I grew from my loneliness by getting out there, and I made new friends!
- Thanks to my friend Andrew, I put on my first solo art show! We got to meld our friend groups!
- Thanks to my friend Natasha, I met my new art and poetry friends Licia, Meg, Geetanjali and Kristen!
- Thanks to my friend Geetanjali, I had a poetry reading in my house! And then helped organize a second one a month later. And started to build a new community of poet and artist friends!
- I made new friends (Brent, Daniel and Laura) who love talking spirituality, gene keys and the destiny cards with me, and that makes me so happy!
- I cultivated deeper friendships with my friends Della Rae, Pam, Joy, Maddy, Nan, Paul and Andrew.
I created new informal partnerships with my long distance friends Vanessa, Kishshana and Pam to roll out products and product bundles together.
What ideas did I find intriguing?
I found the ideas inside adaptive leadership to be illuminating for me as I look at my biases and assumptions and fallacies.
- NAMELY I believe in the just world fallacy… which is just that! A FALLACY! Nobody said nonprofits were just. Nobody said they owed people a decent work environment.
- Also I have been taking on the huge problem of turnover and inequitable nonprofits on my shoulders- wanting to fix the entire sector-and that problem is so huge there is NO WAY that I am ever going to solve it. So it’s ok if I fail or give up. That’s what taking on a problem that’s too big allows you to do. It allows you to not have to really try.
- I learned from the Power Manual that the ways that I play are storytelling (writing, reading and performing) and artmaking (inventing, creating and decorating)- not the other ways…Kinesethete, Competing, Explorer, Collector, Director.
I found the idea of helping people with their 5th chakra issues, speaking their truth, the actual core of my business, thanks to my coach Sarai Johnson.
I found the idea of decolonizing our nonprofits intriguing, so i asked the author, Neesha Powell, to come speak at my summit. She did. And I hope she speaks at many more events!
I found the ideas inside Ellen Bristol’s SMART goals and 5 steps to major gifts incredibly effective, so I asked her to speak again at my summit. And I’m so excited about her app! It will help make so many more development offices more efficient!
What am I doing now?
Partnerships!
- I am working now with Bloomerang to put together a new research report.
- I am creating a new business project called the Entrepreneurial Nonprofit with my friend Sarai, where we help nonprofits increase their efficiency and earned income and equity inside their organizations. We do trainings, workshops, and help organizations learn how to increase their income and heal their organizational chakras. It’s wild and I love it.
- I am working with Phil Gerard of Gerard Consulting to help more jobseekers with their resumes, cover letters and interview skills.
- I want to work more with associations like the Ontario Nonprofit network to take the decent work movement here to the US in each nonprofit state association, I’ve built relationships with two state associations so far, and I want to continue to grow.
Contracting!
- I am working with Multnomah County to put together a brochure in spanish and chinese for their procurement outreach to increase equity in government contracting.
- I am working with Oregon Metro to continue to offer workshops to small businesses in how to do marketing more effectively, and get more government contracts. I’m also enjoying getting to know my friends at Metro and Multnomah County better!
Speaking and Coaching!
- I am doing keynotes and workshops next year for AFP First Coast chapter, AFP International Conference, and others! I’m excited about this.
- I am working with a few nonprofits on increasing their returns through better fundraising planning and messaging of their marketing materials like appeal letters, annual reports, enewsletters, etc. I adore working with nonprofits and hope that I can continue, especially nonprofits that want to grow.
- I am working to put together better bias trainings to help more organizations recognize their implicit bias and help people create more equity in their workplaces.
Ultimately, this year I learned that there’s more to life than just looking at the tasks that I accomplish, or answering every email, or trying to do the best presentation every single month. Just because I want to hustle it cannot take over my whole life. It will make me dry and joyless. When I really take time to breathe, relax and stop working, then I come into my true power.
Life is about taking time for deep relaxation, and contemplation.
Life is about the little experiences every week with my friends and family.
Life is about getting to know people better, and being super clear to help them really know me too. I made some incredible memories this year, and I can’t wait to make more next year!
I learned that enjoying life has to be just as important as creating new partnerships and sustaining my business. And I would never have learned this without KH.