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- [00:00]
Rhea Wong
Hey, you, It's Ria Wong. If you're listening to nonprofit Load On, I'm pretty sure that you'd love my weekly newsletter. Every Tuesday morning, you get updates on the newest podcast episodes, and then interspersed, we have fun special invitations for newsletter subscribers only and fundraising inspo because I know what it feels like to be in the trenches alone. On top of that, you get cute dog photos. Best of all, it is free. So what are you waiting for? Head over to riawong.com now to sign up.
- [00:27]
Christy Peoples
Foreign.
- [00:34]
Rhea Wong
Welcome to nonprofit Lowdown. I'm your host, Rhea Wong.
- [00:38]
Hey, Nonprofit Lowdown listeners, it's Rhea Wong with you once again with nonprofit Lowdown. Today I am very excited because I am speaking with my friend and former student, Christy Peoples, the executive director of Women's Wilderness in Colorado today. Today we are going to be talking about the power of community and what it's like being a bipoc leader representing the environment and women of color in nature, which, as we know, it's not easy times. So, Christy, welcome to the show.
- [01:06]
Christy Peoples
Thank you so much for having me.
- [01:08]
Rhea Wong
We have so much to talk about in this moment in time in this administration. But before we get started, tell us a quick little bit about what y'all do out there in Colorado with Women's Wilderness.
- [01:19]
Christy Peoples
Yes, Women's Wilderness has existed for 27 years. We got started in 1998. It was the brainchild of an outdoor enthusiast and guide who was also a therapist. She and some of her friends said girls learn differently. We need to do programming that's not so aggressive and competitive like the little boys have. It's about charging up the hill and winner take all. Instead, there's a different way that we do it. Long story short, Women's Wilderness was born. Started out doing backpacking, rock climbing trips for girls. Then we expanded into women's adventures, serving veterans in the outdoors, doing LGBTQIA programming. And in the years since, we have branched out to have some spaces that are specifically for women of color, that are for newcomer girls, immigrant, refugee and asylum girls, for non binary youth and adults. So we serve as many people as we can against the backdrop of nature, like inviting them into an experience of being in the outdoors and having agency and a sense of community engagement. All the things that you said.
- [02:38]
Rhea Wong
Yeah, yeah, I think that's so beautiful, especially as women of color, because I think there's this bias or stereotype of, oh, people of color don't go outside. That's like a white people thing. Like people of color don't climb rocks and I remember being in high school. I went to a very outdoorsy high school. It's probably my first time on a backpacking trip. I loved it, but it was definitely. I had to unlearn a lot of the assumptions we made about, oh, people like us don't do things like this.
- [03:04]
Christy Peoples
That's huge. So it's interesting being the Ed. So for the first time in the history of Women's Wilderness, we have a woman of color, a black woman at the helm. And I would hear from different people, oh, people love Women's Wilderness. They hear about. They know about us for a long time. They've known about us for a long time. And people would say, folks know about women's wilderness. They love us. And my response would be, that depends on who you're talking to. A lot of people, I don't know about who we are and what we do, because there was this niche kind of community that Women's Wilderness served or was identified by serving women who. White women who had a lot of money and who were already familiar with the outdoors. And so their kids, their daughters would come through, and they also grew up being in the outdoors. When I came along or when I first got involved, it was at the invitation of a past Ed who realized the benefit of expanding the tent or extending the welcome to other communities of women. And so with that, when I moved into leadership, people would see me and say, oh, yeah, there is a place for me here. Christy's doing it. She's been in the outdoors for a while. If she can do it and I know her, then I want to try it, too. And not to mention my direct appeals and invitation to more women that we hadn't been seeing, not, just, like you said, a backpacking type, but people who maybe wanted to go bird watching, people who wanted to go fly fishing, people who wanted to sit outside and do yoga or meditate or journal together. So there is a lot that we can stand to unlearn, like these internalized ideas that we don't belong because all we see are white dudes and white women zipping down the mountain or sitting outside with the. With that steaming mug of coffee, looking out onto all. Looking at. Out onto all that they own on the horizon and all that stuff. And it's just assumed for a certain set that, oh, yeah, you do that. You can wake up like that now, as opposed to somebody who's new to it who might say, I don't know who's out there? These wild animals, like some of my own family. When I first started Sharing on socials and stuff. Why are you out there doing that white people stuff? Why are you chasing the bears? Or they're out there doing damage to us. They're out there hurting people of color. And so the more they saw me doing it, the more they saw other people coming out with me, the less friction I felt from other people, the less challenge I got from folks saying, we don't do that. That's not safe. And it. People ask about barriers to access. And Rhea, you know this. If. Whether they're real, meaning laws and bars and physical barriers or if they're imagined, my family doesn't do that. We never had money to do that. Those are all barriers to access. And what we serve to do is to lower those mentally, psychologically. All that stuff that we've internalized. We really invite folks to come in and go into the adventure to the extent that you feel comfortable that you're able to meet the challenge, but not go into that panic zone, because there's a lot for us to unpack. There's been so much harm done to people of color and to women in the outdoors.
- [07:00]
Rhea Wong
Yeah, for sure. It's funny, as you were saying, I was just remembering an experience I had where when I ran my organization, we would take kids from communities in New York, and we'd be in New Jersey. It wasn't really like camping. It was glamping. And they would. We maybe take a little. It wasn't even a hike, a walk in the night. And they would freak out with these little noises like maybe it was a squirrel. And I was like, y'all live in the toughest neighborhoods in New York City, and you're afraid of a little squirrel. But I think you're right. It's what are we comfortable with? And how do we help people get beyond the boundaries that they have either constructed for themselves or their communities have constructed for them? Love that. And I love this idea of the outdoors is for everybody.
- [07:40]
Christy Peoples
Absolutely, it is.
- [07:42]
Rhea Wong
So this leads us beautifully into what I really want to talk about with you, because when we've last connected, you talked about organizing community dinners, which is one of the strategies that I really support and teach in my program. And so I wanted you to talk a little bit about what the power of these community dinners were. So maybe start with what are they? And then talk about what have you seen as a result of these community dinners for women's wilderness?
- [08:09]
Christy Peoples
Thought about. We were sitting with this big question of what can we do? When the flurry of executive orders came out, and it upended everything. We were distraught and frazzled and fuming about the feeling of like powerlessness. And so staying within our mission, which is to lower barriers to outdoor access and nature engagement, to cultivate community and to lift up women, girls and non binary people. What can we do in our lane? And so we said, let's have a dinner where bringing the community together felt like a powerful next step for us. It was close at hand. And then we engaged the community itself, the local restaurants, to donate food and beverages. And so we said to our community, come on in, we're going to have a dinner and we're going to have a letter writing portion. We're going to write to our elected officials to let them know, hey, thank you for supporting us, for representing us in the halls of power. And we want you to know that we value the outdoors. This is what it has done for me. And we want you to keep advocating for the right of everybody to be outside for years to come. So it was a really different orientation to the madness and chaos coming together. To have a community dinner is a great way to, to connect, to level set, to just regulate our nervous systems. We are here to nourish ourselves. We're here to meet each other and to connect. We're here to talk about the organization and this worthy cause that we all care about. It was huge too because it brought out different people that we hadn't seen before. So those weren't necessarily the people who were going out on a hike or a backpacking or rock climbing trip with us. These were people who had been maybe on the email list, maybe they knew somebody who had gone out with us before. But they cared deeply about the outdoors and they cared about what was happening in the country. And so that was a way for us to stay in our lane, make an impact, bring people together, also accept donations. And even while it wasn't specifically geared to fundraising, it was definitely friend raising. Those people will be back. And they shared so much how deeply impacted they were by the experience and oh my gosh, doing something that was joyful and that was filled with gratitude. I didn't even think about reaching out to leadership, the elected officials in that way. But I said everything I wanted to through a lens of gratitude and advocating for the outdoors and being able to share my story and what it means to me. So there were so many upsides to doing that community dinner. It definitely won't be the last.
- [11:40]
Rhea Wong
I love that. And let me unpack a little bit of what you're saying because I think it's so powerful. I think in this moment, where everything feels so fraught, where we're all feeling anxious about the executive orders and so on, I think the real advantage that nonprofits have is that we are often the conveners, and we are embedded in the fabric of community. And so our superhero power, if you will, is the ability to bring people together in a way that feels very authentic, that feels very genuine, and that feels embracing to the spirit, let's say, in contrast, seeing the evening news, where I just feel crazy and anxious afterwards. So I think that the idea of zigging while people are zagging, bringing people together on a small scale versus making people feel like they're out here by themselves is really powerful.
- [12:30]
Christy Peoples
Yeah. And what you just said about community. Community isn't the email list. Yeah, Community is exactly that. Bringing people together in real time, reminding them that we're not alone, and that while this is a messy process, we can do this together. And just looking around the room at other people who share the same concerns, who care about. In our case, who care about the outdoors and supporting the people that we support, it's huge. It's validating, it's empowering, and it's inspiring. So people go away, and they are, in a sense, new ambassadors for us as well.
- [13:12]
Rhea Wong
The other thing that I think is really powerful about this is this idea of building alliances and building community, because I think when there are people in power, interests in power, that would have us believe that we are separate, I think the real act of resistance is to stay united and say, no, actually, we're together. Actually, we are united in this set of values, and we will not be depart. It almost reminds me of in India during the resistance of, like, how do we separate people into different castes versus how do we actually have this collective identity of this is what we believe together. Super powerful.
- [13:50]
Christy Peoples
Oh, yeah. That's a whole nother series of conversations, isn't it?
- [13:54]
Rhea Wong
Yeah, for sure. So I actually wanted to talk to you. So you mentioned this. You, as a black woman, are leading an environment, and it's the intersection of women's empowerment and environmentalism. So how do you navigate this moment where it just feels like so much of what you stand for is being directly attacked? Being a woman, being a person of color, representing the environment. I just. It's. And how do you find the wherewithal to continue to do the work?
- [14:24]
Christy Peoples
I would say the first thing that comes up is, I understand my mission. I understand that simply being is political, and it is a threat to many, plain and simple. We had Ahmaud Arbery gunned down in the streets when Breonna Taylor was also killed in her sleep. And just the onslaught of violence and murder to these black and brown bodies that happened, I thought of, I thought about my own experience as a leader and a runner, an outdoors person. During COVID we had a safe at home, I guess, order, right? That said, while you can go out, only contain your movement to within 10 miles of where you live. So safer at home, I think it was. And so I wanted to follow the rules. Okay, I'm a little farther away at the time anyway, I was a little farther away than 10 miles to the beloved mountains where I love to hike and run. So I would go out and run on the streets. And of course I had these people in my mind and in my heart. And it just, it was brought into such real time context for me. Because if I run down the street, what if. And I lived in one of the wealthiest neighborhoods in my area, and what if I run down the street and somebody thinks I'm running from something? Maybe they call the police. What if I'm walking down the street and I'm going a little too slow? Maybe they think I'm case in the neighborhood looking to steal from somebody. What if I run up on one of these white ladies with a fancy stroller that takes up half the sidewalk and if I announce myself several feet away, maybe she thinks I'm being aggressive or somebody sees that and they think I'm harassing the woman. What if I don't announce myself and I pass on the side of her and I'm running, Somebody thinks I'm, you know, so. So there are all these things. What if I run in the street? Maybe they think I'm trying to break into the cars. So everything was potential danger, it was fraught, no matter where I went or how I went. And that was not paranoia. That was and is the reality of what we're living in and what my presence mean to some people. And I was laughing with some friends, I was like, if I were actually as powerful as some of these people thought I was, to like, suddenly I show up and I have stolen all the money, I have taken all the wealth, I have broken into all the homes just by showing up, just by.
- [17:32]
Rhea Wong
Existing, you wouldn't have to fundraise.
- [17:35]
Christy Peoples
There we go. And it was really an interesting moment because is that fear of some kind of inherent power that I have that you would see seek so intently and intentionally to thwart. Right. You feared so much that you would kill indiscriminately because of the power you think I have. And somewhere in there, the power that I absolutely do have, that you're afraid of. So really sitting with that in my consciousness, not even in my subconsciousness or out there in some kind of far away mystical whatever, like with that reality really brought home to me. Christie, wherever you go, you need to walk in your power. You need to know that you have power. You need to know that you belong anywhere you are simply because the culture is trying to tell you you belong nowhere.
- [18:37]
Rhea Wong
Oh, powerful, Chrissy. That is so powerful. Especially given your mission to make everybody feel like they belong in the outdoors. Like you belonging in your own skin. Yes, really. Owning and claiming that power is. It's such a beautiful thing.
- [18:52]
Christy Peoples
And that's exactly what I mean by I understand my assignment. And I understand that although they're handing me, they're handing us all the script that says, hey, these people are bad, these people are good. I know that it is a moment to moment job to vet everybody and to. To really. And by that way, each person and each situation on its own merit. Not going in braced for the conflict and also not being afraid to tell the truth. And that's part of why we're doing this whole thing about sharing your story. We have to tell our stories because if we're not telling our stories, we're not inserting them into the con, the broader conversation of who gets to be outside or who gets to be anywhere. And if we're not telling our stories, we're not diversifying the conversation, we're not having new conversations, which means if we're still milking this old tired narrative, that's all we're going to get as a result is the same old stuff.
- [20:12]
Rhea Wong
As you're talking, I was really just thinking about the, the challenge that I have within myself, which is really refusing to fear the other. Right. Because I think that's the thing is we're fed these lines and fed the script about how the other is so bad or the other wants to hurt you or the. And while that may be true to your point on a person to person basis, I think the more we refuse to give into fear blindly, the more we resist the. This narrative that's trying to control us. And so I'm going to do my best to not stereotype and fear the other, even though it's very tempting to do when you turn on the news, I think that's a really powerful reminder. Thank you for that.
- [20:59]
Christy Peoples
Yeah. And I just want to say to that too, Rhea it's like if people say we're all one and I don't see any color now, I call bullshit on that period. At the same time, if there's any truth I could pluck from that, it is that maybe we are more connected and interconnected than we think. Think. And what if by extension, that means there is no other, so to speak? If our fates are interconnected, you can't be other from me.
- [21:37]
Rhea Wong
Yeah.
- [21:38]
Christy Peoples
You might not recognize. Or the way that you are pursuing survival and prosperity is detrimental to me or at my expense, which is its own other thing. But we see that we are interconnected. But we. But there is cancer.
- [21:59]
Rhea Wong
Yeah. Yeah.
- [22:00]
Christy Peoples
Right now in the human body that we have to address.
- [22:04]
Rhea Wong
You know, it's funny, as you're talking, it's such an environmental metaphor, right? Because in a forest, everything is interconnected. Doesn't matter if you're the biggest tree or the smallest little animal or the fungus underground. It all works together. And when one part is sick, it affects everything.
- [22:23]
Christy Peoples
You said it. I was hiking with a friend once, and I was like, look at all these wild flowers growing in the harshest conditions and popping up through the snow, and they're so delicate. And how beautiful nature. And that same metaphor. All of these species just growing together in harmony. And she was like, yeah, and some of these are invasive plants.
- [22:52]
Rhea Wong
That's a doubter.
- [22:53]
Christy Peoples
Yep. Yeah. And they got to be pulled. They got to be pulled or they will take over. And so again, that is also true.
- [23:01]
Rhea Wong
Girl. I have a short list of people who need to be weeded right now. Such a long list. Actually, as I think about it, we all have. All right, I've got two questions before we wrap up. So as folks are listening to you and thinking, chrissy, this sounds great. I might want to do something like a community dinner in my own community. What advice might you have for folks who are thinking about that?
- [23:23]
Christy Peoples
I would say do it. And that means really keep it simple. Don't waste time trying to make it perfect. Find out, like, who. Who is at hand, who can help you. What support can you enlist to get this off the ground? Reach out to those people that you would want to sit around a table with. It doesn't have to be a perfect set of everybody knowing each other and having. Having certain benefit. I'm using my air quotes like these people are deep pockets, or they. These are the people that we want at the table. Think about the variety of experience and sharing and just presence that you want at the table. Think about that first. Ensure if they're deep pocketed, that's even better. But to really bring in a sense of connection and aliveness and, you know, that feeling of joy and community that you want to have. Think about that first. Who do you want around your table? And then invite them. Reach out to. In our case, we reached out to local restaurants and said what we're doing and why we were doing it. And it wasn't this big, heavy, elaborate proposal that we sent. We got on the phone. We're having a community dinner. We're gonna provide templates for folks to write letters or whatever it is you're gonna do with your community dinner. Keep it simple and reach out. Set a date, and that will help you, that will inspire you or keep you motivated to get people around the table.
- [25:08]
Rhea Wong
And I think it's so important. Don't overthink it. I think a lot of people have perfectionistic tendencies. Oh, I can't do it. Unless all of these different conditions are right.
- [25:16]
Christy Peoples
Yeah, you know, give it a whirl.
- [25:18]
Rhea Wong
See who wants to. See who shows up. See who wants to have a conversation. Don't be so precious about it.
- [25:24]
Christy Peoples
Yeah. Put it in your newsletter, put it on your socials, Put the date. Make sure you have the way to capture those registrations and start backfilling your program from there. Make those calls. It's really worth it, especially when the intention is clear on what you want to do.
- [25:43]
Rhea Wong
Yeah. So powerful. Okay, last question for me, and I hope this isn't too self serving, but you and I work together. You were in my program used to be called Accelerator, and now it's the Big Ask Gift program. Thank you. A little bit about where you were when we first started working together and then what has happened since.
- [26:01]
Christy Peoples
So I was just newly appointed or I was new in the seat of being the executive director, and I don't even know. I was probably Googling or something and found you because. And then it was interesting because I am such a fan of your podcast and all the things that you do, and I recall you saying that you were a new ed and you were googling, how do you do this job? So I was Googling. And that's how I came to you, because I wanted to learn about fundraising. I felt like I. I had to unpack all of my own internalized stories about asking for money. And I knew based on what you'd been sharing and what I'd been reading about your journey, I knew you had to do the same thing. And for me, it was. I don't want to seem like I'm begging, and I don't want to upset people. I'm a new Ed. I'm a woman of color. I'm a black woman. They have all these ideas about me and going with. My mom told me, don't go with your hand out. Able to do it yourself. And the culture says that, too. And so I had to move through all of that while learning from the cohort and everything that we were sharing and you were teaching us. We have to get out from behind our own stories and just lean in, into making the asks, showing up and being okay with being uncomfortable, comfortable being in our integrity. And it was hard. It is. It's less difficult because I know I had to really understand and so much with your support that this is well beyond me. And for me to show up, I have to deal with my internalized stories and the projections that are placed on me. And anybody who is part of the community is not looking at me as somebody who was going begging for bread in the streets, looking for, asking, looking for a shakedown or whatever. This is about elevating the mission, being able to support as and encourage as many people as we can. And so that helps. That just helped crystallize for me what I needed to do. And so your work, the way it was working with you, and I shared this with you a couple of times recently, it was like you're taking us by the hand and leading us in to a new experience of fundraising and engagement and ditching that old script, which sometimes were actually literal scripts, but I could feel my heels dug in, and you kept leaning, and I had to take a step like that, baby. Learning to walk. You're just guiding and they're leaning in. They finally have to lift that foot and then the other foot. And I'm super grateful for that experience because I know that you understand what I am challenged by and up against and trying to dismantle along the way, really ramping up my fundraising and learning how to unlearn so much. I think in my case, in the case of people of color, women of color, leaders, we have to do this work. It's on a parallel track, dismantling our internalized stories and learning to do this new thing. Because the field of fundraising is just. And nonprofits, it's blowing up. I mean, it's. Or imploding, if you will. It's not what it was in years past. It's not that annual one campaign letter or sending a box of chocolates to your big donors. It's getting in there, ensuring that people Know you are there. The people that count on you being available for them, reminding them that we have them. There's so many things that even that go well beyond fundraising. So I'm super appreciative of that work.
- [30:18]
Rhea Wong
Thank you, friend. Yeah. I think the field is changing so quickly, and I think as a sector, we're slow to adapt to that change. But the truth is the ones that adapt quickly will be the ones that survive and thrive in the future. And the ones that are lagging behind will start to see their fundraising over time just slowly decline. It's like a slow death. I appreciate that. So let me ask you one last question. What has been the direct result of having worked with me? Have you been able to raise more money? Have you been able to bring more folks to the table? What are some of the tangible results?
- [30:51]
Christy Peoples
I've been able to really bring light to my internalized stories. I've been able to recognize the places where I'm stuck and continue to move forward. And we have been able to raise more money as a result and bring new people in and bring on new partnerships in the organization just by being so relational and leaning into those relationships. Our development person was sharing some numbers and was saying that last year this time we were at a certain number and now we're more than three times. You know that that number from last year. And we're doing a lot of different signature programs throughout the year. Instead of leveraging everything on the last two months, we have unpacked the gala and scaled it, we right sized it and we're spreading, spreading out those opportunities across the year. So we're bringing in more money more regularly instead of just hold sucking our thumb and then holding nine months of the year, then holding our breath the rest of the year and waiting until next January to see how we did. So it's a complete overhaul of how things have been done in the past. It's not business as usual. Thanks to working with you and understanding that we have. Not just that we have to do things differently, but applying, even just applying some of what you shared, I'm able to really see the benefit in that. I'm watching myself, I'm watching the response of it, and I'm watching the numbers and it's all improved as a result.
- [32:49]
Rhea Wong
Beautiful. I'm a big watching the numbers person, so good for you.
- [32:53]
Christy Peoples
Yeah. And there's less fear. There's less fear of the number. The numbers seem. That's the other. We're talking about the other out there that I should be afraid of. For me, going into it, I realized I had a lot of like, disconnect. And over time it's wait, these numbers are just numbers. And if I pull this lever and do this thing and apply this programming, you know, this, the. Apply this? Yeah, the new programming that. I'm internalizing a new thing. I get to see results and I know where I can like change things.
- [33:28]
Rhea Wong
Ah, so beautiful. I love that. It's, you know, I'd say it all the time. Fundraising is just a math problem. It's just a math problem. You have a number, there's some amount of effort, activities that you do that changes that number. Just do that.
- [33:40]
Christy Peoples
Yeah. And I also want to say to that, the way that you, the way that you offer your input and insights and you're like, like you said, just do that. I sometimes am thinking, wait, but how? And your confidence in the belief that we can do it, like, just do it. Like, it's not. I'm like, okay, she believes. I'm not sure, but I'm gonna try because I signed up and this was my intention. There are these steps again, like you're holding the hands and I'm dug in, but I'm slowly, I'm taking the steps and then it becomes much more, much more natural to take those steps. And even when it's not necessarily easy, the more we do it, it really is. I just texted a friend this morning. I was like, I'm exercising my ask muscle. A S K.
- [34:37]
Rhea Wong
I hope it's the big ask muscle.
- [34:40]
Christy Peoples
That's right.
- [34:40]
Rhea Wong
That's right.
- [34:41]
Christy Peoples
Yes.
- [34:42]
Rhea Wong
All right, friend. Thank you so much for this and I'm so proud of you and I'm so proud of the work you're doing and I'm gonna see you out in Denver in August, so I will keep you posted.
- [34:51]
Christy Peoples
Can't wait. Thank you so much for all you do. You're a huge help to so many.
- [34:57]
Rhea Wong
Thank you, friend. I appreciate you. All right, talk to you soon.
- [35:00]
Christy Peoples
Okay, you too. Bye. Bye.
- [35:03]
Rhea Wong
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