How Self-Love Transforms Everything, Including Fundraising

Jeff Schreifels 

As a fundraiser, you care deeply about changing the world, and you’re working hard to make a difference for a cause you’re passionate about. And that means you probably also struggle with setting boundaries that protect your energy and time. For today’s episode, Richard and I are handing it over to Karen Kendrick, our Senior Director of Learning, and special guest, Nneka Allen, founder of the Empathy Agency, for a great conversation on how to prioritize your own needs, and find more fulfillment in your work.

Recorded 

Welcome to the Nothing But Major Gifts podcast from Veritus Group featuring Richard Perry and Jeff Schreifels. Twice a month, we bring you the latest and best thinking about major gift fundraising so you can develop authentic relationships with your major donors. Here are your hosts, Richard and Jeff.

Karen Kendrick 

Welcome to today’s podcast. I’m Karen Kendrick and I’m taking over the podcast today while Jeff and Richard take the day off. Fundraising is often seen as sacrificial work. There’s a cultural expectation that fundraisers must be willing to do whatever it takes to support the organization’s mission, and that they need to do it for a much lower salary than they would get elsewhere. But this culture needs to change. It’s time for you to see your value, see your power, and start loving yourself because it is truly the key to more deeply connecting with your donors and supporting your mission, not to mention how it affects the wonderful things in your life as well. And I’m thrilled to have Nneka Allen, Principal and Founder of the Empathy Agency as a guest today. Nneka, why don’t you give our audience a quick introduction before we get started?

Nneka Allen 

Thanks so much, Karen. It’s wonderful to be with you today and to be with your listeners. My name is Nneka Allen and I am a relationship builder, a stone catcher, a freedom fighter, professional coach, and storyteller. I am a daughter of the Underground Railroad. I am a sixth generation Canadian. I’m a mama and a dog lover. I have two doggies. Sophie and Sammy. And I live here in Abbotsford, British Columbia with my daughter and her husband. And we live on the unceded shared territory of the Sumas and Matsqui First Nations. And I honor the survival of indigenous nations on Turtle Island, despite genocide. I recognize the theft and the subjugation of colonization and white supremacy culture that they have endured. And as a forced inhabitant of these beautiful territories myself, I’m challenged to confront the cost of living on this land. And I am truly grateful for the historic relationship that exists between my indigenous and African ancestors. And I’m really glad to be with you today.

Karen Kendrick 

Thank you Nneka. Stone catcher? You must tell me what that is, before we go on.

Nneka Allen 

Oh, yeah, I first read that term in the book, “Just Mercy” by Bryan Stevenson, which is a phenomenal book. It also has been made into a movie, but I much prefer the book. And he is a attorney in the south of the United States, and he predominantly defends people who are on death row. And so the book is much about that. He’s also the founder of the Equal Justice Initiative.

Karen Kendrick 

I’ve heard him speak.

Nneka Allen 

Yeah, I have too! It was just profound. And so in his book, there’s a story he tells. He’s talking with an older woman, and she uses the term “stone catcher,” and I won’t give the story away. But what it is essentially is a person who’s willing to step in front of another, to catch the stones that are thrown in their direction. And that imagery very much resonated with much of my life and the way I want to be in this world going forward. So, I made it into my bio.

Karen Kendrick 

Wow, thank you. All right. Now, you and I share a passion for creating a culture where we are unapologetically loving ourselves and taking care of our needs, so we can bring ourselves more fully to our life. But let’s start by discussing what we mean by self-love, like kind of broadly what that means to us personally. And then later on, we’re also going to dive into how that relates to our sector and fundraising so get us started and Nneka.

Nneka Allen 

Yeah, so it’s interesting as I started to think about, you know, the topic of self-love the thing that really immediately emerged for me was the work of Bell Hooks. And I don’t know if you’ve read her book “All About Love.” But that book is transformational and is a constant resource to me. And in that book, she shares a definition of love by M. Scott Peck. And it is really quite transformational. It was transformational in my understanding of the concept of love or the act of love. And he writes, “love is the will to extend oneself for the purpose of nurturing one’s own or another’s spiritual growth.” I think it’s important to note here, when they’re referring to spiritual growth, they’re not talking about it in the context of religion. They’re talking about the truest parts of who we are as human beings. And so Bell Hooks goes on to write when we understand love as the will to nurture our own and another’s spiritual growth, it becomes clear that we cannot claim to love if we are hurtful, or abusive. And so that definition has really stretched, my value of love, my understanding of it, the behavior of love. And it has really forced me to begin to sort of like wrestle with what does this look like in operation, if I’m going to be truly grounded in nurture, for myself, and for others?

Nneka Allen 

I was thinking about how so many different faith groups speak about this. And you know, the piece that actually Jesus did around “love others as you love yourself,” which I don’t think we really pay that much attention to, and how that how it’s so intertwined, right, that whole piece around loving yourself and loving others. And you know, just this morning, as I walked outside to let my dog out, looking at the trees, and taking a moment, and then my head goes to all the things I need to do and how I’m not doing all that. And the little negative self-talk starts bringing that back to a breath. And what’s true, what’s real, I mean, that was being harmful, that was that negativity, that part of us that causes harm to ourselves. So all that we’re gonna be talking about today is how do we think about love, talk about love? How does it play out in our lives? What gets in the way? And how do we, every day in each moment, make different choices for ourselves, and for those we work with for our sector, and some of the things we can look at in that process.

Karen Kendrick 

All right, so talk a little bit more about your journey with self-love. What has been impactful, important, as you have been looking into this, passionate about it, wanting to grow that part of who you are?

Nneka Allen 

Yeah. So love is one of my top two values. So it has this really a central feature in my life, even though I didn’t know it was one of my top two values until I did that work. But when I look back retrospectively over the course of my life, I can see how it very much is centered in the way I want to be in the world and the way I just most naturally show up in the world. And I believe love looks like a bunch of different things, right? It’s not just warm and fuzzy and hugs and kisses. It can also be truth. Right, it can also be boundaries. In fact, I think it is boundaries, right?

Karen Kendrick 

We’ll talk about that a minute. Yes.

Nneka Allen 

Yeah. I mean, I think I may have mentioned to you on one of our previous conversations, that Brene Brown’s definition of boundaries just gives me such a great mental image of love in operation. She says, “Boundaries are the distance at which I can love you and me simultaneously.” And so it sounds sort of straightforward, but when you go to apply that in a circumstance, you know, the wrestling begins. And I think that wrestling is a part of love, too. Right. I was recently only on a six-week Sabbath during the month of December and into January, and one of my greatest challenges was maintaining the boundaries I had set for that rest period. And what I noticed was that my issue was really with some dissatisfaction that I was feeling about needing to reassert the boundaries. I felt like I’ve already said what the boundaries are. I don’t want to say it again, because it’s uncomfortable. And then I turned to, so I don’t understand, why aren’t they just like abiding by the boundaries that I’ve set? And so the more I sort of dug into that, right, I realized it was just my own resistance, wanting to just reestablish those boundaries, like what’s wrong with that? Why not? And it was a real act of love to do that to, like, reassert them right towards myself.

Karen Kendrick 

I think a lot of us are sitting around waiting for someone else, before we even set a boundary, to give us that boundary, right to give us that peace we want, to give us that space we need or whatever it might be, like, somehow we’re waiting for someone else to do it for us. But then we finally learn to do it, to set some boundaries, then it’s learning that it’s not like a one time said deal. And it may be that in one situation, this is a boundary you want to set. In a similar situation, you have a different boundary. It’s movable. I remember learning with my kids, I have three kids who are adults. And they’ve learned that, you know, there’s no guarantee you ask Mom for something, she checks in with her intuition, she may or not comply. And then I finally learned I don’t have to figure out all the possible things and set up my black and white strategy and do’s and don’ts. And then the tough thing is learning to then understand, I guess, I love that the wrestling of everybody else has their issues they want solved too. So if they’re pushing back again, it’s not necessarily personal. So it’s this act of self-love and of love towards them too. Because if you don’t do that, then where’s your relationship gonna go? Right? If you comply, and you’re pissed? So that wrestling with reasserting your boundary again, clearly, and in a grounded way, versus how I used to do, which is no boundaries. And I finally get to a point where I would be like, I set a boundary, like, you know, I’ve just gone to war. Very overdramatic. So I think learning to do it more often, centered, more from a grounded, clear space come back to that, is quite a, it’s a practice, right.

Nneka Allen 

It is. And it really challenged me to think about what assumptions do I hold around this notion of respecting boundaries? Or just abiding by boundaries? I had a bunch of assumptions about that. What that looks like. You put it down once, you’re good. Right. And then it’s no longer an issue. When in reality, like you said, I think that the frequency with which you’re able to reiterate those boundaries and understanding that those boundaries can also be fluid depending on what’s happening, right? You may, again, it’s the distance at which that I can love you and me simultaneously. And so we’re not the same person today as we are tomorrow and the next day, right. And so there’s like that reassessment, I think that needs to happen. And in order to reassess, you have to be present with yourself, which I think is an act of love towards oneself.

Karen Kendrick 

You know, that learning to be present with myself was, for me, the biggest impactful thing in my journey, I think, because I started the journey of life counseling, women’s groups, all kinds of things because I lived very anxious inside all the time. Guilty and anxious. I was brought up to be a good girl, to be cooperative to be nice, all those things, right. And I think there’s a lot of women fundraisers, we may have experienced that way of growing up. And so I was like, wow, I live so anxious, right. And I was doing a training years ago, I’ve told this story before, but with a colleague of mine, and it was tough. It was about race, gender, LGBTQ issues and corporate settings. And I asked my colleague who’d done live trainings with me, I’m like, “Hassan, how do I come across in training?” Thinking I’m gonna get a compliment, thought I was pretty good. He’s like, “You’re kind of an ice queen.” I was like, “Me, an ice queen?!” Well, it was the beginning of me understanding I was not in my body. I was checked out. Because I’m so in tune with people, I’m so sensitive. That anxiety, I felt all the time was partially mine, partially everybody else’s. And so learning that, who I am as a person, how my system works and doing more body-centered, somatic work, I work with horses, I mean, all of that to really tune in to how do I stay in my body, stay present, and know what’s happening and tune in was a huge part of being able to, for me, my superpower is my heart. And it’s very courageous, right. But I couldn’t be in that space when I wasn’t present in my own body. So that was a huge shift for me. Huge shift. Then I can listen to my intuition, I can get a lot of information.

Nneka Allen 

Yeah. I found slowing down. Just slowing things right down, is the primary game changer for me. Because the things that I can hear, fundamentally change when I allow time to bend.

Karen Kendrick 

So what does that look like? Let’s talk about that. So we’re, and we’ll get to our sector in just a minute. But you’ve got a work thing coming up? Maybe it has some energy around it. How do you how do you use time to help you bring in your intuition, your wisdom? What’s that look like?

Nneka Allen 

So you know, I believe that as humans, we are powerful beyond belief. I believe when we step into spaces, we influence those spaces, whether we are aware of it or not. And so I have committed myself to stepping into spaces and being who I am, which is, you know, a black, indigenous woman. And that alone, will frustrate a white dominant society. And so that act of just stepping into the space and being me, who I am, suspending the expectation to assimilate is the first act of self-love for me. I spend a lot of time in spaces where I am either coaching or facilitating, so I have a measure of power in the space. And so I am always asking myself, How can everyone be powerful? And so and I let the answer to that, in any given situation, begin to inform the way I design space and time with people.

Nneka Allen 

And so when I’m creating a space, I am doing deliberate things to frustrate white supremacist culture, which is very rigid and which is absolutely timebound, and which does not value who we are. It’s more interested in what we can produce. And so I use music. I start with music so that we can get into our bodies. Hopefully harmonize our bodies. We spend, I spend time talking about how we will work together versus what we’re going to do. I check in with people and ask them, and I also answer, you know, what do you need right now to feel seen and heard? So that we can actually locate what is real for people in that moment. So we can meet them there. And I find when we begin with just those three things, those are just three examples. We begin to slow time down.

Nneka Allen 

Giving permission to go slow. I was facilitating a session just yesterday. And it was, the group was in Toronto. And so it was the end of their day. And they showed up in session and I was playing little Marvin Gaye. And I heard a little bit of like, huh, like I could, you know, there was like these responses that just, and we just let the song play. We didn’t talk, we just let the song play. But I could tell by the expressions on the face, something was happening, like something had happened or was happening. And as facilitators, me and my co -acilitator, we didn’t know what was necessarily going on. But that’s the real beauty of that question. What do you need right now to feel seen and heard? What we immediately learned was that this whole group of leaders had just come out of back to back meetings. They were landing in this session, where they needed to, like, imagine a new way forward. Hmm. And they were all saying in some way, shape or form, I don’t really have the energy to like, step into this space. And so they’re like, I don’t know, like, we’re here, but I don’t know. Right. And because we gave them permission to just slow it right down. They ended up producing some really creative work and on exiting, some of them were saying they felt energized. So that’s just an example of what it could look like, you know, in practice.

Karen Kendrick 

Yes, I’ve seen you do that with us, a group of us a Veritus have joined the incredible Collecting Courage new training, helping us really dive into diversity and equity issues in our sector. And that’s how you really started with us is to slow us down, get us present to how we want to be together. And I think about how our culture, you know, the white supremacy culture, our culture, has been all about getting the most done the least bit of time, and thinking it’s always the most efficient way. And treating us like machines, in our system, in our sector, you know, you’re gonna get there in time, you’re going to work all day, it’s going to be straight, you’re gonna be productive. And when we’re not feeling that we are, we’re always beating ourselves up, we feel badly, we’re not doing enough. And the exhaustion of just even believing that and then always beating yourself up for not delivering, yeah, and how, the story, you just told of shifting into that different gear of connecting to ourselves, to each other, to what we need, then allows the space for that. I feel like our intuition just hooks into like everything in the whole universe. Yes, I got a great computer right there whenever I need it, in the sense, like the guy who invented the car or whatever, he was just walking through the park and the whole thing came to him. You know, I think it’s kind of interesting, right? We need that space, for that wisdom to come through. So I thank you for, I know you do that, because I’m experiencing it in your incredible training.

Karen Kendrick 

So let’s talk about how all this relates to our sector. So you and I’ve talked a little bit about our journey. Our sector is supposed to be about love, right? Helping world, the universe, the planet, the animals, to making a difference. We think it’s about love. Yeah. And then what happens Nneka? What happens in our sector?

Nneka Allen 

Well, when we don’t understand that love is a verb, and it’s an act, we turn it into all sorts of other things that are transactional. I would say, too often in our sector, we we forfeit the relational for the transactional. What you just described is an example of that too, right? This notion of working like a machine, right and the relational is not a one-way relationship; it is a reciprocal thing. It’s relationship with self and it’s relationship with others. And so if you have to forfeit all of that in order to show up and do our work in a way that you know, is expected, how can we bring love?

Nneka Allen 

You know, I would say that the concept or the act of love is incongruent with transactions right? I don’t know if we would ever put those terms together in a sentence right but when we think about relationship, love sits very central. So the question that comes up for me when I hear that is, well who does our sector love? Because they don’t love everyone.

Karen Kendrick 

Love that question. Oh, who does our sector love? First thing that comes to my mind is we, I’ll include myself in the sector, we love the idea that we’re doing good. We love the idea that we’re doing good. We’re not necessarily loving those we serve many times we’re victimizing or exploiting. We’re not loving our fundraisers and our team members, we’re expecting them to work more, 70-hour weeks, cover many jobs. That’s right. No money.

Karen Kendrick 

We’re not many times loving our donors, because we’re not in relationship with them. We’re treating them transactionally.

Nneka Allen 

That’s right.

Nneka Allen 

Yeah, we determine their worth based on how much money they have.

Karen Kendrick 

Even if they do have a lot of money, we’re treating them transactionally. They’re ATM machines, versus a relationship with a human. I don’t think we’re loving anybody. Are we loving anybody?

Nneka Allen 

I don’t think so.

Karen Kendrick 

Or loving an idea? Maybe?

Nneka Allen 

Yeah, we’re loving an idea. And that, for me is tremendously challenging when you think about the role and purpose of our sector, which is really about social change. Right, social change, not just for the sake of change, but social change, so that people can thrive, so that people can belong, so that people can be loved.

Karen Kendrick 

Yes, yes.

Nneka Allen 

You know, the relationship between love and belonging is a fascinating one, right? We need belonging just as much as we need love, as human beings. Our need for them is equally as deep.

Karen Kendrick 

Yes. And I think about relationships I’ve been in or work settings I’ve been in where I don’t feel like I can show up as my authentic self, I don’t feel belonging. And the love of myself and the love of others and the gifts I bring, they don’t happen. They don’t happen, where, like, right now I’m in a workplace and at a place in life where there is belonging, there is love for self, and there is a space for me to bring myself fully, whether that’s in wrestling with difficult conversations, or whatever that might be, there’s space for that, and allowance for that. So what you gain from everyone learning to come to the table and belong and bring their full selves is incredible. It’s incredible.

Nneka Allen 

And so if you compare sort of the quality of the work that you were able to do in either one of those circumstances, what’s the marked difference that you can identify?

Karen Kendrick 

Previously it was fear-based, it was small thinking. I was in fight or flight. There was not an ability to think broadly or creatively or outside the box or be excited to build great partnerships. It was small-minded thinking, protective.

Nneka Allen 

Well, I believe the opposite of love is fear. And you said fear-based thinking. Right. And I think that a lot of people in the sector work from a place of fear. I know fear was a central feature of my fundraising career. Namely, because I was the only black woman, black person in every organization that I had worked for, with the exception of the first place where I worked at the museum I write about in Collecting Courage. And, you know, that is no way to live, and to be in the world. And so if we’re coming from a place of fear, then there’s no room for love. Like real love. You know, the love, like I described at the beginning, that’s nurturing of one’s own self, and of the other. Right?

Karen Kendrick 

So, I’m listening to this podcast, and I’m a fundraiser. I’m not working in a place that I feel like in bountiful ways creates that opportunity for me, in the very least. So what are some things that I can take away, that I can think about, that I can process for myself from this conversation, and I’m not trying to end this out yet. I’m just thinking about okay, so we just talked about how there isn’t love, there ain’t no love. So, as I’m thinking about myself as a fundraiser in that place of fear, what choices, where do I have power? Where do I have control? What do I have choices Nneka?

Nneka Allen 

So one of the things that our collective, the Black Canadian Fundraisers’ Collective, spends a lot of time talking about with our members is our autonomy. And really understanding that we have choice, and we have voice. And I think that’s the first thing to recognize and to accept, is that you’re not stuck. And you can choose differently. And so if you’re in an organization that you feel is harming you, I say, leave. Take the steps that you need to take to leave. Do that in community with people who care for you, and can care with you through that process. If you’re in an organization and you think, you know, there’s some work that can be done. And if you have some allies or co-conspirators in your network that can come alongside you to maybe help the organization see another way. Again, don’t do that alone. You need community with you to do that. But in every scenario, whether you leave, stay, choose to challenge the organization to another way of being, I think the most liberating part is the simplest part, which is you have autonomy, and you have choice. And so as you begin to contemplate maybe some of the things that we’ve shared here about what love is, and you know how love behaves, and you know how that might show up in a workspace. You can use that information to determine what next organization you want to be in, right, you now have, you can begin to articulate and really define the sort of environment that would invite your truest self to contribute and to be, right, just to be in the space or in the organization. And so that’s feedback that I give frequently to members of our collective. You have choice and you have voice. Your autonomy is yours, and you can do something with it. And we are here as a community to support that. So if you tell us what that is, we’ll go with you.

Karen Kendrick 

I love the autonomy piece. And I know for me, a big learning was before I would see leaders in power, so I would just tell them, like, oh, I have this problem. I’m working too many things, too many hours. Maybe complain about it a couple of times, and hope that they do something about it. So you know, having autonomy and stepping into having my own power would be, how I would do that differently, what I’ve learned is, let me list all the things I’m being pulled into and doing. Let me list the percentage of time they’re taking. Let me show how much time that actually allows for me for fundraising. And how that only will allow this percentage of my goal, and, you know, come to a leader with a really clear picture of what’s happening and a solution. To me that’s learning to have autonomy. Now, if the leader then is like, “I don’t care, tough cookie,” then, you know, I need to get out here right now. A lot of times leaders are just overwhelmed and scared and running them up. And they don’t know how to solve problems either. So learning also to have that voice and give it a whirl in a way that gives a leader an easy way to support you and get doing that with others in support as well.

Nneka Allen 

You raise a great point around communication, our ability to communicate with one another, I think is a important companion to our ability to love ourselves and to love others. And I think we should always be asking ourselves, you know, have I communicated clearly what I need? And/or what I want in this circumstance, right? And that does require some of that reflective work that you were just describing, which is, here are all the things that are going on for me. Here’s the percentage of time. I understand that my priority is fundraising. I see there’s some incongruence here, and I’m wondering what you see, you know? You can bring curiosity to that with your leader, but you first have to do some of that reflective work to really see okay, what is on my plate? What is happening? What is leading to this experience that I’m having? Absolutely.

Karen Kendrick 

So I want to come back later to what are some of the some of the questions I can ask if I go into a new job, an interesting new location, to find out if this will be an environment of love. Let’s go back just for a minute to, so in my daily life and work, as I’m wanting to practice more self-love as a fundraiser in my work, help me a little bit with what does that look like? How am I, in a daily way, wanting to grow and develop my self-love, my ability to set boundaries, whatever all that includes?

Nneka Allen 

Yeah, I mean, I think, again, it’s gonna sound repetitive, I think the slowing down so you can listen to your body, so you can listen to what you need, is really quite central. I can remember, you know, early in my career, and I was a young mom. And my mornings were really a Bronco ride. But like, by the time I got in my car, I felt like I had achieved something just because like I had overcome all like, your alarm goes off, you hit the alarm, jump in the shower. It was just like, go, go, go, go go. Did I get in the car at the right time? Yes, I did. Okay, yes, success. And, you know, if you do that enough, for a long enough period of time, you know what the result is? And I can remember, you know, my daughter’s father’s mother. So my ex’s mother, saying one time, I need my mornings to be slow. So I just, I get up a little bit earlier, and I come downstairs and I make some coffee. And she just started to describe like, how she just sits with herself. And like, just, I don’t remember all the details of what she said. But I remember thinking, hmm, I wonder what that would be like? And then I started thinking, so what would I have to do to rearrange my life in order to do some of that? And I just started from where I was, and it may have been, you know, 30 minutes because of what was going on in my life, but it completely changed how I was like, showing up to work. Now I would say, you know, I spend an hour to an hour and a half, by myself doing all kinds of fun things in the morning. Just so that I can check in with me and think about my day and be really intentional about the things that are coming up, sensing, okay, so I have this thing I’m getting ready to do today, where am I at? What might I need? So I can get more ready, you know, or just be more of my truest self, when I show up into that space. And so I would say that’s probably the number one thing that I changed that had a tremendous impact on just how I was in my work. I mean, our work is so focused on relationships and being, right. And so while we might be showing up and saying all the right words, what are people feeling? Not just within themselves, but feeling from you. And so I believe settled body settle bodies. And my predisposition is not to be that way. It is to like, get the thing done.

Karen Kendrick 

You’re a get-it-done kind of lady.

Nneka Allen 

I am! And so it’s been a lot of practice to value being, overdoing, and allowing that to really shape how I organize my life, and my work. And so, I would say, how can you begin, how can you prioritize yourself at the top of your day. And it could be small, it could be in small ways, like I can remember, you know, doing all little things for myself at points in my life where I just was, you know, motherhood was overwhelming and the job was overwhelming and just so many things going on, but if I could just do like one or two little things that I know that were just for me. Right? It began to give me that space to have a little delight, a little joy. And it changes you.

Karen Kendrick 

Yeah. I just wrote a blog series, I love this whole article around, you can control how much energy you have, but not how much time. Time is sort of set, but you can curve time, if you develop your energy because it seems like you have more time.

Nneka Allen

You can!

Karen Kendrick 

You get more done, if you do less.

Nneka Allen 

That’s exactly right. And then oftentimes, it’s the permission to do less. You don’t have to do it all.

Karen Kendrick 

And they did all these, they taught people to do what you were just saying. Spend some time in the morning, every 90 minutes, take a break, go for a walk, take a breather, get outside, you know? Our bodies are in these natural rhythms and to allow these breaks for it, and make sure that we’re building space mentally, physically, emotionally, and spiritually, you know, all those areas. And how much more energy we then have to then be more productive because we’re more focused, in smaller chunks of time. So it is so powerful to take that moment. When I start feeling tight and frustrated, I used to just push myself more. And now it’s like, oh, I need to really step back and do something different and get a different perspective. Because this space is not going to be, it’s not loving myself or anybody else. Right?

Nneka Allen 

That’s exactly right. What I hear you describing is margin. So, you know, how do we design our lives with margin? And we’re not incentivized to do that now. But I believe that designing your life that way, is an act of loving yourself, because things occur, things pop up, and you want to be available to them, you know? I can remember really being focused on wanting to be present for my daughter, whenever she showed up with with, you know, something going on, I wanted to be able to be present. And that requires, that doesn’t come from a vacuous place, you have to actually have a reservoir, right, to do that. And so, okay, what fills the reservoir? And so I think I mentioned to you, in one of our recent conversations that I’m pursuing softness, like, how can I invite more softness into my life? And I don’t know what that looks like, in tangible ways. I’m sort of, you know, discovering it as I go. And the way I’m discovering it is more through questions than answers. The questions are really curious. So one of the questions that occurred to me as I was sitting in my living room, looking out onto the trees and mountains, one of my dogs was playing on the floor. And he often will come over to me, and, you know, paw me when I’m doing things. And we’ve been trying to teach him, you know, “Off.” And I thought, well, what would change for me, if I was able to give him two minutes every time he paws me? Like, if I could just pause what I’m doing, turn and engage in that moment, which is always, you know, delicious, right? It’s just so sweet. And then come back to the thing that I’m doing, you know? So what do I have to do so that I can I can do that? Just, you know, as as a query. And so, margin is one of the ways right? Don’t pack your schedule Nneka, to the point where, if my daughter knocks on the door and has to ask me a question, that I can’t deal. I have to talk to you later. Or when the dog comes over and just wants a little snuggle, I can’t indulge, right? Just as two sort of common I think experiences that people might have.

Karen Kendrick

My little dog Polo, who’s sleeping right now, will appreciate that one. I’m going to start practicing now. And they probably do it when we probably need a break.

Nneka Allen 

Well this is the other thing because they can sense you know what’s happening for us. And yeah, I mean, I think, you know, for pet lovers, I think pet lovers would agree, we have things to learn from animals and the environment, the inanimate world. There are lessons there for us. And so how do we, what posture do we need to take in order to receive those messages? And I think that posture has a lot to do with loving ourselves.

Karen Kendrick 

Yeah. I teach leadership training using horses. When I would go into my horse’s stall to take her to go do fun things, I’d hold up her halter. And she would just look at me and walk away. Like girl, you are way too much. You need to get yourself together. And I would have to stop and tune in sometimes I would have tears, whatever was going on for me I needed to like, be with and then I’d look at her like she’d kind of be like “Not yet.” And then when I had gotten more present, then she come right over, and we could go play. So I love all that. Other humans and animals and all that help us as our litmus test right of how we’re showing up in our more soft ways.

Nneka Allen 

It’s true.

Karen Kendrick 

So I want to wrap this up. And this has been such a great conversation. I do want to ask you, before we talk about sort of final words of wisdom, if I’m interviewing at an organization, and I’m wanting to find a place that I can show up and be my authentic self, practice self-love and love of others. What would I be looking for or asking in my interview process?

Nneka Allen 

So two things. One, if you want to know if an organization is going to be open to your truest self, show up in that interview as your true self.

Karen Kendrick 

Yeah!

Nneka Allen 

No substitute for that right there, right? Yeah. Show up as your truest self in the interview. I would also recommend that everyone should know what their top two values are, but not just the values, the behaviors that support the values. Like what does it look like in operation? Because you need to be able to connect what’s really important to you personally, to what’s really important to the organization. And so, every organization has values, very frequently do those organizations to other behaviors to those values. But what you can do is you can begin to ask them about what those values that they espouse look like in action. That’s a really great way to begin to get a sense for whether or not they’re living their values. You should be able to get a sense of culture, at least a peek into culture from their response. And I think more than anything, if you are seeking to align your values with the organizational values, and you’re asking those sorts of questions, you have to and I think this is the hardest part, trust your instinct. What is your instinct telling you about that experience, that organization, as it was presented to you in the interview? And honor that.

Karen Kendrick 

And someone can be saying all the right things, but inside you’re like the dog going, hm? Something’s not matching up. So if someone’s incongruent, what they’re saying is not really what they believe or do, they will give you that uneasy feeling.

Nneka Allen 

They will. Asking for examples too. So when they say, this is what the behaviors look like: Can you give me an example of that, like, what does that look like? Can you tell me a time where they really embodied that? Ask them for examples. When you get into storytelling, now we know this to be absolutely true because when we watch movies that don’t ring true to us, how do we know that? We hear stories that people tell and we’re like, I don’t know, right? When they start to tell the story of how those values show up in their organization, you will be able to get a read on, if you’re listening, on whether or not that’s believable. It’s hard to make up a good story, like a real authentic story in the moment. It’s hard.

Karen Kendrick 

I love that. It’s so beneficial. Those are really clear steps to use and take. All right, so what do you want someone to walk away with today Nneka. You’ve said so many beautiful things. This has been incredible. What’s a parting piece that you want to either say again, or add to what you shared already?

Nneka Allen 

I do have an idea. Do you mind if it’s not my words?

Karen Kendrick 

Not at all.

Nneka Allen 

This is what comes up for me, and this is from the Nap Ministry, who I adore: “Softness is available to us. Care is available to us. Rest is available to us. Intimacy is available to us. Community is available to us. Sleep is available to us. Justice is available to us. And pleasure is available to us.”

Karen Kendrick 

That’s really, really beautiful. Thank you so much for reading that. That was beautiful. It was just perfect. Thank you. So to close this out, I want to thank you so much for joining me today Nneka. This has been an incredible conversation. And I hope it’s inspired you to invest a bit more, I hope a lot more, in loving yourself. And if you want to connect more with the work Nneka is doing at the Empathy Agency, you can click on the link to check out her website in the episode description. And if you want to learn more about how Veritus Group can support you in creating better balance and healthier boundaries to help you find more joy and love in your work, we’d love to connect with you. You can reach out to us at the link in the episode description or by emailing us at hello@veritusgroup.net. Thank you and we’ll see you next time.

Nneka Allen 

Thanks, Karen.

Recorded 

Thank you for joining us for the Nothing But Major Gifts podcast from Veritus Group. Richard and Jeff also write an ongoing blog that you can subscribe to for free at veritusgroup.net. Please join us again next time.