Ideas I tried this year

Here’s my 2017 Annual Report! 

What was this year LIKE?

First of all, it was BETTER BECAUSE OF YOU. Thank you for reading. But also, thanks for talking with me! I got to talk with my friends and former clients Kenita Pierce, Molly Ola Pinney, and many other people. I had so many good emails and thank you notes and phonecalls and in person meeting people. I’m so grateful for everyone who reached out this year. Thank you again! You keep me going!

On a personal note, I got to see my family more. I got to speak at some lovely places, and hang out with my Portland and Vancouver friends! I got to make art with my friends a LOT more. I got to be better about boundaries. And be more open about what I need. And get clearer on my purpose.

The first part of this year really sucked.
The middle was also hard.
But the end? ACTUALLY PRETTY FANTASTIC.

Why?

SPEAKING and seeing people IRL! I went to San Francisco and kicked ass speaking about salary negotiation. Afterwards, many people wrote to me and told me that they were able to negotiate better benefits and a higher salary. That made me so happy!

I went to Denver and kicked more ass speaking about building trust and getting earned income for your Meals on Wheels kitchen. People got so much out of my trust session! Some said that I was their favorite session at the conference. I have my friend Kishshana Palmer to thank for giving me good suggestions on how to make my slides better. She is INCREDIBLE. (That’s us above, glowing!)

Things I learned this year:

1. Tech learning 

I learned more about how to use Ontraport lead scoring a little bit. I learned how to do video interviews with Crowdcast (thanks to Vanessa Chase for showing me that new tool!), and webinars too. Learned how to do more with Canva, thanks to Rose Redd’s training! I learned how to use my new site design, plus learned how to make my site more secure, and get rid of bad plugins and got a new site, thanks to K. Martin at Riot Customs.

2. Sales learning

I learned about creating a sizzle reel. I learned to pay for good images for my website. I learned how to make more compelling marketing copy for my website. I learned how to do video interviews to sell the summit. I learned to ask good questions to get the sale. I learned about how to nurture my affiliates to help them make sales. Learned how to do facebook ads for my friend’s political campaign. Generally learned that FB ads do not work for me. I invested in proven business coaching that I KNOW will work! thank you to the Bristol Strategy Group!

 

3. Activism learning

I learned about emotional labor. I learned how working in anti-sexual violence and anti-domestic violence applies to a lot of nonprofit work, I learned a lot more about politics, and saw Chris Hedges speak, and got involved with the Justice Democrats and learned about union organizing.

I learned that my biggest passions are standing up for women, aka feminism, leadership, income inequality and universal basic income. And that I should find a way to do more with that. I learned more about how to help people build trust deliberately, and I taught it. That is a leadership topic I want to do more with.

I learned how to stand up for feminism, for women, and against sexism, and I wrote about it and talked about it. Specifically, what should you do if someone accuses you of reverse sexism? Or what if you’re harassed sexually, at work, by a donor or board member? What should you do?  I learned more about how to help people ask for a raise, and I taught it in San Francisco at AFP National Conference.

I read LOTS of new books from the library and turned people on to books that I was into-got deeper conversations out of it! I talked about how we can stop our email addiction. I stopped my old book addiction.  I started listening to new podcasts and getting news from less biased sources, like The Young Turks, and the Jimmy Dore Show, and the Dollop!

 

4. Values & Nourishing Yourself learning

Since my two words this year were nurture and nourish, (thanks to Sheena Greer, who is PRETTY AWESOME) I decided to nurture myself and nourish my friendships. To nurture myself, I decided to upgrade certain aspects of my life. But I also learned that my values are shifting. I value treating myself better. I decided to stop settling in my personal surroundings and in my personal life. I got a better couch, and a ceramic cooking pan and an air filter, a better showerhead, and a device to listen to music in my car with a USB drive. I decided to stop SETTLING and start naming and claiming what I really want in my life.

For nourishing myself, I started hanging out with friends who make the effort to be friends. I started only eating when I was hungry, eating really good food, drinking green tea,

always taking my vitamins, and cutting out sugar. I consistently exercised every week and went to the gym every week and got stronger.

So in addition to stopping talk about whatever new terrible political thing is happening every single day, and shifting the topic to what we are doing now to make things better, I started giving to the Justice Democrats and I helped a friend of mine get elected as a progressive candidate.

 

5. RELATED: Relationship & Partnership learning

I learned to step back from giving too much. I learned that sometimes our reaction to trauma can be to give too much. WHOA. Mind. Blown.

I worked on myself and did the exercises in Deeper Dating by Ken Page and the Gene Keys and learned a lot about myself.  Learned how to date again. Learned how to ask more for what I need, and say what’s on my mind instead of suppressing it. Learned to break my own rules with dating and see how that went. (here’s a hint- NOPE.) I learned to lean back and let people show me who they are. Learned how to have better boundaries with dating and not give people the time of day if I don’t want to. And I learned what makes me inspired when I date people.

I learned how to ask for help when I needed it, and got some help from a variety of people. I’m so grateful I did too! Thank you specifically to Sheena Greer of Colludo, John Lepp at Agents of Good, Pam Grow of the Grow Report, and to Gail Perry of Fired Up Fundraising, and to Erica Waasdorp of A Direct Solution, and to Sandy Rees of Getting Fully Funded, because they were ALL THERE when I cried out for help! Thank you also to my partners for my conferences, Charity Village and Bloomerang!

Learned how to nurture my friendships a bit more with notes and art parties and phonecalls.  I prioritized being with friends and family over being online.

So I went overseas for a vacation to visit my brother and his girlfriend for the first time in a very long time and had so much fun in Taiwan and Vietnam!

I helped a friend of mine with her launch and codified what I do when I launch, and was able to extrapolate it to her work, and I felt really good about that.

I helped my friend I get elected to public office. That made me feel really hopeful about our future for this state and for this country. She is part of a minority community, and she was the first to get elected in her community. Now her granddaughter is running for class president. And now her daughter is running for office in her community also.

It’s all about representation. Which brings us back to equity. Are you making sure you have representation of people of color on your board? In your trainings? And in your leadership? If not, why not?

Partnerships: I tried doing affiliate marketing for my summit and it worked! People got a good bit of money from it as well! I also made new partnerships and relationships and strengthened other ones this year. We had lots of good pre-webinars with partners that attendees really liked.

 

6. Leadership learning

For the last three years I’ve interviewed lots of nonprofit leaders about how to make this world of ours more effective, but THIS YEAR I researched leadership a lot more, and got more interested in books around that. Here’s a leadership post roundup. I learned that the best leaders are teachers, to lift up everyone around them. Why I got to learn a lot about leadership was thanks to some REAL HELP, thanks to Ellen Bristol, of Fundraising the Smart Way, and Eric Anderson, of The Healthy Nonprofit, and Peter Drury. They recommended some good books to me, including Noel Tischy’s The Leadership Engine, The Speed of Trust, GRIT by Angela Duckworth, First, Break All the Rules, by Marcus Buckingham, and another book I’m still in the middle of. I also read a lot of other books that were not worth a mention.

7. Art learning

I made a TON of encaustic art and felt art and started an art-making practice every week with my friend. I made time to have art parties nearly every month and I got to see more of my friends this way too.  I learned how to do encaustic monotypes and art better with videos and practice and help from my friend Yukon’s experimentation too. I wrote a LOT of poetry too. SO MUCH POETRY. It’s time for another chapbook! Possibly two. I have so much saved up now.

 

8. Body learning

Learned how to do Bhangra and Bollywood dancing! I learned I love ecstatic dancing too, and I went back to that. Learned that I could be more healthy if I just ate less, and stopped eating my feelings. I learned that exercise doesn’t really have much bearing on how thin you get. It’s 90% diet and 10% exercise. I’m still doing SUPERSLOW, which is STILL SO GOOD. So that was a big idea that I got this year. I also learned that I need to get back to the Pain Free exercises from Pete Egoscue.

 

 

9. Adult learning ideas

I created and put on the Fundraising Career Conference and the Nonprofit Leadership Summit and people got a lot out of it because i got the best speakers in the industry to talk about different aspects of leadership, and career management, spread it out over 3 days

If you want to see all of the things that went wrong, just mosey on over here.

If you want to see previous annual reports- HERE you go!

Annual Report 2016

Annual Report 2015: All of the joys of 2015

Annual Report 2014: Thank you, yes YOU!

Annual Report 2013: Wow, what a year!

Annual Report 2010: A Look Back at 2010

You know this year has been hard for a lot of people. I know it is STILL HARD. Between politics, natural disasters, and mass shootings, the continuing automation of our work and outsourcing of our manufacturing, I mean, I could go on. BUT SO MUCH GOOD IS HAPPENING IN THE WORLD TOO!

Overall, it has been a pretty good year- and I am excited about the future! What happens next? STAY TUNED!