Finding Joy In Trying Times

by Rebecca Margiotta | Aug 2, 2018 | Becky Update

Friends,

I hope this finds you well. I am fresh off a three-day workshop with one of my mentors, Katie Hendricks and I want to share my biggest a-ha discoveries with you in case maybe you’ve been struggling with something similar.

My intention for the workshop was to explore how I might experience joy in my life given all that is going on in the world. How can I feel joy when I know that our government still hasn’t returned hundreds of children to their parents? How can I feel joy when every other time I log onto facebook I read a post from Shaun King about another innocent black man who has been shot by the police. How can I feel joy when the current administration is giving the green light to corporations to pollute our water and our air? How can I feel joy when every week or two I learn about another mass shooting? Please feel free to add your own concerns about current events here, the point is there is no shortage of injustice and suffering in our own backyard, not to mention the rest of the world. 

I want to acknowledge that the injustice and suffering that I’m noticing is not necessarily new. It just seems to be pervasive and occurring on an accelerated timeline right now.

 These injustices are not ok by me. And. And. AND. I am married to my favorite person in the whole world aka my “hot wife.” We have two radiantly beautiful and healthy children. We live in a our dream house in a vibrant medium-sized college town with mountain views out our windows. I just took a yoga class (in the middle of the work day). So on this whole other level, my immediate day-to-day life is incredibly good. I feel so grateful for all that I am so blessed to enjoy in my life, and I find it increasingly difficult to reconcile my privilege and good fortune with the unfairness and suffering that I see all around me.

Perhaps you’ve wondered this, too.

Let me break it down for you in slow motion how this pattern unfolds for me.

I read or listen to the news or scroll my facebook feed and discover some new injustice or tragedy that has taken place. This has been a daily occurrence for me for a long time.

 I feel angry. An injustice has occurred. A boundary has been crossed. “This is not ok!” I say to myself. And anger is the appropriate response to an injustice or a boundary incursion. It’s biologically adaptive and it serves the purpose of producing the energy to restore that boundary.
Unfortunately, in this case, I don’t have the power to personally right the wrong or restore the boundary. Which catapults me into a second cycle where I then get stuck: I recognize that I’m not “big enough” or “powerful enough” to right the wrong, and then I feel scared. That takes me onto the drama triangle that we teach about in the Skid Row School. I start off in the victim position where I’m “at the effect of” forces more powerful than me. Then I might head on over to the villain position where I can go into a blame and criticism spiral and get that adrenaline hit from being right and self-righteous. And it is satisfying for a minute because I’m actually pretty good at diagnosing exactly what’s wrong and who is to blame (let me know if you ever need help with that). But it’s not deeply satisfying and for sure it doesn’t make things any better. Then I hop on over to the hero position where I figure out what I can do to make things a little bit better, and to be honest, it’s rarely more than a bandaid on a sucking chest wound. Then back to victim, then villain, then hero. I have spent more time in this triangle cycle than I’d like to admit for the past year or two.

When I was exploring this at the Hendricks workshop last weekend, we played a game where we drew a random card from this Integrity Card Deck (they’re inspiring works of art that I encourage you to check out for yourself). The particular card I drew said, “I listen to others accurately, appreciatively, and to invite wonder. In what ways can I learn to speak that are free of blame and invite wonder?”

 That’s when the lightbulb went off for me. Authentic communication is my reliable pathway off the drama triangle and back into creativity. I consider it an area of genius, if I do say so myself. Think about all the life energy I’ve been wasting on that drama triangle when I could have been creating authentic connection toward supporting the “us” that will grow in momentum and power to be able to right these injustices afterall! That’s where I am choosing to put my energy going forward: authentic communications in support of growing the us that will transform the planet.

 As I made this commitment to myself, another thing came to me: “Yes to authentic communications, WHEN YOU CHOOSE TO DO SO.” Which doesn’t have to be all the time. I have been vigilant on my social media feed making sure that no unconscious systemic racism slips by without comment or sharing the news of things I believe we should be collectively alarmed about. I watch and read the news to make sure I’m up to speed on the latest bad thing that’s happened. To be honest with you, I feel exhausted from it all.

One thing Katie Hendricks taught me years ago was how absolutely essential it is to consciously choose where to place my attention. I had forgotten that lesson. I have not been mindful about what inputs I have allowed. So over the past few days, I made some decisions to limit my information overload.

Last night I deactivated my Facebook account. I unsubscribed from Hulu Live. I deleted all the apps that are a source of upset from my iphone. I decided to leave my iphone to recharge in my home office each night so it doesn’t interfere with my quality time with my family. These are small tweaks but I believe they will free up a lot of creative energy for more important things! I will still listen to NPR but as my friend Nicki said, “Observe, don’t absorb.” I want to know what’s going on without triggering myself. And I commit to directing my energy toward the actions that are most likely to create the transformation I seek – authentic communications. I will focus on small and local knowing that will all add up.

There’s so much more redistributing of resources that will be necessary to create a more just world, and…attention is a resource. A big one at that.

 I am excited to see where these new commitments take me. I look forward to many authentic conversations with you and I want you to know that I LOVE hearing from you when you respond to these letters so please keep that up!

 Christine and I will be on staycation next week and I look forward to writing again the week of August 13th. Until then – be good to yourself and don’t be a stranger!

Xoxo,
Becky

Staff Transitions

We are absolutely delighted to welcome Selena Liu Raphael to the Billions Institute team where she will be working as our Operations Coordinator. She comes to us with two decades of experience in the Child Welfare, specifically foster care, intensive treatment foster care and adoptions in Los Angeles and New York City. She was a supervisor at Five Acres and oversaw the social workers who supported the families who were fostering or adopting children.

In addition to being incredibly efficient and adaptable, she also has fantastic insights into human development and has a deeply compassionate approach to dealing with people.

It’s not on her official bio, but you should know that she was cast on a reality show that never aired called “When Women Rule the World.” Her natural leadership skills were so solid that she ended up being “Queen for a Very Long Time” and there was no drama (which is why it never aired). We are so thrilled to enjoy her calm and grounding leadership at the Billions Institute. She and her husband, Jordan, have three beautiful children and live just three blocks away from Becky in Claremont.

Small Tests Shall Set You Free

by Rebecca Margiotta | Jul 27, 2018 | Becky Update

Believe it or not, this was a “thing.” 

Hey friends,

If your indoctrination about what it means to be a leader or a manager was anything remotely like mine, it’s possible that you have some notion of “needing to control others” wrapped into your self-concept.

My memory might be a little bit foggy, but I think I remember the old definition of leadership at West Point in the late 80’s being something along the lines of “getting people to do what they don’t want to do.”

At the Billions Institute we come at things from a different point of view. Our Model for Unleashing (orchestrating the loss of control of thousands of people moving in the desired direction) doesn’t ask “how can I get these people to do what I want them to do?” Rather, we start with, “how can I help all these people doing what they want to do?”

Easier said than done, but if you, like me, have a daily wrestling match with your inner control-freak, here’s one short story I offer for your consideration.

I am dating myself with this example, but back in the 1970s there was a fabulous commercial on one of the four TV stations (I’m talking before remote controls here, people) in which happy hippies picked packs of Juicy Fruit gum off a massive tree of seemingly endless packs of Juicy Fruit Gum. Think I’m making this up? See for yourself.  I mean, if only there were trees like this, right? Who’d leave their yard?

So five or six year old Becky decided, “I’m gonna grow me one of those trees.” I didn’t have a pack of Juicy Fruit, but I did have one cardboard textured piece of pink Bazooka Joe bubble gum. I dug a hole in my back yard, planted the piece of Bazooka Joe gum, covered it up with some dirt, and diligently watered it every single day, trusting in my soul that soon a bubble gum tree would emerge!

Well…a few days passed and my patience couldn’t stand it anymore. So, I dug up the gum. Then I ate it. Yup. I ate the gum. That had been buried in the yard.

So what help is that story for you and your inner control-freak?

What do you think would have happened if I had asked my parents permission to plant a Juicy Fruit tree in the back yard and they said, “Heck no, weirdo kid. That’s the most foolish thing we’ve ever heard! It’ll never work. It will be a waste of precious resources. Here’s what you need to do instead….[lecture, lecture, lecture, word, word, word, insert helicopter parenting technique here].

Probably for a couple months I would have thought with resentment, “I betcha it would have worked. Adults don’t know anything!”  Or I would have secretly done it anyway. Or I would have lost my curiosity or willingness to try things on my own and sat around like a cow waiting for instructions on age-appropriate activities.

Here’s the thing. Adults are just grown-up kids. And tapping into our curiosity and our willingness to try new things are absolutely essential building blocks for doing anything that makes any difference at all in the world. So I think the name of the game is to nurture and encourage curiosity and willingness to try new things whenever possible.

Obviously you don’t want your team to become a complete free-for-all, olly-olly-all-oxen-free utterly lacking in discipline gaggle of folks. The key to unleashing curiosity and agency while not completely losing control is three things:

1. Aims – how much, by when?
2. Measures – how will we know as we go?
3. Small, rapid-cycle tests.

I want  to grow Juicy Fruit tree (aims). I will know I have one if anything remotely resembling a Juicy Fruit tree starts to grow where I planted my gum (measures). If it doesn’t work, I’ll eat the gum. (small test).

No harm, No foul. Lots of learning.

I think the ideal time frame for small tests is a week or two. I look for opportunities in team meetings to say, “You should totally try that! Do you think you could report back to us on what you learned in a week or two?” Even if they’re going down the grown-up version of the Juicy Fruit tree failure, I know that’s ok because we’ll only lose a week, but we’ll gain their growing curiosity and sense of agency. And who knows – there’s just as good a chance they’ll discover something brilliant and game-changing.

Play on!
Becky

Upcoming Events

We are currently accepting applications for our January 8th – 11th, 2019 Skid Row School. October 2018 is completely sold out but please email jennifer@billionsinstitute.com if you’d like to be put on the wait list.

We also have one remaining spot for an alumni who wants to join our two-year fellowship this September 25th – 27th, and two spots for leaders who’d want to start Feb 5th – 7th, 2019. More info and an application here.

Responding (Versus Reacting) To Social Media Haters

by Rebecca Margiotta | Jul 14, 2018 | Becky Update

Last week I wrote an opinion piece on my thoughts about how we could prevent gun violence for the Lily, a woman-focused publication of the Washington Post. Everytown for Gun Safety had asked me to serve on a Veterans Advisory Council and I was happy to do my part for the team.

Later in the week I was going through my facebook feed and I was taken aback by the hostility and aggression that complete strangers were directing at me in the comments of a post that I had made public by request. People with NRA logos as their profile pictures called me some pretty nasty names, questioned my integrity, and questioned my military service. My favorite – brought to my attention by my dear friend, Mike Shore, accused me of being a “gun-fag mental masturbator.”

You know. Just another day at the office.

The other day I saw a quote by Martin Luther King Jr. that said, “There comes a time when one must take a position that is neither safe, nor politic, nor popular, but he must take it because conscience tells him it is right.”

I think he’s got a good point, but today I want to talk about the fear doing so brings up for you as a change leader. Let’s break it down in slow motion.

Imagine me sitting on my couch, late at night, absent-mindedly scrolling through my facebook feed. Oh, there’s a comment on my post. Let’s see [click]….wait – what?!?

When I read the mean and hateful things people were saying about me, my heart raced immediately. A brief wave of nausea roll through me. I noticed my brain kicking into fight or flight mode. The back of my neck tingled and my vision narrowed to focus in even more closely.

All this in an instant, from words written by complete strangers.

I am imagining maybe you’ve been there, too. That in your work to create change in the world, you’ve taken a position that’s unpopular or unsafe, and felt the full heat of the status-quo monger push-back.

In a future weekly email, we’ll hear from a guest contributor who is a communications expert their expertise on what to do in these social media situations. And there are better and worse responses. But the key word here is responses. Not reactions.

I knew that night sitting on my couch that the very first thing I needed to do was to come home to myself. Months before I had asked my friend and mentor, Katie Hendricks, her advice for staying present and connected when it feels like the whole world is falling apart. Her words of wisdom stuck with me: First, you must come home to yourself. Breathe. Move. Wiggle. Put your hand on your heart. Talk to yourself with kind words. Whatever it takes to return fully to your presence, because when fight or flight kicks in, Elvis has left the building. (I added the Elvis part there, but you get the gist). You have to be here – be present – to create change.

Then, once you’re back fully connected with yourself and inhabiting your own body, look up and see who else is present and make an energetic connection with them. Those of us who are conscious and present and awake and committed to creating positive change – everyone on this mailing list – we need one another now more than ever.

Then respond. But not before.

It took me three days to respond. Three days for trolls with pretty much zero friends/audience to network ride on my social media friends/audience and spread their hate. Ultimately I decided to delete their comments – they are not entitled to my “platform” so to speak. The point I want to make here is it’s partially about what you decide to do, but don’t decide that until you are back inhabiting your body fully. Easier said than done.

I offer to you Donella Meadows’ words from her prophetic article “Leverage Points for Systems Change” (if you haven’t already read it, please bring this short, powerful piece to the top of your reading list):

“So how do you change paradigms? …You don’t waste time with the reactionaries; rather you work with active change agents and with the vast middle ground of people who are open-minded.”

It is my greatest pleasure in life to work with active change agents through the Billions Institute. I wish each of you a wonderful week and I invite you to bring your awareness to a few things, as our own awareness into our own experience as change leaders is a good part of the work:

Is your conscience telling you that perhaps now is the time to take a position on an issue, even if it is unpopular or unsafe to do so?
When you get scared in your day to day work to create change, do you have reliable ways to come home to yourself? To connect with others? Then respond?
Are you working with active change agents and with the middle ground of people who are open-minded? What else might you like to do with them/us?

This is all part of the work for large-scale change and I encourage you to have fun with it, because friends don’t let friends lead large-scale change alone. I’d love to hear your answers to any of those questions – just hit “reply” and let me know!

Becky

Folks Are Hiring

Shift Results is hiring a Project Manager.

Sandy Hook Promise is on a California hiring spree.

Upcoming Events

July 10th – 13th: Skid Row School for Large-Scale Change in Los Angeles. Deadline for registration is June 19th and we have a few more spots. These are the last available spots for 2018. We’ll be announcing 2019 dates soon!

Weaving Together The Web Of LIfe

by Rebecca Margiotta | Jun 28, 2018 | Becky Update

So…we decided to go ahead and drive to Tornillo, Texas, for the rally this past weekend. On our eleven hour road trip, I received text messages from Voto Latino who was behind the rally. That’s to be expected. I also received texts from the Movement for Black Lives Matter (to take action on behalf of the separated families). And from the Sierra Club (to take action on behalf of the separated families).

The rally itself was not large by the big city standards I’m accustomed to in Los Angeles. Maybe a couple hundred people. I was thankful for my sunglasses because my eyes welled up with tears each time we chanted, “The people, united, can not be divided!” and “Free the Children Now!”

Then I noticed three or four really big Human Rights Campaign flags from HRC – a LGBT civil rights organization. I saw many young people with #March for Our Lives t-shirts. Then I noticed a very old woman in a wheelchair who was a holocaust survivor.

A Native American woman joined in the protest as well. Several times she reminded anyone within earshot that taking children away is nothing new for the US government, and that all of us – immigrants included – are on stolen land. Point accepted.

After the rally was over, Christine and I walked 100 yards to the actual border. Twenty or so people were there, peering through the gate blocked by security guards to bear witness to the tents where the children are being held. We noticed a familiar face because she’s on MSNBC news – and it was her organization’s rally – in Maria Teresa Kumar. She seemed pretty approachable so we said hi and thanked her for her leadership on this issue. I asked her if she minded that the HRC flags were so big – did they overshadow Voto Latino? Here’s what she said:

“Absolutely not – I’m so glad they were here. We wanted them to come. They’re starting with the immigrant families kids but they’ve told us their plans. They’re coming after all of us. First the kids. Then they want to take away citizenship from naturalized citizens. Then women’s rights. Then LGBT rights. So we all need to stand by one another and not allow that to happen.”

Who is “they?” I asked.

“Pence, Kelly, and Miller.”

We exchanged hugs and well wishes. Christine and I headed back home to our own kids who were safe and sound the entire time. But what Maria Teresa said stayed with me. And I am still getting texts from all those groups to continue to stay engaged and involved until all the families are back together again. 

Recently one of our fellows, Nicole Hockley, Managing Director of Sandy Hook Promise said this:“I do not believe in coincidences – I believe the fabric of life works hard to keep people connected for the right purpose, at the right time.”

For me personally, I go back again and again to MLK’s quote: “In a real sense, all life is inter-related. All men are caught in an inescapable network of mutuality, tied in a single garment of destiny. Whatever affects one directly, affects all indirectly.” My friend Heather Hackman once said to me, “That’s not just a nice quote. It’s the key to avoiding extinction of the human race.”

I’m reminded of another fellow, Eunice Nichols, Director of Encore.org’s Generation to Generation Campaign and how she routinely reaches out across sectors and issue areas to deliberately weave together the fabric of life.

Sometimes when we’re leading large-scale change, it’s easy to get sucked into our own silos and issue areas. That’s completely understandable because there’s just so much to do. Sometimes it’s even tempting to throw others under the bus to advance our own cause. I can’t tell you how many times when I was working on street homelessness, I was asked, “yeah, but what aboutfamily homelessness?” As if it ever has to be an either/or. I think in many cases, the answer is a both/and. Don’t be afraid to reject the premise of the question, ok??

 This week – with all that is going on that is truly breaking my heart, including the latest shooting in Annapolis just today – I am going to keep Nicole Hockley’s words front and center. How can I be part of actively weaving together the fabric of life? How can I come out of my silo and reach out to others? Because we are all in this together.

Becky

p.s. While I was writing this, I received an email from Maria Teresa Kumar that the tent city in Tornillo will shut down by July 13th.

Special Request for Skid Row School Alumni

I want to bring your awesome aims into our sessions on…aims. My intention is to print them out on laminated 3×5 cards and have them in the room as inspiring sample aims for folks to see.

Please take a minute to share your aims with me here and we’ll be sure you inspire the folks who are following in your foot steps. Thank you!

Upcoming Events

We have one remaining spot for an alumni who wants to join our two-year fellowship this September 25th – 27th, and two spots for folks who’d want to start Feb 5th – 7th, 2019. More info an application here.

Resilience In Hard Times

by Rebecca Margiotta | Jun 21, 2018 | Becky Update

I’m not gonna lie, y’all. It’s been a rough week. I received a letter in the mail that had a not-so-thinly-veiled death threat in response to my piece for the Lily. We took all the necessary precautions, but it took my attention off my creativity for a bit there.

But that’s nothing compared to the distress I feel about what is taking place at our borders right now. The weight of the harm that is being intentionally inflicted weighs heavy on my conscience and my heart. I am assuming it does on yours, too.

Coupla thoughts.

1. I’m reminded of something I read that Paul Farmer said to his biographer, captured in one of my favorite books, Mountains Beyond Mountains. In response to the many people who somewhat patronizingly praised him for doing good works, he said, “I’m not doing good things, I’m un-doing bad things. ”

We turned to one of our alum, Melissa Rodgers, Director of Programs for the Immigrant Legal Resource Center and she shared this list of six concrete actions people can take to un-do bad things.

Here are the actions we are taking:

a. The Billions Institute made a 4x matching contribution all employee donations to any of the causes listed here.

b. I just got off the phone with my wife, Christine, as we are close to making a decision about what actions we will take this weekend. The two questions we asked ourselves were, “What are the best good things might we help do more of, and what the worst bad things we might help stop?” We are leaning toward up and driving to Tornillo, Texas, for the protest this Sunday and are weighing which of our actions might have the most impact. I’ll let you know what we decide, and I’m curious how you are navigating the events this week.

c. Hugging our very young children and shielding them from even knowing that this is taking place for now. Note to policy-makers: if you wouldn’t want your children to know what you’re doing could happen to them, maybe that’s a bad idea.

Which leads me to my second thought:

2. Resilience.

I am lucky enough to call Jim Guy, Founder of the Headington Institute, my friend. Their mission is to equip humanitarian and first-responders with everything they need to cope with the trauma they will witness in the course of performing their duties. He’s thinking seriously about spread/scale for his organization so I asked him, “Exactly what is it that people can do to be more resilient in the face of trauma?” [Those of you familiar with our model know what I was getting at: what’s your turkey sandwich, my friend?]

He said, “Oh, that’s easy. We know that for sure.” [How I wish everyone knew the answer to the question as clearly as he did!] Here’s what he said, “It’s four things, and you need all four:

1. You have to have one person who you could call in the middle of the night and they won’t hang up on you. Just one.
2. You have to exercise every single day. It doesn’t matter what you do, or how much of it you do, or how difficult it is, but every single day.
3. You have to have confidence that you are well-trained, and that’s a combo both of how well-trained you actually are but also that you believe that you’re well trained.
4. You have to have a sense of purpose and meaning in your life that’s bigger than yourself. It doesn’t matter what you believe – just that you’re connected to some sense of life being bigger than just you.

So there it is, folks. Easier said than done, but when I think about what all of us who aspire to make the world a better place are up against on a daily basis, as we un-do bad things together, I thought some pointers on resilience might be helpful.

Please let us know what you and your organization are doing if you’d like to share.

Meanwhile, Keep Ya Head Up.
Becky

Folks Are Hiring!

StriveTogether is hiring a Vice President of People, Values and Culture

Upcoming Events

We have one remaining spot for an alumni who wants to join our two-year fellowship this September 25th – 27th, and two spots for folks who’d want to start Feb 5th – 7th, 2019. More info an application here.