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Join feminist coaches Taina Brown and Becky Mollenkamp for casual (and often deep) conversations about business, current events, politics, pop culture, and more. We’re not perfect activists or allies! These are our real-time, messy feminist perspectives on the world around us.
This podcast is for you if you find yourself asking questions like:
• Why is feminism important today?
• What is intersectional feminism?
• Can capitalism be ethical?
• What does liberation mean?
• Equity vs. equality — what's the difference and why does it matter?
• What does a Trump victory mean for my life?
• What is mutual aid?
• How do we engage in collective action?
• Can I find safety in community?
• What's a feminist approach to ... ?
• What's the feminist perspective on ...?
Becky Mollenkamp (00:00.761)
Bye everyone.
Taina Brown she/hers (00:02.05)
Hello.
Faith Clarke (00:02.135)
Thank you.
Becky Mollenkamp (00:04.111)
Taina and I are joined by a very special guest today, Faith Clark, who is my partner and feminist founders. The three of us, along with Jordan Maney, are in a mastermind or whatever we want to call that, a wonderful community together. And we just discovered that Taina and Faith both went to the same college.
Taina Brown she/hers (00:23.261)
no, not this face. That was a different face.
Becky Mollenkamp (00:25.567)
I was like, what?
Faith Clarke (00:25.795)
I was just like, which, when was that?
Becky Mollenkamp (00:28.943)
Yeah, for a faith. Okay, because I was like, wow, how did you guys not know that? Okay. Well, then nevermind that part. But, well, that's okay. I know too many faiths. Two faiths is too many. I just need the ones that I know who we're talking about. But anyway, well, I'm excited to have Faith join us because she and I obviously have cool conversations all the time. And so do you and I, Taina, and then three of us all do.
Taina Brown she/hers (00:33.645)
Sorry, that was my mix-up.
Becky Mollenkamp (00:51.577)
So I think this will probably be super casual just because we're so used to talking with each other. And I feel weird to make it feel like an interview. But we were thinking because Faith, your specialty is really around belonging that we might start there. And when you talk about belonging, what do you mean? Because I don't know if everyone really knows what that means.
Taina Brown she/hers (00:55.863)
Yeah.
Faith Clarke (01:10.702)
Yeah, and it can, it's so subjective. Well, I want to just contextualize it a little bit because my work right now is really focused on work culture and restorative work culture. And I am passionately, and maybe I should say violently opposed to work that extracts. You know, and the very definition of work is, seems to set it up for extraction, toil, hardship, and this kind of thing. And then our work systems,
have been built on ideas that commoditize human bodies, particular human bodies get more commoditized than others and therefore are used like spare parts and tossed aside and then others are gained for the system, right? So in my own work, the question is how do we design our work and our working together so it's not extractive?
And for me, part of the answer is belonging. And then there's a way that old systems were not built on ideas of belonging and equity and justice and all this good stuff. And so we have to own the fact that the systems that we have of work and working together, we're not anchored in ways that care for people. And so we have to radically over all them. So that's my little soap box there on work culture. so belonging, and I'll say how I got it, but
Belonging as I've understood it. I'll use Claude Steele's definition, social psychologist, he was at Columbia, I don't know where he is, he talks about inclusion as the feeling of feeling that you belong, the feeling of being grateful to belong, and the feeling like in this place where you belong, you can thrive.
And so when I ask people, so there's this element of togetherness and thriving. And so when I ask people, does, what does belonging feel like? They describe something that's really subjective. It's embodied. And then they describe things like this feeling of safety, like home. A lot of people use the word home, even when they know it's not my real home. My home was never like this. When they use the word home, that's it. It's, that, that warmth that they're looking for.
Taina Brown she/hers (03:10.7)
Hmm.
Faith Clarke (03:26.264)
And the thing I found the most shocking but also grounding and helpful to me is that it's a feeling of your needs being supported by other people without your self-advocacy. So if I have to, the more I have to advocate for myself, the more I know I don't belong. And then it's a feeling.
Taina Brown she/hers (03:49.864)
Hmm
Faith Clarke (03:52.874)
of an awareness of this experience of when bad things happen, it's not just my responsibility to fix it. So it's communal care for need fulfillment and a communal commitment to harm repair. That's what belonging is. And I just like it, it was just so, so good for me to like, yeah, when I am here shouting from the rafters, listen to me, it's a signal that I don't belong.
And when I have to prove to you that I need a thing, yeah, I don't belong.
Taina Brown she/hers (04:28.786)
I like that you described your position as being violently opposed to it because I think
For someone who might be new to this conversation or new to just understanding how oppression works in general, that phrasing might feel jarring, but one thing that I've contended or have had to contend with early in my journey towards understanding how liberation works is that even though I might not be experiencing physical violence,
the act of oppression is in any way is an act of violence. And what that can look like or feel like is anything that does not allow me to thrive as a human being. Anything that takes away the opportunity for me to thrive is an act of violence against my human dignity, right? So poverty, legal restrictions, right? Even the way that policing happens, right?
whether or not there's physical force that's being used is an act of violence towards a lot of people in this country and around the world. And I think that's why when people talk about belonging, they talk about a sense of, of safeness, of feeling safe, because it's the antithesis of feeling like violence is being imposed on you. So I like, I like that you specifically use that phrasing because it's really gets to the heart of the matter in terms of
what it means to live in a culture of not just physical violence, but emotional and mental violence as well.
Faith Clarke (06:14.978)
I think that when you think about violence, it's, it's, that violation is, part of, you know, so it is the, I don't have the power to stop this thing from being taken from me. I can't say no, that's violence. The moment I can't say no, that's, that's where it's, it's stepped over into this other thing. Yeah.
Taina Brown she/hers (06:27.721)
Mm-hmm.
Taina Brown she/hers (06:37.405)
Yeah.
Becky Mollenkamp (06:41.663)
I saying, like, I don't know, I feel that sense of belonging. For me, it feels like I can drop the masks that we often have to wear in different spaces and actually be my true self. That's for me, some sort of how I would describe belonging. But I love that additional layer you put on of like, I don't even have to have express necessarily my needs or once people are like it's anticipated that that feels like a being held sort of thing. And that feels so
rare. And especially when you bring it to workplace, like my head goes, is that even possible? Certainly my experience in corporate America did not feel like that was just let alone the dropping the masks piece. Like that didn't even feel possible. But then that additional step of actually being like truly cared for and held in that way. So is it possible, Faith? Like have you seen it?
Taina Brown she/hers (07:18.037)
Yeah.
Faith Clarke (07:34.712)
Yeah, I've seen it. But I want to say, first of all, that the reason we wear the masks is because we know we don't belong. Because you have to cover up the needs. know, whatever they are, have to, you know, kind of, I don't want to use, yeah, I'll say whitewash. You have to whitewash the whole thing so that you look like the caricature of whoever it is that they say belongs in the system. It's its own act of violence.
Taina Brown she/hers (07:38.582)
you
Faith Clarke (08:02.924)
The fact, it is possible, but there are systems that make that, that perpetuate violence against you when you believe that belonging is possible and act accordingly, right? So yes, it's possible, but perhaps not possible in particular places. So when I talk about culture, I talk about...
Taina Brown she/hers (08:05.865)
.
Faith Clarke (08:25.048)
What's the environment like grass isn't going to grow. Now we have the blinding, the blinding brain melting heats. The grass isn't going to grow in this heat and the dryness. So there is the question of what's the environment that cultivates belonging. It's not, we can't just kind of say, faith in my corporate structure where hierarchical supremacy system are in charge is belonging possible. Maybe not. Cause cause
Taina Brown she/hers (08:38.804)
you
Faith Clarke (08:51.492)
Cause that stuff will kill it, you know, it's and it's aggressive. So I, I think one of things that we have to understand it, what are some of the preconditions and being able to see people as fully human, being able to not moralize the differences between people, being able to own the power hierarchies that do exist and to share power and to be intentional about, I have power and privilege. don't know.
Taina Brown she/hers (09:14.241)
you
Faith Clarke (09:21.434)
what that means. Like I honestly don't know what you need because the road is paved clear for me through the lens of a particular identity. There are multiple skills that are needed to facilitate belonging and the humility of knowing that, well, I can't make sure you feel like you belong. I can do my best to heal the environment so that these preconditions can exist. And it's a long game.
Taina Brown she/hers (09:40.904)
.
Faith Clarke (09:47.864)
But if people can do it between two people, if the three of us here can do it, then it means that we can do it in another space. And it be harder in that other space because of environmental factors, like, you know, you're going to be seen as not the right kind of boss, so you're not going to get promoted. you know, and your mortgage is at risk because you can't get promoted. There are risks to acting against system. And we have to kind of just own that.
Taina Brown she/hers (09:54.152)
Mm-hmm.
Taina Brown she/hers (10:14.694)
Yeah. Do you find that there are certain spaces that are more resistant to this idea of belonging than others?
Becky Mollenkamp (10:26.039)
and or types of people, which is where my head went.
Faith Clarke (10:32.73)
I think everybody craves belonging and can recognize what it is. So the question is more people who have a ton of belonging already in other areas of their lives may be resistant to changing systems that are comfortable for them to create belonging because they just don't need to. The system already works.
they already belong and they belong at home and they belong in community and so on. And so when I say types of people, yeah, if you belong a ton, then it's hard for you to shift to notice that other people don't belong and do work that may feel unnecessary to you. So when I say types of people and systems that it's hard for, I found the older the system,
Our system origins matter. And the older the system, the more multi-level, multi-layered. There's so many of our big systems that have been developed by just patching on things onto them. So you have some kind of Frankenstein system. I was like, Franken-systems are resistant because it's very hard to have a ground swell when you have had these old entities that are trying to reinforce
Taina Brown she/hers (11:44.541)
Uh-huh.
Faith Clarke (11:56.602)
structures from different eras all along.
Taina Brown she/hers (12:01.477)
Yeah. You know, while you were explaining that, was just like, I don't think I've ever asked you this, like, in all the conversations we've had, like, as a group, what's your belonging story? Like, what was your moment in, like, corporate America or wherever where you realized that, like, either you felt like you really did belong or you've or you realized that, like, this is an issue.
that needs to be addressed. Like this is actually what's happening here. And this is why X, Y, and Z.
Faith Clarke (12:39.198)
I think I have several moments, not necessarily in corporate America, but when you said corporate America, I remembered this moment when my boss, this was Wall Street and I'm like, you know, technology person. I have a pager, the Bloomberg pages, me tells me when the downloads have hit the mainframe and, and this pager rings at three in the morning, by the way, as if I'm to be checking. if the
The download didn't happen. I'm supposed to log into my computer and do something about it at three in the morning. Nonetheless, she said to me, Faith, you don't have to take your whole lunch break. And I was like...
Taina Brown she/hers (13:17.678)
Excuse me?
Faith Clarke (13:20.346)
I don't understand what we're saying. I don't know.
Taina Brown she/hers (13:27.302)
Wait, so she said that to you like it was a revelation?
Faith Clarke (13:31.874)
She's suggesting I shouldn't. I should not take my whole lunch break. And I don't know if she was like woman to woman kind of, you know, in this environment, you know. But it stuck out to me because I was just like, what are we doing? You know, how?
Becky Mollenkamp (13:53.999)
I think we all have those stories, right? I'm curious, because I know I do. I remember there's many, but the one that was like the straw that broke the camel's back, for lack of better term, for me, and the last time that I worked for someone else was when I was, it got to a point with a new CEO where we had to document our restroom time. And I was like, that was the day I left. I quit that day. I was like, I refuse to have to report to you when I'm using the restroom. That is...
Taina Brown she/hers (14:16.422)
I do, I do. Nothing as, I don't think severe as those two, but when I worked in a church, like I just never felt like I belonged. And so, and I think it was because the majority of...
Becky Mollenkamp (14:20.587)
A bridge too far for me, friend. Do you have one, Taina, of like any time where you're like, this is no.
Taina Brown she/hers (14:44.057)
the leadership. And when I tell people I worked at a church, people are like, you worked at a... Like, it's weird for people to wrap their heads around people working at a church. But yes, it's a job. Like, work needs to be done. But yeah, I just, never felt like I belonged there. And a lot of it had to do with the fact that I was not thin or white or middle class. And I didn't realize that at the time. I realized that in hindsight. Because it's one of those things where it's like, I think...
As humans, do crave a sense of belonging. And I've worked on this with clients before, of just creating this sense of home, right? And knowing that it's an internal thing. It's not necessarily where you are, right? You can create that sense of home for yourself internally. So no matter where you are, you feel like you're at home. I, fuck, I lost my train of thought. But.
Yeah, so like this place, this church that I was working at, it just, it never felt like home. And I think that in hindsight, once I started to realize, once I started to understand how power and privilege work, and I was just so blinded by that when I was like working at that church that I was just like, that's why, that's why, because no matter...
how hard I tried, it wasn't enough. No matter how good I was at my job, no matter how much extra work I put in, no matter how many emails I responded to after hours, it was never good enough. It was never enough to make me feel like I belonged, like I was accepted in that space. And that was a little itch that I could never scratch while I was there that I didn't realize until after.
Becky Mollenkamp (16:38.009)
I'm guessing that that's something you hear from people faith too, is that feeling of, didn't, I don't, until they experience belonging, maybe they don't know what it is, they just know they haven't felt it until they do. And then I feel like once you do, it's hard to go back to a place where you're not experiencing it.
Faith Clarke (16:59.236)
Well, many of us have reconciled the fact that we won't belong in all spaces. And lots of us have even used that as a way to say that we're resilient and we're capable and lots of type A people are like you to expect to belong everywhere. there are, I know people who focus on self belonging because they're alien and they accept their being alien, you know, they're alien to each other. And I appreciate and respect that so much.
And also that takes the pressure off the systems, which is 80 % of the problem to change. And so I honor the fact that we are all different and we can build structures that help us navigate that. also, because people, we will accept it. We will accept not belonging because that's just how the world is. And I think it's the people who experience the violence of not belonging.
that are much more likely than to say, and experience the violence as violence, you know, are much more likely to say, whoa, after they recognize the power that they have to shift stuff around. And when you gave the church example, Tayinah, I have a really specific church story, but that's because of my son's autism. A lot of my own work was triggered by my kid's stuff because I too was quite willing.
to not belong and to struggle and to, I can do hard things and I really glorify that. But when I realized that, the thing that parents do at church is to make children go to children's ministry. And that's how adults get to pay attention and not have, you know, a little one doing things on your body. But the children's ministry was for typical children.
Taina Brown she/hers (18:24.539)
Okay.
Faith Clarke (18:47.61)
And so autism was, it was hard. But if your child is five, you could probably get away with it because that's just a rambunctious five-year-old, an autistic five-year-old. And you could probably put that five-year-old in with a three-year-old. So there's a way that you can kind of sort of belong-ish, you know? And it was, I think I remember this moment when I had three children and one is seven or eight and...
Taina Brown she/hers (19:07.042)
Hmm.
Faith Clarke (19:12.58)
can no longer fit in with the three year olds and there's nowhere else for him to be. And I have the four year old and I have the baby on my shoulder and I'm walking around outside just trying to keep people quiet. And I'm like, clearly this place is not for me because I can't, like one of the clear signals of not belonging is being unable to participate and being unable to contribute.
Taina Brown she/hers (19:36.29)
you
Faith Clarke (19:38.146)
And like without having to hurt yourself. And so I'm here and I'm showing up sort of, but I'm not able to participate because the supports that are there to enable participation don't work for me. And then I became part of problem solving that, but it was my problem to solve. And I didn't have the power to actually solve the problem because I didn't have the money to change the system, to create training, redesign. Like I didn't have that power. That wasn't my job.
though I was busy advocating for it and talking to people about it. So a lot of us are in situations where we're in advocacy and we're doing this work and it's great work to do. But the very fact that we're having to do this work is the signal of not belonging.
Taina Brown she/hers (20:19.99)
Mm. Mm. Yeah.
Becky Mollenkamp (20:22.967)
And I'm so like, don't know, I'm a 50 year old woman and honestly, I don't have much belonging beyond familial sort of belonging, the belonging I've created within my own family structure, which I definitely feel like that is the place I probably feel the most at home. But I haven't had.
I hadn't had a lot of those experiences. I think I had glimpses and tastes of it and what I thought was belonging. But one thing I've noticed is while I may have felt I've belonged in spaces, it really was our community together that we have created, the four of us inside of this space and some previous iterations before that. But like my exposure inside of spaces that were primarily black women.
The belonging I have previous experience wasn't belonging because is it belonging if I feel like I belong but then later realize maybe it was only because everyone in the room was like me and so it's much easier to belong. You know what I mean? And I think.
the community, the space that we have together has really been one of the first times I've experienced this feeling of like, this is what I think belonging really means. It's like that really being held and being held in a way that also includes accountability, held in a way that includes that kind of support and giving the anticipation, just stuff that I hadn't really experienced before in many spaces where I may have at one time thought that I felt belonging. So I just think that's an interesting thing too of.
I guess it's kind of like none of us are free till all of us are free, that sort of concept like none of us can belong until all of us belong. I don't know what that brings up for you, Faith.
Faith Clarke (21:59.15)
But I think that like for you, don't know just based on what I know about you now, I don't know that if in those spaces you removed your mask because you understand what the performance of whiteness is and you can do it easily. Like there's a way that what I say about autism is that my kids can't mask or my oldest cannot mask. And that's what brings up the challenge to the system.
but my middle kid masked for a really long time. And so when you can mask and do, you don't really belong, but you don't know because you're busy perfecting the performance of it. And so.
Becky Mollenkamp (22:39.535)
Well, that's really true because I could think of, as I reflect on that now, you're right, those spaces. And I still sometimes exist inside of them. And now I'm more acutely aware of the performance part of it when I'm there, than I think there, than I might have been a decade or more ago. So it is interesting to think about, like, you're right, all the ways that I'm performing, which is, wearing that mask.
Taina Brown she/hers (22:56.064)
Mm-hmm.
Faith Clarke (22:57.378)
Mm.
Taina Brown she/hers (22:59.348)
Yeah.
Taina Brown she/hers (23:03.157)
Yeah, I think also even if even if you are in a space like where you're not necessarily performing, but you do have a sense of belonging, like, well, I know for me, like one thing I try to like, keep top of mind, it's like, understanding the power dynamics in this space, right? Does the person with the least amount of power and privilege in this space feel like they belong? Because if they don't, it doesn't matter if the rest of us feel like we belong.
Faith Clarke (23:22.49)
Thanks.
Faith Clarke (23:28.344)
Right.
Taina Brown she/hers (23:31.818)
there's no sense of belonging, right? So I can feel like I belong 100%, but if there's a black trans woman in this space or someone with, you know, visible disability in this space or something like that, that doesn't feel like they belong, then really all I'm experiencing in that moment is privilege, not necessarily a sense of, like, it feels like a sense of belonging to me, but it's really just privilege, you know? And that's necessarily like to like...
be self-deprecating, but to contextualize how power dynamics can shift from space to space. So if I'm in a space with majority of white people, I'm definitely not going to feel like I belong. I never have. I probably never will. I probably will mask or perform to some degree. But that degree might be smaller if I'm in a space full of Black women or queer people.
I still might perform or mask a little bit, but the degree that I do might be a little bit smaller. And I think that kind of, it feels that kind of perspective can sometimes feel debilitating. Cause it's like, it's like never over, right? But at the same time, it also feels really empowering because then that means, I can actually do something about this.
Like I'm not disempowered to just like sit by and not engage or not take some kind of action. Like I can understand how my own power and privilege is dynamic and fluid given the circumstances and then take action accordingly, right? Whether that means giving up some of that power and privilege so that someone else can feel like they belong.
or seizing that power and privilege for whatever reason.
Faith Clarke (25:29.05)
Yeah, so I think about the belonging, collective belonging in the way I think about an ecosystem. And it's not a state, but it's a dynamic system of noticing and responding to everybody that's in the system. And if the system is excluding a particular person, so my hands aren't on the screen, but like if this is a system and we only have this dynamic noticing or responding over here, then these people don't belong.
And so we can have the perception of individual belonging, yeah, right? But our system has not included these other people. And I tend to say, I don't believe it's possible to include everyone. And I think we need to be honest. If you're not...
able to include me for whatever the reason is because we're going to go with we all have skills that we need to build and we're not moralizing difference or whatever but in collective space there's infrastructure that's needed there's you can't determine that everybody is going to be at the same level of skill so if you can't include me don't invite me take my money say that you're going to give me resources but you haven't
cultivates the environment in a way that I can have my needs supported, met, and I can feel like I belong. And so there is some honesty that's required and just say, I'm building a system. I can include A, B, and C, but I can't include these others. And in my onboarding or my intake or my conversations, I say that. You know, I'm worried that, somebody said this to me recently, I'm worried that the people here,
may make you feel uncomfortable. And I'm like, that's cool, that's good, just owning the fact that, you know, there's some microaggressions that are happening right now. And they're like, yeah, we don't know that we can, we don't know how to do anything about that. And I don't blame them for that. Yeah, they need to do some work. But in the meantime, it's violence to accept people into space that you have when prepared for them. And therefore,
Taina Brown she/hers (27:39.741)
Mmm.
Faith Clarke (27:40.96)
expose them to stuff that signals they're all not belonging and harms them in a sense.
Becky Mollenkamp (27:46.927)
interesting. think we see that a lot in spaces, or at least I see it a lot in spaces that are run by white women who, because of their own marginalization as a woman, often think that they have an understanding of marginalization.
of all types of marginalization that they don't. And maybe they've done some of the work. And I'm saying they, I have been there. So I should say me too, at a certain point where it's like, well then I can hold space for all folks, right? And yet they really aren't able to yet. I wasn't able to yet. And still know that there's much room for me to do work. I'm now at a place where I make sure that when I'm inviting a
particularly a black woman, but you know, a woman or a person, I guess, because not just women, but anyone who's holding marginalizations I don't or that are not very present inside of a community I'm running, I try to let them know, like, I want you to know this space is primarily white women. We still would love to have you, but I want you to be aware of that because I also understand that may be a barrier for your entry, right? Like that may be something that isn't comfortable for you. And I understand that. And I didn't used to do that, right? And I do think that that's a
Taina Brown she/hers (28:43.205)
.
Becky Mollenkamp (28:58.189)
That's a sign of some growth, but I also know there's so many ways that I still probably contribute to this. But I see it a lot where people think they're able to hold space for people maybe they're really not able to. And the admitting that you're not is really, really hard, right? Because we want it. It goes back to all that stuff we've been taught about good and bad. And that means I'm bad if I can't. And what does that say about myself and my journey? So I think it's really nice to hear that reinforcement that, no, it's actually a good thing.
Taina Brown she/hers (29:10.301)
Yeah.
Becky Mollenkamp (29:28.173)
to be honest about that and to say that maybe you can't hold the space yet and that doesn't mean you're failing it's just where you're at in your journey.
Faith Clarke (29:35.282)
Two, the leadership structures that we've had are all supremacist. And one of the things about that is that, so there is a person at the top and that person should know. And so it isn't even, that you can't, although that may be true.
It's that we haven't developed the ability to collectively hold belonging for this person. Belonging is a community responsibility. And so we then say the leader is responsible for cultivating belonging and cannot be cultivated by a person. Belonging is a community responsibility. And everybody in the community must...
Taina Brown she/hers (30:00.71)
Hmm.
Faith Clarke (30:14.106)
Have you ever seen these games where, you know, ring games and somebody's on the outside of the ring and they have to try and get in and the whole ring is preventing that person from getting in. It's not just one little entry point. Yeah, there's a weak link. But if a person is gonna come into the ring, although two people move aside, the entire ring shifts.
Like, enfolding people into community is a community thing, not a person thing. And so I even talk about this with onboarding. Unboarding cannot be HR and so on. Unboarding has to be a community enfolding of the new person. So the belonging as a community responsibility versus a leader's responsibilities, like I think one of the places where we struggle and therefore, you know, and then every employee kind of says, well, good, you do that then.
Taina Brown she/hers (31:07.541)
Mm-hmm.
Faith Clarke (31:08.718)
Yeah, it's just, so.
Taina Brown she/hers (31:11.374)
Yeah, I think it ties into or it's that's like a symptom of just like that toxic individualism that is so prevalent in our culture here in the US and in other cultures like in different places around the world. There's this idea of that hierarchy and everyone is just like in their silos like working for themselves and there's no
There's no communal goal, right? And when you think about how most organizations are structured, it's like there's the organization and then there's departments and then there are leaders and managers who lead those departments and then they have maybe...
someone under them that helps lead and then you have the employees, but like each department is responsible for a very specific thing. And not that that has to be completely shattered to create the sense of belonging, but looking for those places where there's overlap, where there's opportunity for overlap and there's opportunity for cross-pollination, for lack of a better term, right? To create that sense of belonging can be...
can create a healthier environment, I think, for everyone.
Becky Mollenkamp (32:31.597)
Tainy, think we have both experienced the way faith is so good at this. Like inside of our mastermind, I've seen her do it elsewhere, this idea of collectively, what are we working towards? And collectively, how do we support each other so that it's not like, like inside of our mastermind, those I've been in so many because I've started so many masterminds over time. And there, even though it's a group and the whole concept of it is group think,
They've typically in my experience been deeply individualistic. It's here's me, here's my goal. How am going to work towards my goal and how are you going to get me to my goal, right? Versus like faith is so good. Okay, so then what are we as a collective, what's our goal? And then even when we're working on your goal, how are we collectively in support of that?
And it's so beautiful to see. And I think maybe the reason why it's one of my first real experiences of belonging, because I've never seen that kind of model. Like you really walk your talk, which is great. And it inspires me. And I want to do more of it. And yet I still see all the ways that I am still so tied in all this individualistic stuff where even if I don't want to be, it's hard to break free of it because sometimes I can't even see it.
Faith Clarke (33:39.95)
Right, right, right, right. I think that leads us into the thing that's been preoccupying me recently, which is invisible labor, because we're blind to it, and yet the system doesn't serve us and we don't belong. Then we absorb the things that need to be done in the cracks. Whether it's that we're masking, or we're just trying to meet our needs, or we're just being loving and trying to care for the needs of another person, we take on labor.
Taina Brown she/hers (33:42.266)
.
Taina Brown she/hers (33:54.267)
Okay.
Faith Clarke (34:09.922)
just to make the system continue to happen. Because I think inherently, we know how things should be, or maybe even on a body level. what the data says is that primarily people who are not men will, because the more privilege and power you have, the more the road is paved for you, the less you need to step into cracks. There are no cracks.
Taina Brown she/hers (34:33.38)
Hmm.
Faith Clarke (34:33.402)
is how I'll pay, right? So invisible labor is more and more and more the more marginalized identities you hold and people who are not men, just thinking about the workspace are in many communities, do the work of tending and soothing.
and supporting and the meeting happened and it didn't go the way people wanted and somebody takes two other people and they're talking about it and they're debriefing but I don't call it a debrief, it's happening in the bathroom or it's happening in the chat. Girl, did you see that? goodness, whatever. And there is this emotional work of carrying that people are doing in organizations everywhere. And I...
Taina Brown she/hers (34:58.377)
.
Faith Clarke (35:15.576)
I think there's a part of me that's back to the violence, Tayina, because as I experience the imbalances in some of the communities I am in, or even in my ecosystem here at home, or in extended ecosystems with previous partners, there's a way that I'm like, my goodness.
you left this work to me because of your ignorance or your lack of willingness to do work or whatever the reason is, you've left this work to me and I'm doing it. And then you blame me for some outcome of me doing the work and say that you couldn't have done the work because of some feature of my own being.
And so this kind of weird, people doing invisible labor, people then getting, so people not belonging, therefore people do invisible labor, people do this invisible labor, and for any weird reason get blamed for something in the system because a person who's not doing the labor says you should have done this thing, whatever the thing is, and then your own,
Taina Brown she/hers (36:15.342)
.
Faith Clarke (36:32.02)
navigation of that moment of conflict requires more invisible labor because what it requires of you is to center the person who's blaming you. Okay, how do I, it's like petting sharks. How do I figure out how to be with this person so that they don't explode, so that they don't call so-and-so so that I don't lose my job or, or so that they don't whatever it is. And so
Taina Brown she/hers (36:36.441)
you
Faith Clarke (37:00.664)
I was in that conversation this morning where I almost lost it because I, was like, wait, so the advice you're giving me on how to navigate this moment of conflict is study your opponent, center them, and then come up with a five or eight point strategy, eight or nine points added to my own list of invisible labor, and then execute that and
maybe you get 20 % of what you want. It's still going to be tough because these people are going to constantly blame you. I just, in the experience, I just realized we are so blind to invisible labor that we offer it to each other. So we all come to each other for support and we know that power doesn't yield. So what we say to each other is do more work. I'm so sorry that you're having this experience. Here's more work for you to do.
And I, I just like in that moment, I was just like, how do I center myself and how do I get you to center me? And I'm like, see me and center me. And I think if there was an invitation from the conversation I was having this morning to myself is it's not, it's not bad for me to ask people to center me. I've like center me. Don't add work to my table. Don't suggest that I'm to be blamed for the, for the problem that has shown up.
Taina Brown she/hers (38:06.81)
you
Faith Clarke (38:26.306)
Just center me. And I think if we practice that more, just like, as we noticed power imbalances, just center the people who have less power in the moment. We could just build some more capacity for this because the centering of me in that conversation I was having would have signaled care and need fulfillment that was not something that I was going to ask specifically for.
Taina Brown she/hers (38:40.206)
Mm-hmm.
Becky Mollenkamp (38:53.929)
the beauty of the belong of belonging as you describe it and talked about it where it's other people recognizing what's happening it's other people anticipating and helping because i think so often we can't because of so much of the conditioning we get as women as folks who have other marginalized identities it becomes
challenging or even impossible to notice the invisible labor, to recognize it as such. Like I think so many women I talked to specifically just don't even recognize the labor that they're doing. That's not recognized, that's not noticed, that they just take on because they think they're supposed to. They don't even see it as this extra weight. And even when they do, or when they get to that place and be able to discover it, the like...
naming it as hard and then the trying to ask for help, receive help, even when it's being given. So even when people are anticipating and helping you, can become hard. I've experienced this with y'all trying to help me where I'm like, I have such a hard time receiving the help. And so it's hard enough to ask for it and then to even allow yourself to receive it. Like there's all these barriers towards making this shift for ourselves. you know, belonging the way you describe it, at least starts to take down some of those barriers.
Taina Brown she/hers (39:55.326)
.
Faith Clarke (40:05.306)
because it's a community responsibility. I once you own it that way. I've, you know, I can get, I think both of you know me as being pretty direct, but I can get belligerent in groups because I'm like, you should not be allowing this person to do this because we're so.
Taina Brown she/hers (40:15.322)
Yeah.
Faith Clarke (40:24.282)
It's so easy for us to say, but why are you holding all this work? Let it go. And I've had people tell me, Faith, you should let it go. You should release some of this. I mean, if I release it, it's gonna crash. It's gonna crash. I it's gonna, I've experienced it. It's gonna crash. All straight down into the gutter. I have to be willing to grieve that. But on the other hand, you are community and you're letting this happen.
Taina Brown she/hers (40:35.976)
Mm-hmm.
Taina Brown she/hers (40:47.895)
Mm-hmm.
Faith Clarke (40:48.238)
you are letting this person hold this. Stop it. Stop letting people hold things that they shouldn't be holding. And so I was leading a board retreat one time and I kind of got in. But especially, you might not be belligerent, but it was just, in nonprofit world, volunteering is one of the chief ways that we let this happen.
Taina Brown she/hers (40:52.247)
and
Becky Mollenkamp (41:02.255)
I've seen you belligerent, but it's fun to think about it.
Taina Brown she/hers (41:05.463)
Yeah
Taina Brown she/hers (41:12.982)
Hell yeah.
Faith Clarke (41:13.718)
I think volunteering is a fantastic thing to do coming from the inside of me as I offer it to you, but you letting me harm myself through volunteering, shame on you. It's just.
Taina Brown she/hers (41:22.762)
Yeah.
Becky Mollenkamp (41:22.991)
that's not an attractive thing that you're violently against. It doesn't matter if it's any for-profit or non-profit. In fact, in a lot of ways, I think the non-profit world can be even worse because there's like this added level of moralism that gets added.
Faith Clarke (41:26.403)
Yes.
Faith Clarke (41:38.488)
Yeah, yeah, yeah, because it's that the old philanthropic model that's built on, well, it was rich white people who had money to do, know, like go find meaning in your life. That's wholly different from a lot of the foot soldiers in art of these spaces are just humans who want change. And we take advantage of that by saying, we have money for impact.
Taina Brown she/hers (41:38.857)
Yeah.
Faith Clarke (41:59.854)
but we have no money to care for the people doing the impact, stop it. Something is wrong with how you're accessing those funds.
Taina Brown she/hers (42:07.483)
Yeah, yeah.
Becky Mollenkamp (42:08.973)
When we talk about
invisible labor because it's something with Feminist Founders podcast that we've been exploring all summer through our own explorations and then also interviews with other people around some of the areas that this touches. You and I are going to be hosting a group container this fall that is specifically dealing with this very particular issue of invisible labor. And part of that is, like I was talking about that awareness piece where so many of us aren't even aware of all the ways that we're carrying this extra labor.
Taina Brown she/hers (42:29.99)
You
Becky Mollenkamp (42:40.049)
also figuring out then what, that then what part is really hard because the awareness is hard enough for a lot of people. But then once you're aware of it, it's just like, and now I know the load, so it feels even heavier. And now what do I do with it? And so part of that is that, is there anything that you want to tell people about that container or what they can expect?
Faith Clarke (43:00.09)
think what we're going to do is cultivate that space of belonging. So we will build the trust that allows the people participating to bring their shoulders down a little bit and receive that feedback. That's like, wow, Becky, that's kind of heavy, this thing on your shoulder, because it's hard to, when people say that to you without trust, you kind of take it personally. Am I stupid?
Was I stupid to have to eat? we just immediately begin that self-criticism. So to have a space where you're going to be held and challenged, but at the same time held while you're being challenged is I think one of the biggest things. I want, know, once we work on the assessment, we have assessment tools that are going to help work on awareness. But I think the biggest thing that's going to be there is we will feel like we belong to and with each other. And then from there,
our care for each other will be to help each other know, like body honest, know in body honest ways what we need to do to relieve the invisible labor. And then strategically, you and I are both good with the analytical part of it. Then we'll come up with, okay, good. Now that we know what labor needs to be shifted, now we can get into the strategic and the analytical part of.
What does this mean in your business? What does this mean in your life? What does this mean in your, you know, and then we can kind of figure out the action planning of that.
Becky Mollenkamp (44:29.773)
Yeah. And I feel so lucky. And I think feminist founders are so lucky that you are a part of this because I love being in spaces with you and watching you model the belonging keys and ways that I
I just am not equipped to do yet, like learning and growing and trying to get there, but you're really good at that. So for people who this belonging conversation, you're like, I want to know what that experience feels like. This container we're creating should be a great place to experience that. So we'll put information about it in the show notes. Is there anything else that we didn't ask you about that you wanted to make sure we talked about, Faith?
Faith Clarke (45:04.154)
If people are listening and they are experiencing in their organizations or on their teams or even in their nonprofit, on their volunteer crew, whatever. If you're experiencing high turnover, meaning people come and go, something is up there. It's not just people are like, if I could pay people more, they would not.
People do stuff for free, right? So I'm not saying they should, but they do. So if there's high turnover or something else, if you find that there's either conflict or there's no conflict. Yeah.
Becky Mollenkamp (45:41.539)
People love to think that's a sign of healthy culture. we wonder if nobody ever fights or in relationships. we have a great relationship. We never argue.
Faith Clarke (45:46.828)
Yeah, we don't have to talk. It's like, what? There's something, let's heal that. Let's work on that because retrofit is a beast that will blow up in your face in a second. If you find that you have these silos, like you have little clusters of people who are good and close, but then you have difficulty integrating into a cohesive whole. So I tend to work with small organizations because
Taina Brown she/hers (45:49.172)
That's a big red flag.
Faith Clarke (46:14.648)
You can change that in a year. It's amazing how you can redesign that and just see something shift. So I'd be happy. I'm trying to build out a set of case studies for small organizations just so that I have my stories written down with permission, because I can't tell everybody's business. So if people want to talk to me, I would be so psyched to document and then also just to share with you my wisdom on whatever I see based on what you're talking about.
Becky Mollenkamp (46:40.591)
I love that you showed, you talked about, we should have asked, but that you were talking about some of those signs of a lack of belonging. Because I don't, I think it's hard to recognize sometimes. And again, sometimes people think, everyone gets along. We're like family. That's always a scary thing inside of cultures. Yeah, it can be hard to recognize a lack of belonging if you're not sure what it looks like. So thank you.
Faith Clarke (47:01.432)
that person who doesn't talk at the meeting. People who are not in the meeting at all.
Taina Brown she/hers (47:04.244)
Mm.
Taina Brown she/hers (47:09.937)
Yeah.
Becky Mollenkamp (47:12.623)
Thank you. Anything else to add?
Taina Brown she/hers (47:14.991)
No, just to say thank you so much Faith. As always, it's always good to just be in the same space with you and talk about things and just kind of yapp away as the youth say these days.
Faith Clarke (47:27.066)
you
Becky Mollenkamp (47:27.097)
Do they say that? I wouldn't know. And we'll put all the information on how to get in touch with Faith also in the show notes so you can find it there. And then make sure you listen to Feminist Founders podcast because that's where Faith and I also talk about things. So thank you so much. Thank you.
Faith Clarke (47:39.332)
all of the things.