Being new, trying to figure things out, being the least smart person in the room doesn’t always feel good to me personally, but is the best way for me to feel like I’m always learning and growing.
I’ve been thinking a lot about the conversation with Tiera Barber and her point about opening up a candle making retail business where she teaches classes on candle making without ever having done it before. She talks about just knowing in her core that it was the right thing to do. She was led by her gut, her intuition, and what she calls her discernment that helped guide her belief that it was just the right thing to do.
That’s a lot like where I am right now. I’ve been working on this Capitalism for Good project for a couple years now and it’s been out in the world for almost an entire year since I posted the first podcast episode. So many things have changed. I’ve changed locations. My life situation has changed. My goals have changed. And none of this is surprising. I’m a human just doing what all humans do by evolving. So I’m not exactly sure what it’ll look like, but I’ve got some very specific long term visions and some personal goals that are my parameters. I’ve started writing about those in a blog on the Capitalism for Green Patreon which was the first step of me showing how I'm attempting to put all of the things I’m learning in Capitalism for Good into practice. If you haven't been following along there, then you know that this Capitalism for Good project has shaped so much of where I am now. Specifically, it’s shaped my confidence and idea that I can really replicate what others have done in a really tangible and specific way.
As I was researching and vetting all of these different folks that might be good fits for the project making sure that they come from a variety of fields, backgrounds, demographics, experiences, and have all these different perspectives to bring to the table with the obvious overlap of making a positive impact on their community, I kept finding myself being naturally drawn to 2 very specific types of business leaders: 1. Those that lead sustainably manufactured goods and 2. Those that have refill and zero waste shops.
If I let my own personal interest overhaul the project, I would have diverted it completely toward those two categories even though I knew that the misison & vision of it was something more broad where I really learn and showcase folks from all different fields. Especially those which I personally wouldn’t have thought of at the beginning. I wanted that variety and that approachability that touches a broader range of interests and people to prove that we all can really make a positive impact no matter our role in making a spending money.
So me as a human was popping into all these refill and zero waste stores as I was all over the US and following them on social media and emailing and, yes, interviewing some of them for Capitalism for Good. I’ve also talked a little bit about how I’ve been spending more time in the Kansas City suburbs where I grew up and where my parents still live trying to reconfigure what the next few years of my life might look like. So as I’ve been resubmerging myself in midwest suburban culture, I’ve tried to better understand the trends, needs, and wants of this community that I’ll likely be spending a lot more time around in...
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