So my guest. Today, christian bread and ten meteorites there on a mission to unlock the potential of girls and women, especially in parts of the world where there are often excluded from education and in turn from much of life and the opportunity to help shape their communities and lives in a really meaningful way, which interesting is kristen and Tammy. They grew up in households where they were loved and supported, taught to believe in themselves and the power of education and to become strong advocates and to have you strong point of view. There are also both the first and their families to go to college and they landed in the magazine world in new york city, swiftly fashion after graduating, where they started to build careers and really rise up in the industry, but an increasing awakening in. Really the inequity that was happening around them lead.

collaboration. That would start as a viral video to raise awareness and eventually led them out of the world of magazines and to become oh founders, of a foundation to help women and girls globally become educated, called she's, the first and along the way they ray imagined the foundation model becoming leading voices in million new approach to philanthropy that has revolutionised outdated models by shifting or to the most vulnerable, so many we'll started coming to them to learn more, not just how to be a part of she's the first, but also how they did what they did and had a step into the world of giving in a different way that they decided to distilled their philosophy and insights and strategies to

the powerful new book, called the impact it step by step plan to plead the world. You want to live in so excited to share this conversation with you. I'm Jonathan fields- and this is good, like project. Met yet the global private aviation leader is known for personalizing every detail of your travels because net, yet standard is not just to meet their definition of perfection. It's to exceed yours discover more at net jets, dot com.

So the ten percent happier podcast has one guiding philosophy. Happiness is a skill that you can learn. So why not embrace it? It's hosted by dan Harris a journalist who had a panic attack on national television and then send out on this journey of transformation and he's now on a quest to help. Others also achieve peace and happiness, and every week Dan taught you top scientists meditation teachers. Even the odd celebrity in wide ranging conversations at explore topic, psych productivity, anxiety and lightness, psychedelic and relationships. The interviews cover everyone from bernay brown to cerebral less to sam Harrison more. I love learning from his questions and experiences and incredible guess think of listening to ten percent happier as a work out for your mind, fine ten percent happier where every listen to pot casts

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right now. You're hanging out new york you're working with his really interesting organisation that will drive into bottom This was not either of your original path or intention when you thought about what you be doing in your cook: grown up lives, what are we sort of them? the story, prolific as it makes more sense with Tammy and then war chris. Or ring you into the conversation that would just sir, like dive into the whole mix Tell me, I know one of these. I've heard you repeat over and over indifferent come patients. Is you grew up as a kid shy, I'm curious. I know you ve said that what I'm curious about his head, it actually shop in your life, Well, you know, what's funny is that after this conversation, I actually have an interview with the editor in chief of my high school newspaper, the viking, by which I used to be the editor in chief of survival,

a whole circle moment. But that takes me back to when I was seventeen and when I was in high school, I dreaded speaking up raising my hand in class standing up in front of people to speak was my worst nightmare and I really found myself expression and some competence in writing, which is why was drawn to journalism and decided that, when I went off to college I would I would be a journalism major with the dream of one day being a magazine editor senior year of school. There is the tradition of the superlatives in the yearbook, many I can remember that, and I was voted in a fairly large a class of a thousand some students? I was the one who was most shy and, I remember posing for that picture in the year they they asked me to.

the stand in the lobby of the high school- and there is this pillar and they asked me to hide behind it and pretend, as if I was just scared of the world, in my head. I was like this is a terrible things have been known as most shy. This is, meticulous, but I went, with that, and I just silently promised myself that I would make this most shy. Title irony one day, and I would be anything but and I would go, after college and I would go where no one knew me and become the young woman. I wanted to be. so that's kind of where everything changed for me, as when I began my journey as a first generation college student, I mean I'm curious also, whether so shies and interesting word, and it's loaded word and its also imprecise where these days right? Because you know-

It often speaks to this spectrum that ranges from severe social anxiety to introversion and which listen to me about that and I'm curious about how you experience it is. You know we we have looked at Generationally shy or introverted was the functional equivalent of broken there's something wrong with you. That has to be fixed. I think Susan Cain's book quiet hope in so many people's eyes, including me, because I'm definitely more on the introvert side of the spectrum and really made. I think a lot of people wake up to the fact that their ashley's, There is just the sort of like that drum, and it's not. nothing wrong with being on the more introverted side of it. You know unless it and it s in anxiety or things that actually stop you from living. Let you want live when cures, how you actually experience it like did you? is this as just this it's the way, I'm actually pretty good with it, but for this social reactions to it, or was it actually more of it leading

as a socialist, I did everything for you So I am an inch and I think that is different from being shy and kristensen extrovert. So I week we complement each other really well. An initial version has actually been a great strength in this year of twenty twenty, and I made me very well equipped record unseen and given me a lot of resilience but as a kid as a teenager being shy, I was really afraid of the judge. When that other people would make of me and what I had to say, and I no longer identify a shy cause. I I think, I realise that, I had to make my voice matter and stand up for something and when you do refrain and record as you can push yourself too speak up and and be a leader to serve others. That was my way of overcoming the fear other people's judgment was

socially social anxiety, I dont fi with label it as that cause. I did have friends, who were like the studious quiet bunch, who I had good relationships, win but I never went to school dance. ironic. We can talk about this later, but I ironically, I worked for seventeen magazine before starting she's the first and I would a part of a magazine that I never felt cool enough to read because I didn't feel, like my clothes were stylish. I didn't wear make up as a teenager, so those. I think my security came from now. In retrospect, I that, together this way of seeing these images of what a cool competent girl looked like an, I didn't think so that aligned with who I, who I at the time, don't you love those societal expectations and how they have like frame our early life. So often it does

like, though you know, while maybe surely the social interaction side of things was yours, we are learning that you really comfortable, actually taking to writing and having a voice and having an opinion and actually leading in the context of written expression so. It sounds like it was less about a fear of being judged for What's going on in your head in your voice and your ideas and your thoughts, it was just sort of like it was the channel. It was the the the path because I lot of people who are terrified of writing a pretty things into words and help people respond to that, and we certainly sheila Certainly it is as yet yeah. That's a really interesting observation, and I think some of us just like to collect our thoughts and process it before and put they together Even so I mean like writing a book. Is such a vulnerable thing to do because you're, it's not like a tweet that you can delete it's out there for ever in the world. But I thank you. that's why what

ten years have gone by where I ve built up that competence to or to justice. do it anyway, and certainly when you have partners and collaborators as I'm lucky to having Kristen it does make you more brave, sir. You and up as you mention first person your family to go to college focused. and disorderly continuing the process, reuse, journalism through college and then out into the world of magazines, which is a whole interesting place to be and when we bring into the conversation across and also certain at the time he described you as as an extrovert did that show up really early in your life, also were user of the person who loved and needed to be around people to fill you up yeah, I've, always loved people, and also I grew up surrounded by people surrounded by women actually in a very loud households and so I've have sound energy

from the energy of other people, s always really resonated with me. There told but that herself now so I my mom, had me really young. She was a second all this and shoes. Nineteen when she had me and so hurry. Younger sisters were constantly around. We lived with them and with my grandparents, and so I had all of this feminine energy constantly I was the only grand can and so you know I had. This was really interesting dichotomy going where my grandmother spoil the hell out of me They literally she used to say to me your and bread. So you can do whatever you want, and then I had my mom who you know she had me really young and she immediately went to work as a waitress and then eventually put herself through school to become a nurse

was working nights and and holidays in the e r for a while before she before she got on her feet, and so, on the one hand I had my grandmother telling me I could do anything. I wanted and on the other I had my mom was constantly drilling into me. How hard you to work where'd to get ahead in life both in a book. her words and through her actions mean the women, the woman worked to take care of me and eventually, my my little brother as how does young christian process those for, like seeming similar opposing are duly messages. Younger sin, decided that she can have whatever she wanted if she worked hard enough for it and why Sleep really ended up. Keeping my world view even to you today in that I have a very hard time accepting that that is not true for everyone, depending on on the circumstances that you're born into an as one of their the roma

it is for me a life is that I think it should be true. I think you should be able to and get a head and it it kills me that it it just, is not there I mean it occurs to me also that here you go in them multi generational house, over three generations under one roof, which used to be the norm, Did you ask me, like a generation or two ago? It's just the way it was, but has actually become. I think me more the exception. I remember a little while back we had who lancastrian who shared how he had a similar experience. You grow with his grandmothers mothers, brothers, and he shared how sometimes really challenging- that dynamic was but also really powerful. It was be in that environment and how he felt like it really equipped him differently than a lot of a lot of other people, curse, whether you use similar way, I think, the thing that has really stuck with me from my upbringing

is more than the gender aspect of it and because it was multigenerational, it was even stronger. So my whole family from the time that I was born, really reiterated that men were untrustworthy ends. That's because for me of them. Their experiences with men really proves that theory proven they re out and so growing up, surrounded by these women who created uncultivated? This, incredibly happy childhood for me at the same time that they were reinforcing these messages about what in hood meant and about the opposing forces between men and women in a lot of ways as if they saw the world, really that shipping, who became, and the ways that I ended up needing to explore some of those standard, ailment dynamics later in life too yeah I mean it sounds like that also is part of

what you end up really focusing on. When you end up again similar tammy first generation going to college and then say there was a really an extension that was really dynamic and what you focused on with a lot of your resurgence or like exploring women's issues, dishes and equity, and things like that yeah- and you know It is important to know in my childhood growing up both in there the lives of ants as well as some there. You know my mother. Ex husband and then her my father's brother, we spent a long long time living with eating These experience has taught me a lot about what emotional abuse the plague about. Why unhealthy relationships are clear about the physical abuse, the plague, by the time I left for college. The idea that women and and girls had a right to be safe, would be safe was

ingrained so deeply into my dna that it ought we express itself, and the truth is that I actually wasn well to identify at what I had lived through and white. Some of my family members had lived through could be called abuse until much later in life, but because of those experiences I was still expressing them, and so, as you hinted at jonathan when I went to college all the research that I was doing was around issues that were in packing women and girls wrote about issues impacting women and girls. Similar. To tell me, I went into the magazine world so I could talk to women and girls in and ended up working at glimmer magazine honour on a scholarship project for them. I think that, lot of times the experiences that we have growing up, shape us and at our actions. Where we can even name it For me even realize, what's happening were all right. acting on it and it son.

It takes us a while, certainly in my case, a dead for a bit I used to be able to catch up and say, oh. This is why this has been so meaningful to me. This is why this has been so important that so interesting right it sort of 'em year. It's really hard, sometimes to understand the context. When you're, in the middle of the facts, cat and in all parts of life for pretty much everyone, so I think it's me Fascinating, you know, so you both are leaving these very different life, yet so many similarities in so many overlaps and experience. You end up In two different colleges in in the same industry in the magazine industry us, What's interesting to me, you end up, serve glamour, oriented magazines yeah, which which, on the one hand, is like hey cool new york magazine industry. There's no other place to be. but on the other hand, given that the

underlying the cheaper fascinations, interesting new impulses and sense of purpose, with both of you. It's interesting that that those that becomes the content We are first at into usefully the working world, I'm cool. Is how I'm sure you both reflected on it independently with each other tommy. I loved you sure like explore what your thoughts are on, that and and how it either worked with or create attention with you now, absolutely right. We were in the magazine industry and, like the tail end of the glory days where it was still very much double where's prada and It was a huge contrast to this personal interest that I had in girls who were living in poverty in and struggling to have access to education. That was an issue that I started to become aware of my senior year of college, because I was doing this capstone reporting project for a class.

A woman who was a refugee and the liberian civil war and has the foundation back in liberia to help kids, basic needs met and for girls to go to school and I was really fascinated by both her story in the context of her trying to create this change under in a country that was now under the leadership of the first to be male president. In all africa, Alan Johnson, sir, we for me. That's when this notion of the power of being a first step, and to settle in because I hadn't identified as a first generation college, grand or student united come to campus waving a flag. Saying look at me. Nobody showed me like house the finger all this out. It was. MR thread, that I pulled out as was graduating so I this this woman, her foundation was headquarters in new york city, so I wouldn't volunteer for her. She didn't have a staff.

After my days, working in the hearse tower, I would just walk a couple blocks down the street to her apartment and do all sorts of administrative work. I'd send out the taxes, it's too her donors. I would help her organise get her gallery that were at the four seasons, hotel and what all I learned a lot about how nonprofits run and I saw on one hand I saw the power of when you can get these resources, of which there are plenty in new york, city and fund. That into community is that dont have any it just change the entire life outcomes, particular we for girls who would go, de graduate break the cycle of poverty in their family. And I was coming to these realizations in two thousand seven to two thousand nine. So that was a time also when attention was starting to be paid- of scale in the public eye and mainstream culture to girls?

there was a documentary and a book that came out on the You have girls education, so I was kind of their noticing, like I think, there's a lot of opportunity here and here I am twenty three years old and on facebook I facebook came out when I was a sophomore in college, and I was seeing how my friends were. next thing- and I was hosting about this volunteer work. and they wanted to be a part of it, but they can in a word. The ticket the thousand dollar tickets to the gala and there just this disconnect on well didn't feel right that there are- We were in this room and everyone's like having their dinner and photos of poor children were just like on the screens, they felt off and that's when I took a step back and I said, I didn't intend to work at all the nonprofit industry myself like I wanted to continue on the path of being a magazine, editor,

But I recognise that media has a lot of power to people aware of issues and also give them cause to action on how they can help, and I became fixated on. How can I direct my peers, who don't have a lot of money at but who can all do something and can all do small things happen I give them a step to take to support girls. gravitated to this concept of girls would be the first. To graduate high school And that's when I clicked for me that it would be really powerful to launch a social media campaign and creative and betty. I had done something similar at work work. With the seventeen bran. I launched a campaign called donate. My dress, which was about getting people to donate their own bridesmaids and prom dresses, two girls in financial mean. So I thought if we had this model but applied it to girls who are just trying to get access to school and

that's when I posted to my own facebook page saying here, have this idea for a campaign called she's the first here Why I'm passionate about it? Does anyone want to help that's unchristian enters the scene and responds and we start collaborating the way to launch a social media campaign, and we began doing. That issue is still a senior at circus university, but It was something that happened like after hours of this glamorous magazine job I had, and I think it best to me out- because I saw within my workplace- I was fortunate enough to be serving a readership, that is my northstar. You know I was taught two girls and and building their confidence. I think subconsciously, trying or maybe consciously trying to tell them what I wished. could tell my own seventeen year old self. so it didn't give me a lot of meaning and purpose.

I also like other editors at the time. You know you go to fancy press events and being taken out One shares of publicists- and it just seems to me- like all of these- companies. All these brands that are in the magazine like how can A funnel then towards making up making impact and I wanted to channel those resources that I saw in the media industry to the causes that I cared about. Met. Yet the global private aviation leader is known for personalizing every detail of your travels because net, yet standard is not just to meet their definition of perfection. It's to exceed yours discover more at net jets dot com.

The good law project is supported by a master class, so I have been writing books for over a decade, but I've never written a novel, and lately I've been feeling like. I actually have a thriller in me and David Baldacci is one of my favorite writers in that genre, and I was thinking, wouldn't it be so cool if I could literally learn from him, which is why I was so excited to discover, I actually could, and so can you on masterclass, so with master class, you can learn from the best in so many different fields to become your best anytime anywhere and at your pace. There are over one hundred and eighty classes, and not just writing- is literally everything from the science of better sleep, with Matthew, walker to cooking with Thomas keller, that's thomas keller, gardening, with RON Finley to relational intelligence, with astaire, parallel and just new classes added monthly, and now that David baldacci class, for example, I learned so much like how to find an idea using his writers prism or how to outline that idea and how he builds suspense, using red herrings and plot twists and cliffhangers, and what he calls ticking clocks. It was like I got this incredible peek behind the curtain and learned so much to help me start thinking about my own writing and the whole time I kept thinking. How much would it cost to take one on one classes from incredible instructors who are literally the best in the world at what they do? Well master class annual memberships start at only ten dollars a month, and that includes unlimited access to every class. Every instructor. It's really just incredible. I pretty much want to take every class they offer and I just might so get unlimited access to every class and right now, as a good life project listener, you can get fifteen percent off when you go to master class dot com, slash goodlife, that master class dot com, slash good life for fifteen percent off an annual membership, masterclass dot com, slash good life or just click. The link in the show notes

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And this is where you at your increasing, really start to combat the other, although it's not the first time that you had met yet there, there was, I guess, oh sure, like a shared organization that was involved, in scholarships where near the- early connection? Can it was there, but it was pretty loosen over the years and in this Are they coming back together What's interesting also is the store you're sharing is so similar in a lot of ways to Scott Harrison and the the origin story for charity water. In that it's not how much a walking away from bandinage what you're doing it sort of its looking, what you're doing and looking it may be, the savary and the less every part of what you're doing and saying what he said. Is helping me develop both said skills and am an ecosystem relationships, what if we repurposed it,

when we took everything that we learn, how to do and we're getting good at, and we re purpose debt for a different outcome. So Chris you see, I'm Tommy's outrage and. I got something in use. I ha ok, it's interesting I am so as semi mentioned, I was still in collars when we, when we first started she's. The first and I've been doing a lot of research on poverty alleviation on crossing women's rights, because of my own background and and because I wanted to write about something that mattered I wanted to use this platform for something not that really mattered. Anything also relevant to the story is the fact that ten me and I come from very solidly middle class backgrounds my mom was a nurse Tammy's mom worked in a school and I think it It's in a way what

You think, as a kid is. Possible for you, when you think about careers. in that. I think that you do kind of gravitate towards things that you can see that feel very tangible, because you know that do need to make money right there like there's no world in which you can go to school and not make money after the fact, because that is the reality of a no class life, and so for me. I think one of the reasons that I reached for journalism and that I reached for editing and magazines was because I like that was away that I could talk to women and I could talk to girls and it I would also pay the bells right. I like. I didn't feel that I had the luxury of a less or unless conquer. Option? And so in college was the first time I really had a chance to explore what I could be doing for fun outside of that,

and a lot of my fun and looking like running the campus magazines and working extracurricular and volunteering, and because it is doing so much research on girls the occasion on girls rights on poverty alleviation. I was seeing all of the data that was then coming out after these longitudinal study is about the impact girls, education. Communities around the world and the idea that if only half of your population is educated then all of your other initiatives, whether that is medicine or clean water, or what have you the only going to be half its effective and- when I saw Tammy's post you know my ambitious college self was like oh yeah. We could. We could definitely do that. We should do that. Why aren't we doing that? I messaged her back and I was the only one to message her back, so I am. I got the job certain of that because I think it's really its powerful,

anything else. Kids, I open a year for em the reality is most people. Listening to this are probably going to be living in a more comfortable western culture, western andrew with access to the internet and access to all. Of resources into the ability to listen to a broadcast in urban, join your walking around the data on education inequity in women, especially in developing nations and around the world there. I mean there's This is a powerful information about both the positive role when education becomes a priority and resource, but also the negative riddle when it. not you know it's an end and how that ripples out into all aspects of personal life, family life culture, society and all these things, can you share a little bit more about what some of that wisdom is well what we know And- and these are sat her in

right now. Two thirds of the world's illiterate population are women. We know that there are a hundred and thirty million girls who are out of swollen won't go to school. we know that there are another twenty million by the way that might not return after the corbett maintain pandemic. And then we know things like that. Every seven seconds. There is a girl under the age of fifteen who is being married off, This is this is the reality that were working against. Is that when particularly when families are facing an economic crisis, it's often women and girls who pay the price either in early marriage in child labour in dropping out of school and so is what we are working against those either. Those are the that we're trying to close an idiot honestly. The covered nineteen pandemic has made those there's a lot harder, we're looking at until backslide

to where we were ten years ago or fifteen years ago, and not that's scary, It is a scary reality of our work at the current moment. Jargon Imagine that's kind of devastating tommy when you see christians response and she's a good hey, I'm in, and then you also happen to know that that's the only response that you ve gotten garden, we're still talking about the early days who were still talking about you know this is really just a campaign, not just but it's a campaign. You know, there's a video there's, let's see if we can do this one thing together, that pretty quickly morse into partnership it more into hey what if we turn this into something bigger, What, if we turn this into a foundation and organization that actually had its own legs, it's on funding and made sir priority Really, with the goal of gender inequality by supporting girls, Joe to be the first new family to graduate to actually move through a full educational process at the same time, on a personal level. Both of you have to make this

it's kind of interesting right because first nation college coming from solids early middle class backgrounds, as you both described landing the big power. Washing job in new york city, which is, is the aspiration for so many people in the world, while the print media and then you both- saying? Ok, we worked so hard to get to this place. And we believe yelling it. Hardly you have to work but at least in art nina place it. This is possible. We're gonna walk away from it, in the name of starting this thing that we have never done before. We now have a ton of experience and doing I'm curious how hard that decision or easy. That decision was for both you and then I'm also curious did your family's respond to that decision since the first ways has snowballing over the course of three years before,

I quit my job and jumped ship. So something at that point now we're in twenty twelve, I step away in a candle burning at both ends. I would wake up at six a m work on she's, the first until I had to be in the office by ten weeks. office at six and then seven to midnight. I would be working, it was, they had a lot of energy as as a young person, but I was starting to get really burnt out of strain. Make mistakes at my day. Job and I knew that I'd have to make a choice, because I couldn't contain new to perform well- give seventeen what it deserved and also keeping. The first going like she's, the first will either have to fizzle out, were higher. me and higher staff to to support its growth and The reason she's the first was taking off is it was gaining traction in two ways,

and one way it was our community of donors who were loving and felt like was something that they could have. They can actually make an impact and they could see the difference that they were making so they went through word of mouth. It continued to grow through social media grew and then On the other hand, we were winking off to grow it's organizations working with girls around the world and starting to build relationships with those organizations and their response and how they shared with us that she's the fur was meaning a need now in terms of sending them money but also listening to now, what girls needed to succeed, but what the organizations needed to build their capacity and to be able to take their own local solutions to help girls. that were set up to do today, training organizations as well as funding them so I had to decide. Am I

and again she's the first the shot, it has to be a tremendous force for change, and I when about trying to get funding for start salaries I have a story. I love to tell about how it actually all came down. One of our first funders. He sits on our board today, Tom He is very philanthropic man, with three daughters. He lives in new jersey And the reason that we know Tom is because back and twenty twelve one But my volunteers shit a cab with a woman who knew tom here they were to strangers in a cab. They struck up a conversation that led the violent or to talk about she's the first and then when are they exchanged contact information? The woman said: oh, you know I'm one, Clients time, like he's really passionate about equality and wants to make a global impact they decide.

At that time needed to meet tammy, and we had our first meeting. I, when I shared she's the first with tom, and I I the term I done my research- I saw that he had made some major gets to other organizations and I I asked him if he would be our first funder. He and his wife, I was so nervous because I had never asked so I was really gonna asking people for twenty five dollars, but not for twenty five thousand dollars I created this brochure for him in, like microsoft,. Word or whenever programme it was an he took her and he said I'll think about it and the next day he me back and said he and his wife would love to give us that seed funding That was that was when I realized. Ok, I'm gonna take a chance. I got twenty five thousand dollars in the bank, it's not full salary, but it will get me started and from

if she's, the first had my full time focus. I really believe that I would be able you bring in more resources the That could happen. I ask myself: is that I would fail and if I did I knew that I would be hired back in the magazine industry. It was. I was starting to get a lot of recognition for my role as on seventeen first social media editor. I was on the cover of industry magazine you, the thirteen under thirty issue and getting all these awards for it. So I realise that there was a safety net for me, but for the girl, who she's the first serves there was such safety net, so That's when I decided by this is worth calculated risk on my part and then ask for my family. They surprise actually They are really encouraged me on. Trusted me, and here I am Nobody privilege that I didn't graduate with any debt, because

my dad he worked over time hours like throughout my teenage years. So that, in addition to my scholarships than my parents didn't want my sister and I took graduate with debt, so I didn't have that burden I didn't have children I didn't have other than paying my rent. It was pretty cheap because of a rent, stabilize department. I had I had the privilege and the luxury of being able to take that bet on myself Christian was that europe similar yeah. I think that for me That choice is Tammy quit seventeen in may and then my contract, a glamour was up for renewal in august. And so I came in to into that month. Knitting make this decision about. Was I going to renew for a year glamour, or was I going to to quit tour

she's the first and I did have student loans, and was very nervous about the prospect of of not bringing in enough money I knew to think First that first wonder that we had who provided that seed funding for us to get started. He also set me up with a one day per week, job that would give me just enough flexibility and just enough money for me to make it work. Secondly, Was that when I thought about the impact of these two potential, jobs in the world of these, these two potential, some parts in the world. I was turning to see the limits of working with him, the magazine industry. Particularly when you're, when you're starting out- and you don't get to say what the articles are going to be about and what the theme the issues are going to be, and so.

looking at a situation where we that is essential to take she's the first to the next level and so I had four months. And I knew that I had four months and if we didn't have enough in the bank at that point to start paying me, then I would a full time job again, and we took as for months and we made it happened, and so in january of that next year, twenty thirteen, especially on staff as well yeah, I mean it's him It's amazing what happens when you know that you have a certain like clearly ident five runway and it is me, a break is like this is the mark that you're looking ahead, you know and and for you so that you becomes- is this season where you're, both all in and you a certain drive to make something happen, and that first thing is yes, we want to serve all these women around the world and organizations who sir women. and at the same time we have- make this sustainable.

because you're saying notice, something which is very appealing in a lot of ways to you and to a lot of people, but there's a real big yesterday is a much bigger. Yes, if you can also make it make it work good sustainable, suggests relate. The initial go over period of years. It does become sustainable becomes this. You know for organization. That's raise millions of dollars at a mechanism. Organizations reason devote you have raised millions of dollars Yet this is the work of human beings. Are women who have gone out and worked fiercely to make this happen?. And build a global network of relationships with organizations with schools around the world with other organisations that allow to do this incredible work from india to uganda, to Guatemala, to so many different places and from what I understand, thousands of nine or ten thousand women's lives touched at this point is not just their lives.

visually. We talked about the ripple. You know like for everyone, a person who you are able to effect theirs siblings, the parents, the family, the extended family, the community everyone else who benefits, because these women are then going out into the world and then sometimes coming back to their community and making profound change so being in in this position right now, you know, there's there's the over mission of what you ve been doing and the stunning work that you have accomplished: then there are also a lot of the warnings either. Almost always come from stumbles and figuring things out and either being a part of or witnessing things that don't work right That is what your you're new book together in tat. Part of it is about the planning process about really put into other intelligent plan, getting clear on what you're doing a thing- most curious about some of them. The other awakenings that have

drift into your experience. One of them is around bias, and I think it's. So an important moment to have the conversation around that tommy use that were privilege enough. of times- and I a lot of our the alot of people, I'm a white middle aged guy in my eyes, had been increasingly open over the last number of years to a lot of things I never considered are thought about before just in the context of my day to day life here when you're doing the work of raw, king out to other countries, many of the women that you're helping black or brown in very deed cultures your two white women in the united It's doing. This work talked him. about talk to me at this dynamic and how you have both experienced it. What you ve been awakened to end

and seen and and learn from it, maybe even changed on the way. I think this is sweet hide in really closely with the evolution of the first, which is that she's. The first started with the idea that we could and we were provide one scholarship at a time for one girl somewhere in the world. what their initial model is based on a kind of after we came out of that the media campaign phase what we learned over time from those local partners was as Tammy hinted. I some of the some others structural issues and challenges that they were facing in their work. and also the ways in which the international development space very much mimics. built on colonial worlds and colonial frameworks,

and what I mean by that. Is that often the way that aid workers, the with charity works, is that a solution is decided on in the? U s or in though in the starter the global north, and it is then implemented all around the world and these places that were traditionally colonise in many many many cases, and we just expect that is going to work ever handing over any power So the decisions continue to be made and places far far away from where these solutions when quotas are being amended and these power dynamics of where power sets and where decisions are made and who has impacted by those decisions, stays the same just as it was in colonial times. Except now. We're talking about education programmes were we're talking about social programmes, and so those good intentions, don't make

system work any better. the only way to really create sustainable long term change, is to have a local approach. And so what we ve done and very, very lucky in the partners that we worked with over the years that they have been willing to have conversations with us about what really is needed and it to open our eyes to how the system works so that, the change it. I think the other thing that that position, as well to learn about how our work, is or is not impact for is that we set in this unique space where she suffers. Seeks funding from donors and we also provide funding to grassroots organisations and so we understand kind of inherently the power dynamics when you are asking for money or when you are receiving money from someone and the constraints that puts on you what this means is that today, the way that we work with our

is by ensuring that they have flexibility. We provide them with funds for girls programmes, but they decide where it gets spent. We work come on improving outcomes. So we co host trainings with local facilitators, local experts on how improve outcomes for girls within a local context, and we network so we connect our partners to one another and to other organizations in the space, so there they can learn from one another Ultimately, go, all really is now about helping, What about changing the life of one girl, although those stories, are incredibly powerful about. How do we change power dynamic. How do we build new centres of power around the world, third in girls and women who can Change the world for the better, yeah. I mean that so it's a really powerful

reflection. You know, and it's really speak to the shift from Here is what I want to do to tell me what you need us to do, tommy, I imagine so much of that involves. Humility and listening which, when you and something like that: you're so charged, and you just want early If that sometimes hard to access, especially in the early days I think one thing, I'm Kristen just profound summarised how she's the first has evolved and it made me liked on how, along that, on that journey. At it, we ve learned how to sort of edit ourselves out of the story, in the early days it was very much you know, tammy stan founded, she's the first, and it was a prominent part of how people were introduced to the organization and now, in the model, what we know works is girls, having role models that look like them that's why we fund programmes where they don't just have access to school.

But to mentorship programmes led by women who have come from the same source. economic background and culture who have overcome the same obstacles that they are faced with. And in my role as c o interfacing with donors. Are they in those early days? I oftentimes centred the donors needs, knowing that donors liked to be gratified with the connection to one girl that they are sponsoring and We used to have that kind of an old school sponsorship model and it took me several years to recognise that not only who was that system just administrative way, a huge burden to pull off by It also wasn't healthy for a girl somewhere in tanzania, kenya, india, nepal, wherever too, why they so tat to her. I don't who would then no about her. but they don't know it's not right,

broke. All they don't know others personal He tells about their donor and it it's it's set up like this unhappy. dependency its. much more empowering an effective when a girl instead has those ties to her tor in her programme and when we can provide, are grass partners with the flexible funding to strengthen the systems and the design of their programme, so that benefits more than just one grow at a time, but actually hundreds and thousands at a time so that's definitely been. I think, as the organization has evolved, we as leaders and me in my role- I definitely have noticed a way of. changing the way the way I approached the work and thinking what is most valuable for girls to get out of this experience and learning how to communicate that out. To donors and wife ultimately find is that people are our

to support an organisation that has. A progressive model and one of our dreams- and I guess this put- leads us- ensure to writing impact not just words, towards our vision at she's, the first a world where girls can choose their own future, Kristen. I also want to disrupt the philanthropy sector, but all and get nonprofit and an donors, regardless of whether you are supporting she's, the first or other organizations, tend to think of differently and when you approach organizations to come at it not from what you you know your good intentions and why? What you want and what you need, but rather what Does the organization and want to its beneficiaries? Need I mean it? two powerful sort of mega mission. On top of

the more focused mission. Oh she's, the first good thy project is supported by noon. So it's that time of the year, where a lot of oak start to think about their fitness schools getting their bodies moving myself included. I actually recently started playing a lot more attention to how I was fuelling my body and also really came to realize that I was carrying a lot of information in my body and potential disease risk in the form of way. So I wanted and intelligent and sustainable and supportive way to increase my health, lose the widen inflammation and just feel better and new is just a great solution for this one that I have turned to numerous times over the years to help me accomplish wellness and when it makes sense, wait management goals as well, so new uses science and personal is asia, and so you can not just intelligently manage wait for the long term, but also really learn from their psychology based approach that helps you build better habits and behaviour set are easier to maintain and the best part you decide how new fits into life, not the other way around, based on a sample of four thousand two hundred. Seventy two numerous ninety eight percent say new helps changed their habits and behaviors for good, and that is because new actually helps you understand the science behind your choices and why you have certain craving. So if you feel, like you, been lacking the knowledge to make the changes, you wanna see, try out new, so you can start making informed choices and start to really change the way that you think about weight, loss and wait. Management and wellbeing take the first step and sign up for your trial today at noon. Dot- com- that's an oh, oh, am dot com to sign up for your trial today or just click. The link in the show nuts

we live in a world, it's more digital than ever, with nearly every want or need just a tap away, and so many of our favorite digital services seamlessly meet the physical world when they are delivered to your front door. But until now that hasn't been true for crypto digital currencies have been tied up online, with no easy way to bring them into the real world that why were so excited to share that you can now cash in and out of, select digital wallets at participating, money, grand locations without a bank credit card or debit card flex. Your finances, using the only digital wallets with real cash access activated by money. Gram, learn more money, grandma com, slash, stellar, wallets. I'm curious when you say you want to disrupt the the current model, when I think about the vote that you ve written, On the one hand, it could be written for people in listing institutions to reconsider how they're doing things, but We all know that, like many

this has been around for decades and to actually break that model. The creative destruction require to remake it in the mode of something which is new and different. Is kind of unbearable from most of the people who exist in those organisations show if the disruption that you're looking for is to try and convince the existing ones to change or Are you more focus on saying: hey, listen, a gambler back in myself ten years ago and all the people were coming out of high school now because we see activism taking a route so much earlier now the people were coming out of. You people who may not even be going through any formal edge asian, but our just moved to make meaning And to organise that this is like hey, Here's a road map, even if you're looking these giant multi billion, dollar organizations and saying I want the difference, but that doesn't feel right to me here is another way to approach a prisoner. I'm curious.

that was so like in your minds as you both worked on this yeah. I think for both ass. When we set out to write impact, there is a primary goal and the book, which is that you as an individual reader, pick it up, and it helps you to make sense of making an impact It works you through how to do that. How to do it ethically things to consider this. Get motivation. The more Hidden motivation was the idea that we could equip, An entire generation generations of people with the knowledge they need to be better volunteers? better donors better leaders better cs are exactly That's right and to be able to plug into the ecosystem? in ways that are going to have positive ripple effects across all of us at me and There are some basic elements and things to think about that

If we, if we could spread of those messages, then even if not reader never goes to start their own organisation or never goes on to run a huge foundation themselves. Their ability to interact with the world in these ways means we can change how society views impact overtime. And so that those are lessons like the differ It's between your good intentions and your passion and your excitement and the actual impact of your action. It bringing in not biased conversation and understanding that you may not always be the best place person to develop a solution. So how'd you identify what you're strongest skills wave your unique gift is that you can do to the world and that you can you an offer and that you can create change were You know it's safe. It's really a manual not just to feel better about your own life in your own impact in it, but

As with the world and more, once more ways. There you write something like this. You. Obviously you have to have a certain amount of time in the game before he can reflect and say, ok, have learned enough. I've accomplish enough. I've stumbled enough, and I have reflected enough to really understand to write something that you feel can withstand the testing. I'm an end is discreet and About what a yes to writing a book like this, also having you being a writer as well generally- you say yes anywhere from twelve months to nearly three to five years in advance, which I'm assuming you said. This is not like hey, you know, may have twenty twenty. Let's ride about sancho. fascinated when started working on this before this year before twenty twenty nine when he twenty heads and the book comes out in the fall of this year after so much just right. For so many reasons globally,.

how does what's happened both within your own organisation and the organisations are women they use? to be in services and also just those at you to inspire the intention of the. But how is it evolved the nature of what has and this year. I'm really curious. Maybe tommy I'd love to hear your thoughts yeah. So we had a window of time monsieur while in quarantine to make revisions on the manuscript. We turned it in in january with a spring in our step thinking, you know it's going to be the best year ever we got it back, in march, and we had a window of time to do revisions and we found that, even with everything that was going on in two thousand and twenty, we actually didn't have to change the text very much, because what we had written the advice, the tools, the frameworks it it stood the test of time and if, If anything, it was the chapter on resilience that we really were reminding ourselves of our own wisdom.

To speak at a time when this crisis that she's the pherson on girls was stirring the spiral- and there was so much it's anxiety in our own professional lives with she's the first and we We're gonna reassured by our own words, which I always encourage people to do, is like look back on comcast they might have died or advice journal entries that you re end because a lot of times we can remind ourselves of what we truly believe in that that's something that impact book that I myself am turn to an practices exercises anytime, I want to create impact in a new way. that that's, how we hope it becomes a is People shelves for a long time, because it is something that you revisit all the time I dont believe anyone ever becomes an sport and master in change making. It really is a product,

that challenges up to show up. Rita and recommend to what we fight for I love that frame is seeing change, making as a practice rather than outcome. Yeah there's there no they're there and as you mentioned, resilience is a huge part of that and something that you write about. You speak about and especially this year, because I have to imagine even the best of times there is the opportunity for burn out. There is the opportunity for vicarious trauma when you are in service of organisations and and people who enduring trauma on a daily basis, and that following your own personal practices when you're this committed to something that is such a deeply held belief and mission and sense of purpose for you and theirs out of struggle involved in it that developing your own practices to be ok, to be resilient to whether constant struggle Certain extent

I gotta be so critical to your ability, not just to sustain the organization, but just personally to be ok, yet every morning and and be like this. hard, but I'm ok, I'm christian churches work that the hayfield about that yeah one of the concepts we talk about in the book when it comes to self care is the idea that self care is not actually about what makes you feel good in the moment. it's what allows you to continue on and something we evolved into practice this year. So for me that includes making sure that I'm exercising, ideally, I get out of the apartment. At least once per day, I've been hiking At least once a week for the last five weeks in a row in order to try and balance out Much of that negative energy that comes from sitting in one place, the stress of

running an international organisation during a global pandemic, the stress of launching a book in the middle of a global pandemic, there's a lot going on and I'm lucky and I'm well and healthy, and my friends in my family so far are well and healthy and we are all facing different elements. of this same struggle. right now and it's Important to focus on not what is going to make. You feel good for thirty minutes, but what is going to make it so that tomorrow, when you wake up you're able to get out of here, so whether that is exercised, whether that is working on a new skill to keep yourself interested engaged or knowing that you to make funding it's a line so that you know that you are a. Can you getting connecting with someone, you know it's is often not the things that we want to do actually at the moment, the things that we need to make time for, so that we can feel ok later that day

and- and I know, I love that frame that change, shifted from your indulgence to sustenance. Basically, I know also that there can be. I have friends that had been aid workers in the field and really tough places and there can sometimes also be when you think about devoting any energy any yearly personal resources to taking care of yourself that that also sometimes comes with a sense of guilt or shame. you kind of feeling, but. But no matter what I feel like I'm going through, like these other people here who I'm in service of organizations have a quote so much worse. Who am I to? kay time. Energy resources, anything taken care of myself and when you do there be this sense of, like other, taking advantage concerning stand your gun at it, like this sense of guilt, which I've had enough friends struggle with that

something the wind I deal with that, is that I have a number of men. These girls are now young women all around the world who have expressed some version of that to me and hearing from someone that you know to be worth to make the lives of other people better hearing that kills Someone who knew look up to who you know a day in and day out, is doing the work and deserves the break, who you know, needs the brick or the ability to take care of themselves. It lights a fire in you think. What we all need to do is to give ourselves the same greece that we would to our men, tea or our best friend or our partner. when we see them working and working and working and not taken care of themselves. We need to love ourselves just as much as we level people who are most important to us

because the second that you start letting that guilt get to you going to burn out. and we're going to lose you and we can't afford to lose you. We are all working towards our world, and I need you by my side, so you have to take that time. I need you to take that time, so You are in tip top fighting shape so that, were able to create change so that you are able who are towards something better. I love that a good place for us to come full circle as well so hand this container of good life project. If I offer up the praise, live a good life for each of you. What comes up? Maybe we'll start with me. to live. A good life is to follow your northstar and tick since every day that create the world you want to live in prison. Political life is too. Leave the world better. you found it,

to know that the people that you too, and the places that you touched are better because you were there, however, briefly thank you. Both thank you Jonathan,

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