277 | Full Spectrum Leadership for Social Entrepreneurs with Nina Simons
Our guest this week on the pod is Nina Simons. Nina is the Co-Founder of Bioneers and serves as it's Chief Relational Strategist. She is a social entrepreneur who is passionate about the power of women to transform the world. Her new book is called Nature, Culture and the Sacred: A Woman Listens for Leadership.
And a special thanks to members of the Awarepreneurs Community for sponsoring this episode!
Resources mentioned in this episode include:
Social Entrepreneur Leadership: Interview with Nina Simons of Bioneers
NOTE: While it’s not perfect, we offer this transcription by Otter.ai for those who are hearing impaired or who don’t find listening to a podcast enjoyable or possible.
SPEAKERS
Paul Zelizer, Nina Simons
Paul Zelizer 00:02
Hi, this is Paul Zelizer, and welcome to the Awarepreneurs podcast. On this show, we dive deep into wisdom from some of the world's leading social art. Our goal is to help increase your positive impact your profits, and your quality of life. Before we get into today's topic, I have one request, you could hit subscribe and do a review on your favorite podcast app that helps more people learn how to have positive impact through values based business. Thank you so much. Today, I'm thrilled to introduce you to Nina Simons. And our topic is Full Spectrum Leadership in Social Entrepreneurship. Nina is co founder of Bioneers and serves as chief relationship strategist. She's a social entrepreneur who's passionate about the power of women to transform the world. Her new book is called nature, culture and the sacred a woman lessons for leadership. Nina, welcome to the show.
Nina Simons 00:55
Thank you so much, Paul. It's great to be with you.
Paul Zelizer 00:59
I was doing my research. And I was like, Oh my gosh, Bioneers started almost in 1990, according to the internet, and I was like, wow, we might be here for a while because there's some things to talk about over the past 30 plus years.
Nina Simons 01:13
Well, it's been the best education I could possibly have ever wished for. And I've learned so much. And I'm so honored to serve it. You know, it's a it's a living system that I really am devoted to. So I'm so grateful we started it.
Paul Zelizer 01:29
I'm grateful to Yeah, and given that you all are New Mexico bass. Nina's my neighbors lately to the north and Santa Fe, I live in Albuquerque, certainly been hearing about Bioneers for many, many years. And it's just such an honor to have you on the show. Hello, thanks. Suddenly that for our listeners who like might not be familiar with you and your journey if somebody wanted to get a sense of like, okay, what's Nina's background? Let that help you, like, you know, decide that something like Bioneers was wanted and needed. Have you always been a social entrepreneur? Or where did your professional journey start?
Nina Simons 02:08
Well, no, I have not always been a social entrepreneur. I started out as an artist. I was working in theater, and I was the daughter of artists. And I moved to New Mexico in the early 80s. And when I did a few years later, I was still working in the arts and managing restaurants. And a few years later, I met my husband and partner life partner, Kenny ASA Bell, and Kenny is an amazing social entrepreneur and a filmmaker, and an author and many things. He's a hyphen that we love laughingly say. And when I met him, he was finishing a film about the politics of cancer. And I didn't know anything about it. But as I learned, I realized that people all over the world were calling his home after being diagnosed with cancer. And they had heard through the grapevine that this guy knew something about alternative therapies. And they were calling up because they were terrified. And I was really moved to help. I realized that, you know, our system of medicine has pretty systematically chased away most alternatives or devalued them. Most alternative therapies, many of which are ancient and tried and true. And so I kind of jumped on the bandwagon and helped him finish the film, and then market the film. And then he was invited to make a movie at biodiversity garden. And we went together to a garden in southern New Mexico. That was extraordinary, that was cultivated by a master gardener named Gabriel Hauer earth. And he was cultivating all these seeds, because he had learned that biodiversity is really the stuff of life. It's, it's what nature turns to when we have a crisis. And he knew that there was a pending crisis in seed stocks, because all of the multinational corporations were gobbling up all the mom and pop seed stores, and all of the places that he had been tending the world's biodiversity of food plants, and that they were becoming extinct. And so he was cultivating hundreds and hundreds of varieties that he had collected many from native peoples all over the world. And I was a city kid. I grew up in New York City. And as I walked through that garden, I had a transformative experience, Paul And Gabriel introduced us to each plant as we walked through the garden. And he told us its common name and its Latin name. And then he told us how it was related to all the plants around it. And I began to understand that this man knew these plants better than most people know their own families. And, and as I took in the beauty of this garden, I mean, let me let me tell you what it was like it, there were sunflowers that were literally eight feet tall, that had heads like 18 inches across, that felt like they watched us as we walked through the garden, there were whole societies of tomatoes. And this was like in the late 80s. And nobody had ever heard of grains like quinoa and amaranth. But I have to tell you, when you see them in a garden growing, they're exquisitely beautiful, you know, quinoa is these golden shiny braids, that look like amazing. I don't know, plant dreadlocks, you know, they're just stunning and, and amaranth, wood. There's an amaranth called an elephant head, amaranth that looks like an elephant rearing its trunk into the sky. And it's it and it's Scarlet plumes of grain and, and then he invited us to taste as we walk through the garden. And there were whole societies of tomatoes of every color and shape. And they were all warmed in the midday sun, you know, and I realized my senses were just dancing. And I fell madly in love with this garden. And then as he described the coming food crisis, and why he was motivated to do this, what I felt as I left that garden, Paul was that it was like the spirit of the natural world tapped me on the shoulder and said, You're working for me now. And I had no idea what that meant. And I didn't feel equipped at all. And I had no business background, and no gardening or farming background. And what wound up happening was that my husband and partner, Kenny, and Gabriel, and another master gardener, started a company called Seeds of Change. And I quit all my work with arts and went to work for seeds of change, and embarked on the steepest learning curve of my life, and learned how to write a business plan and learned how to write catalogs and negotiate with seed growers and all a million things. And I felt like I was in service to the sanctity of life itself. And that was my introduction to social entrepreneurship. And Kenny and I were both in a deep learning curve about biodiversity. And he was also studying bio remediation, which is the art of using natural systems to help detoxify the air and soil and water. And he was discovering all these amazing people who had incredible innovative and practical solutions. And also, because we were living in the southwest, we both like you have a great affinity for this land, and also for the cultures of the ancient traditional peoples who live here, the Pueblo peoples and, and others. And so one day, Kenny was in a hot tub with a friend. And he was telling his friend all about the people he was discovering through his investigations. And the friend said, Why don't you have a conference? And Kenny said, I've never been to a conference. It sounds boring. Why would I do that?
Paul Zelizer 09:05
What a great answer. Right?
Nina Simons 09:07
Right. It's so true. And and the friend said, here's a grant for $10,000 Make a conference. And Kenny came to me because of my theater background. And I had never been to a conference either. So we had the brilliant advantage of beginner's mind. And together we put together this annual event that's somewhere between a celebration and you know, a fount of solutions and a ceremony and it features people who have practical and visionary ways to reinvent civilization from all walks of life. And I remember sitting at one of my first Bioneers conferences, with my mouth hanging open and thinking, well, these are the people Paul and the leaders I want to support with my communication skills. So that's, that's really the short answer of how I became a social entrepreneur.
Paul Zelizer 10:10
There's so many overlaps. And we're not here to talk about my story. But I got to New Mexico in 1993 Nina and my training is in community mental health and community organizing, don't have any training or business whatsoever, I wound up in a little farm along the Rio Grande, not too far from Dixon, New Mexico, bought some lands that I met in the house permaculture, study group, box and wound and started you know, the Jewish kid born in Queens started learning about nature and the cycles of life and watching Eagles fly overhead while we were eating breakfast of things we grew in our gardens and the eggs that came from our chickens. So anyway, this place taught me so much as as well as it's taught you so just honored the wisdom of this place, and what kind of impact that's had on both of our journeys.
Nina Simons 11:05
That's so fascinating. Paul, I had no idea that was your background. And and it's, it reminds me of what you alluded to either that earlier that I think the land supports us in ways that we are only perhaps beginning to become fully conscious of, and this land has a profound effect. It does.
Paul Zelizer 11:27
Absolutely. In my community mental health work, I did quite a bit of work. And actually, my last Community Mental Health job was working as a contractor for the Bureau of Indian Affairs. So So I did a lot of work on the northern Pablos. And one of the things that is the teaching here that I have permission to share, there's many things that I got exposed to that it's not mine to share. But one thing is that native peoples here talk about when you walk on the earth, the earth is always paying attention to us. There's just pays attention, but we don't always pay attention. But if we are paying attention to the earth and this sort of how can I describe it, this mutual doubt starts to happen between humans who are paying attention and the planet that we're living on a living breathing Earth. And people have been living here in this place. In New Mexico, Taos Pueblo is the oldest continually inhabited building in North Americans. 1000 years people have been living in the same building and, and drinking, you know, water out of the same streams. And when people come to the, you know, the southwest, they're like, something's different here. And yeah, it's beautiful in the Georgia O'Keeffe scenery, and the food is awesome. But it's not only that, and it's like, yeah, people have been walking in relationship with the earth for over 1000 years. And in some places, that's not that old. But in North America, that's not that common. And there's something that happens if we choose to step into that relationship. And I've learned that from the Native peoples here, and they said, you can tell people that part of it.
Nina Simons 13:03
Oh, that's beautiful, Paul and well told. And for those listeners who may be thinking, this is a little woowoo for me, I would guide you to an amazing YouTube video. That's called the Mycelium is listening. And it's science proving exactly what Paul is talking about. And and it has, you know, the the sort of grandfather of the fungi, Paul Stamets, talking about the scientific discovery that the mycelium underground responds to sound frequency, and it responds especially well, to low frequency like the sound of drumming. And, and so when you think about our ancestors and the native peoples here, doing their rituals on a seasonal basis, you know, there is there is really a reciprocity going on between the mycelium and the earth and all of Gaia, and the people doing the ceremony with their drumming. It's quite extraordinary. I love one science affirms what we intuitively feel, you know.
Paul Zelizer 14:16
So if you're new here, I love to give as many resources as I can in the show notes. So find that YouTube video, put a link to Bioneers we'll put a link to Seeds of Change. And, of course, we'll put a link to the book, which we're going to talk about in a second.
Nina Simons 14:29
Well, let me just say you don't need to put us link to Seeds of Change. There are many other sources of good biodiversity seeds now. But seeds of change was actually acquired by a multinational company in a hostile takeover. And so, you know, folks can find great seeds that are heirloom and open pollinated, and diverse in many other places. Yeah,
Paul Zelizer 14:53
so 9090 Like what was the first Bioneers Cafe if we were sitting in the audience when that first conference happened, like, what was it? Like?
Nina Simons 15:02
Oh my gosh, well, you know, it wasn't like any other conference in the world. There was beauty on the stage, there were lots of flowers. There are a lot of conferences that have caught up in many ways in the many years since. But it opened with ceremony with a native person from this place. The first three conferences were actually in Santa Fe, New Mexico, before we outgrew all the facilities here. And it was relatively small, the first one, it was about 150 people and, you know, it felt kind of like, how do I say this, like a secular spirituality, you know, there was this feeling of both hope and having and a lot of oddballs having found each other, and the sparking Enos of people's creativity, and that innovative spirit that is so core to entrepreneurship, you know, sort of permeates the space. And it feels like we're connecting the past with the future, it feels like we're celebrating pluralism. So there's a lot of diversity both on the stage and in the audience. And my sense is, that's the closest experience I've ever had to the world, I want to co create to the future world I want to co create, because it keeps being surprising, because of all the different perspectives that are there. And yet there is a quality of respect and reciprocity, and a kind of reverence that, you know, is how I want to live. And it's the reverence for life itself. You know, it's not, it's not a reverence that says, My sacred is better than your sacred, it says reverence that says, All of us are sacred, because we're part of this loving system. And, you know, that's, that's a good way to treat each other and ourselves. Yeah.
Paul Zelizer 17:15
So that's part like ceremony part, like innovation in the realm of, like sustainability and social innovation. And like, when you first started, they said, here's $10,000. Like, I mean, were you thinking about things, I used to work for wisdom, 2.01 of the larger conscious business conferences on the planet, I was there at the very first one. And by the time I left, working for it, there were 1800 people at that conference. So I got to see what a conference journey looks like, it can be a little chaotic, shall we say? If you pull back the curtain, right, I mean, is that fair to say? No?
Nina Simons 17:56
Oh, it's very fair to say. I mean, you know, what I would add is that what we were doing was so unusual, that, basically, we, you know, we had a really hard time raising money for it. I, at the beginning, I thought, Well, surely, if a foundation has four funding categories, and we fit into all of them, than they would like us, right? But no, you know, foundations back then at least, we're very rigid about No, you can only apply for one. And, and we really cared more about the mission than the money. And as a result, I think Kenny and I worked for the first eight years without any real compensation. And, you know, and, and the word got out after we moved to San Francisco on year four, basically, the word got out that if you wanted to come to Bioneers, and you couldn't afford it, you should just volunteer. And so we had like, squads of volunteers, hundreds of volunteers. And, you know, it was it was somewhere between, you know, I don't I mean, I it's, it's hard to describe, because it is a celebration, and it took a while for us to learn and attract the resources that we needed. And really, it was just about when we were ready to give up, that a donor stepped up and said, You're doing everything I care about, I want to give you a grant for five years to help grow this into an institution. So don't ask too low. And that was a miraculous day. So, you know, it's a yes, it's turbulent and wild. And, and, I mean, thankfully, we've been able, you know, it's been so well suited to our visions and mission, that we've been able to keep evolving it. I mean, if anyone had said To me, Paul, you'll be doing this same work and 30. Some years, I would have said, No way, that's not true to my nature, you know, I have learned that I am an entrepreneur. And to be fair, Bioneers really grew initially out of Kenny's vision. And then as I came into my own vision, which was several years later, it began to evolve more into the realms of, you know, integrating the inner work and the outer work, integrating women's leadership as one of the core values and programs. And, you know, and evolving, it keeps evolving every year. So it's always a challenge to be really current and, and to keep evolving it and it's become as much a media enterprise now, you know, I think we hit we're on radio stations all over the world. And we have this podcast that wins international awards every year. So there are a lot of ways to dip into Bioneers. And it feels like it's more needed now than ever before.
Paul Zelizer 21:11
Absolutely. So go ahead knew I was
Nina Simons 21:15
going to ask you a question, which is, with your background in mental health and community mental health. One of the things that I've been monitoring is how the social ecology is so anxious and skewed and depressed and triggered, and wow, are we living in a time of mental health instability? And I thought that must be very relevant for you.
Paul Zelizer 21:42
Yeah, thanks for asking about that. What would I say about that? You know, I think a lot about Krishna Murthy his quote, I probably will am paraphrasing. I don't know if I could get it exactly right. But that is no sign of well being to be well adapted to a profoundly sick society. Yes, yes. I've really been sitting with that. And I remember when I was doing my grad program, James Hillman came and he had just come out with the book, we've had 100 years of psychotherapy, and the world is getting worse. Yes, it is a fabulous book, if anybody is interested in well being and the interface between the end you know, the the individual journey and the collective journey. It was the young man who said, like, we're really fixated on individuation, you can hear in that word, it's a youngin word, the individual nature of the journey. And, and we're running into the limitation Not that that's a bad thing. But we're running into the limitations of that. And I, I sort of bumped up against that in my career and mental health, which is part of why I pivoted into social entrepreneurship, because I feel like social context issues are. It's not that I don't care about the individual attorney. But I feel like we could have all the therapists in the world, I'm trained as a therapist, not a bad thing. But that mindset is that I was running into the ceiling of how I felt like I could have positive impact. And it was really a painful rubbing into that ceiling because I was working mostly with marginalized communities. Yes, who oftentimes are not well served. So So it's both the best of time and the worst of times, I think it's good that we're pushing out past that frame of just me and my journey. A friend of mine is coming out with a book, I need to introduce you to her Genevieve Chavez, who's writing a book on spirituality and money. She has been a guest on this podcast, a long term friend of mine, she talks about the, the me mine kind of approach to living. And the we asked approach to living and I just kind of ran into that Western mindset of what mental health means. And it couldn't stay in an individual mind. And I felt like, the next wise step for me was to step into the social context conversations that I saw were happening even though like you, I had no training in business whatsoever. I was totally intimidated. I was not the easiest transition was very challenging transition, but I'm really grateful that I did.
Nina Simons 24:29
That's beautiful. Thank you. And I so agree, we're moving from a me culture to a weak culture. And it requires a lot of practice. But also, I just really appreciate that social entrepreneurship is one of the key levers to help transform the world and also to fulfill our dreams, you know, and and make a difference and make a living all at the same time. So it's, it's certainly served me well.
Paul Zelizer 24:58
Absolutely. Yeah. So let's Do this in a second. And I want to come back and ask you about the book and a little bit about this journey of like coming into buy in yours and bringing this feminine leadership thread to weaving in as a core value and what that's been like whereby in years and now, what some of the projects you're working on. Before we do that, I just want to take a quick break and hear a word from our sponsor. Do you have a business that's about making the world a better place, and you want it to grow both in terms of your impact, helping more people and your income, so you could live a good quality life? If you do, I'd like to talk to you about some research for a second. When scientists look at what actually contributes to humans reaching their goals, the single biggest predictor, whether it's a wellness goal, or it's a business school, is what they call social support. In other words, a group of people who are on a similar journey, who can help you with specific strategies that work on that journey at the time and point of development that you're on, as well as emotional support for the ups and downs of that journey. Being a social entrepreneur has highs and lows, right? If you like that kind of support, where printers has a community called the AWARE printers community, over 270 really generous and really skillful social entrepreneurs. And that's what we do with each other. We share concrete strategies, as well as emotional support for the ups and downs of the journey. If you'd like to find out more, you can take a look at aware printers.com. Forward slash community. And thank you to everybody in the AWARE printers community who helped sponsor this podcast. So welcome back, everybody. In the second part of the show, Anita, we like to joke about okay, let's we've got the top level. Now let's put on our social entrepreneur glasses and get a little more granular. So one of the things, I am blessed to work with a number of couples who are in this journey that you and Kenny have been on for a really long time. And I would be like doing a huge disservice to them. And a lot of our listeners, like what was that? Like? You, you were maybe a little bit more in the background doing really important work, but Kenny was more in the foreground, and then you like kind of leaned in and brought a theme that maybe wasn't there as heavily at the beginning in terms of women's leadership, and feminine leadership styles. And you really leaned into that, and that's become a very significant both for you personally. And for Bioneers. It's become something that is baked into the DNA, like what was that journey? Like?
Nina Simons 27:45
It's such a good question, Paul. It was hard and wonderful. You know, I think that we, we come together, either as couples or as friends or as partners, often because we recognize that the other person has has stuff we need to grow in ourselves. And we grow each other that way, you know, a teacher of mine once called it balanced meeting. And I think Kenny and I were very much like that. He is eight years older than I am. And as a result, you know, he came in with more business experience, more writing experience. And I came into our couple partnership, in a sense, with more inner training with a lot of experience, learning about spirituality, and mysticism and inner tools for cultivation. And as a woman, I mean, I guess I want to say, we all mature at different rates, right, we all grow up in our own way, in our own time. And everyone ripens in their own way. And so it took me some time to begin to unpack my own social conditioning. That said, I'm the woman behind the man. And I don't really have great ideas to contribute. It took me a little time to unpack that and begin to work on myself in such a way that I could trust and bring my own vision forth. And, and that was not always easy. You know, I think it took a long time for Kenny and I, to acknowledge for Kenny to acknowledge me as a co founder. But, but really now we have finally after working through my largely my power issues, I think, but his two we have come into a space of being in a very beautiful collaborative partnership and It's not for the faint of heart working with your partner. And it's not for everybody. And we happen to be blessed by being wildly complimentary, and also having visions that are really mutually supportive. I mean, I think part of what I brought to Bioneers was the integration of the inner work, not just women and feminine leadership, but a real questioning of, you know, how do we reimagine leadership as coming from the inside out, rather than from the outside in. And, and also, I as, as my own vision matured, and has continued to, I've become a tremendously strong advocate for both racial equity and indigenous justice, and climate action. And so, you know, it's interesting how your purpose as you describe for yourself, Paul, evolves over time, as you realize, Oh, this isn't quite the right outfit for me for this next phase of life. And I think we're all in a time of reimagining ourselves and questioning our own sense of purpose and what causes us as the world is going through so much turbulence and turmoil. So it's been a blessing and a challenge. And probably any couple you asked What, sir, that
Paul Zelizer 31:23
telling the truth, right? Yeah, it's so you're so passionate about this kind of leadership that you're describing, Anita, you decided to write a book, talk to us about the book, like what led you to wanna, you know, plant a flag, like there's something about and I love the whole title, but particularly, the subtitle a woman listens for leadership, like that is such a beautiful window into how you think about leadership, like, why did you want to plant your flag there at this moment in the human family's journey?
Nina Simons 32:01
Well, you know, part of what happened for me, Paul, was that I had been learning from Bioneers. You know, each year at Bioneers, we host over 100, visionary leaders, and innovators. And so I had been studying leadership in many, many forms for many years. And then what happened was, I was acknowledged by a magazine for my leadership, I was given an award, as you know, a visionary leader under 40. And I really didn't like it, I found myself feeling really awkward and wanting to deflect it and feeling like I hadn't earned it. And it painted a target on my back. And I had all these reactions to it. And at the same time, I had learned so clearly from Bioneers, that what the world needs now is leadership from every single one of us. And I thought, well, what's wrong with this picture? You know, if I don't like being called a leader, and we all need to be leaders, what's what's what's, how do we fix this? What is it? And what I realized was that I had inherited a mental model of leadership that was top down and hierarchical, and often, in many ways, aggressive or abusive, and I didn't want to be any of those things. And so I began convening women. Well, first, I started an inquiry about leadership, which was the first book that I did that's called moonrise the power of women leading from the heart. And it has two men in it. Because it's not just women. And I explored how many of us are reinventing and remodeling what leadership looks like now. And so that was a great inquiry. And it's a beautiful book, and that I'm very proud of, and, and so, you know, it was bigger than gender. It was, it was, wow, if we all need to be leaders. How can we surface a model of leadership that everyone can wholeheartedly aspire to? And so that led to my first book, and then the second book really came out of about 20 years of exploring me growing into my own leadership. And the way that I did that was partly through convening very diverse women leaders for about 15 years. For a week long, deep dive into the nature of women's leadership, and what we've inherited that we have to shed and what how we can cultivate ourselves, and how cultivating ourselves in community can greatly accelerate our growth in our learning. And that was a fantastic learning experience. And at the same time, I was co hosting Bioneers conferences every year, which gave me an opportunity to write a talk each year about what I thought was most important to share. And that's always a daunting, you know, wonderful and daunting challenge, because I basically had, you know, 15 minutes to given to speak an essay or a talk. And so I pulled all those talks from like 20 years, and looked at them all together, and realized that they could become a book. And then I realized that I could integrate into the book, all of the learning that I had found, from convening women and experientially in embodied ways. And so I could create both something that described the arc of my journey through how gender was important to my leadership, through some of the facts and statistics and stories about how women's leadership are, are proving tremendous change all over the world, in every sector and system. And then about my journey into intersectionality, and gender and racial justice. And, and so let's see, so, you know, the book, the book became my offering. And, and I, you know, again, it's a book about leadership. And I'm very proud that there have been several men who've read and reviewed it and said, This helps me understand how to relate to the feminine in me, this helps me understand my daughters, and my sisters and my wife, you know, this helps me become a better whole human because what full spectrum leadership describes is that really, no matter what gendered body we may happen to be in, I want to live a life of leadership, that allows me to draw from anywhere on the gender spectrum. And, you know, I think we all have masculine and feminine within us. And we're all products of a culture that has biased us towards the feminine, that's towards the masculine in ways that have led us to this crisis time on Earth. And that part of what we need to heal ourselves and our societies and our systems is to rebalance the masculine and the feminine in all of us. And in all of those systems. Let's long winded
Paul Zelizer 37:40
know that well, you know, after 3233 years, and you know, you get to keep on when you learn a thing or two, didn't sound long enough to be at all Oh, good. There's so much there. Oh, my gosh, we could be here for hours. The couple things I wanted to highlight, and then I have a follow up question to that. So one of the things that I was sitting with, as you were describing this beautiful journey in finding your relationship as a woman, and with that more feminine style of convening and being in community, and being a leader in calling in wisdom, as opposed to spouting forth getting on the stage on stage, right, here's the microphone. Let me tell you all how it is right, which is not what I'm hearing you advocate or model, right. And I was thinking about podcasting and listeners, you know how much I love podcast, I just love podcasting. And there's so many reasons, and I can talk about the demographics and why it's an awesome opportunity to market. You know, deep work because it's not a you know, 13 where meme on Instagram, but fundamentally, it's a learning opportunity for me, you know, we just published Episode 271, five and a half years with some of the best social entrepreneurs on the planet. And I get to listen and be in conversation and every comment, I do all this homework before I hit record, every conversation changes me, like profoundly, and who we've had on the show have been some of the most incredibly innovative and diverse from different continents, lots of marginalized communities and women and men and non binary, like what I have learned, like you cannot get that in a master's in business or a master's focused on leadership or a PhD. It is a embodied community sitting in circle week after week. There's nothing There's I've never I've been blessed to be part of so many learning experience and Nothing even comes close for me to that learning experience. And I was thinking of that as you were describing. It's like, Yeah, this is one embodied. experience I've had of what you're describing didn't come from But it didn't come from one person at the front of the stage. It happened from years of being in community and having really hard, really deep conversations about some of the most pressing issues on planet Earth. And it changes you.
Nina Simons 40:15
That's so beautiful, Paul, and you know, what it exemplifies, for me, is what I call relational intelligence. And it's one of the hallmarks of leading from the heart. You know, and, and another one, as you've so beautifully teased out, is listening more than talking, right? It's a quality of humility, and of recognizing that we're all always learning and always changing. And it's the interaction between us that changes us. And that's a magical thing. And something to really appreciate. But as a leader, you know, that was one of my first aha was was like, Oh, my gosh, that conventional mental model I had was, you know, the sage from the stage was the guy who barks out orders. And, and I'm much more interested in listening, and in listening with my whole body, not just my ears, right. And I think it's one of the greatest leadership skills. In fact, one of my favorite teachers, is a woman named Deborah Eden tall. And I just heard her say on a podcast, that the most authentic power comes from receptivity. And I thought that was a rather profound way to put it. And I believe it's true. And so as we collectively are reframing leadership, try that on
Paul Zelizer 41:48
one of the beautiful wisdom teaching, thank you for sharing that with us. And you know, so I, I asked you before I hit record, if it was okay to talk about tech boners. And we, for listeners, you're like, What the hell is Paul talking about? There should be an episode by the time this one goes live of a fabulous food entrepreneur, Byron White of your pond brothers who's growing one of the only indigenous to North America, caffeine plants. And if you look at the history of humans like caffeine, and we import a lot of it, and most of us in America, if you're drinking tea, it comes from about 1000 miles away for drinking coffee, it's coming from four to 6000 miles away. And it's like one of the most common things that are shipped around the planet. And the repercussions of that are huge. So, but one of the thing that Brian was teaching us was about this bias, and you were talking about and I wanted to get a little more nuanced since Bioneers is so well thought of and has so much history in sustainability world, what we were talking about there, as he was specifically referencing the bias in the sustainability and climate solutions space for high technology solutions. Software that, you know, is a key example of that, and how much of that software or technology is developed by white male leaders from very, you know, resourced backgrounds and how that is oftentimes sucking up all the air. And here he is a food farmer, and he's hiring people coming out of prisons and from marginalized communities and helping black farmers and they're doing well, but they're kind of having to work across this, you know, swim upstream where the capital in, you know, a lot of the sustainability podcasts are Amplifying Voices that don't look like theirs. Right. And I thought you would have an interesting perspective on this bias. What What have you seen in that space? And how do you work with that, personally? And also, how does Bioneers work with that bias?
Nina Simons 44:04
Well, you know, it's an example of how that bias there are, there are researchers who have said that the gender bias is the deepest bias in the human psyche. And when I first heard that poll, I thought that can't be true, you know, deeper than faith and race and religion and anything else. And and the more I've lived into it, the more I think it may be true. But, you know, in that particular reference, I, the phrase just cracks me up the desert all areas. It's hilarious. And, you know, I have heard that phenomena referenced before in philanthropic worlds because I also navigate through a lot of philanthropic worlds and I think we are living in a time of so much transition between Gen interational philanthropy, and you know, and in the, in the venture capital worlds. And among unfortunately, part of what we were experiencing, is a bunch of power crazed billionaires who are, you know, living out their personal fantasies of flying into space, since the Earth is not going to be livable anymore, because they have found, you know, because they grew up on Star Trek. But this is a real concern in philanthropic circles, in that, you know, those kinds of tech solutions, you know, of geo forming, or, you know, the idea that the idea that we are going to technically design our way out of climate change is kind of obscene, because the Earth is an ancient living system. And, you know, the Gaia hypothesis is proving out over and over and over again. And this system knows how to adapt to change, and how to survive and thrive through 4 billion years of evolution. And so, the tech Boehner phenomena, really bypasses that completely, and imagines through man's hubris that we're going to come up with a better idea, when, in fact, we have already passed all kinds of tipping points with climate change and climate justice. And the truth is, we're in a struggle for the survival of humanity. And, you know, when people say, I'm doing this, because I want to save the Earth, I kind of have to laugh, because from an indigenous perspective, you know, the earth is going to be fine. It's our species, that's really endangered right now. And we need to all band together. And this divide and conquer strategy that has been so effective for so long, is really getting in our way. And the food entrepreneur, you were just describing, is actually, you know, what he's doing is so beautiful, because it's such a systemic approach. And in truth, you know, we all need to be growing food locally, we all need to be developing local solar and local banking, and localization, in the interest of transforming the system from the grassroots up is this huge opportunity for social entrepreneurship. And I think everyone listening probably recognizes that. So I guess, you know, that's what I what I would say is, I'm not sure we're going to change those guys minds, I think what's going to happen? You know, they say that science changes one funeral at a time. And I think, I think this massive system shift that we're in philanthropy is changing because the next generation of philanthropists are coming up, and they're inheriting a lot of resources. And hopefully, many of them are doing really smart venture capital and social entrepreneurship investment. So that's, that's, I guess, my best response is, I hope we survived the tech Boehner phenomena. And I think we're gonna do it by by being in community, and by trusting our own innovations, and really being in the endurance game. I think I just heard a, a beautiful James Baldwin, quote yesterday, which I can't quote offhand, but it's all about how essential endurance is to creating something powerful and new and transforming things. So certainly my experience
Paul Zelizer 49:01
thanks for that honest answer, Nina. You know, I can hang out with you all day. And I know you're really busy human and our listeners are really busy too. If you were gonna leave our listeners with something, a strategy or resource something that they could take with them when it's time to turn this podcast off, what would it be? Besides go buy your book, which I'll tell them to do already.
Nina Simons 49:30
Well, you know, go visit by an IRS for good
Paul Zelizer 49:33
yes, go visit by and years go by the book.
Nina Simons 49:36
But um, you know, it's hard to choose just one, Paul. I would say that, for my own leadership cultivation, I am finding mindfulness practice to be an absolutely essential tool, especially in navigating the incredible turbulence and distractibility of this time And the resource I would guide people to would be Deborah Eden tall, who is an amazing mindfulness practitioner. And I would guide people to listen for a species mentor in nature. Because at the beginning of the pandemic, I was guided to do that. And it's been an end, it was a plant, a plant that's endogenous to this region that actually claimed me. And I have been learning so much about resilience from the Apache plume, which is an incredible plant. And, you know, I think, when you study a species, and really engage, give your attention to it over time, there's so much to be learned there all our elders really. And I do believe that we live in a conscious universe. And let's see. And I think the other thing that I would say, is focus your attention on your inner guidance, rather than the external distractions that are so flying around right now. Because really, we are, we are nature. And I believe, we have nature's sacred wisdom coursing through us, if we only get still and quiet enough to hear it and receive it. And so that's what I would offer because I think we are in a marathon. And trust to and take care of yourselves. Because the tendency when you care about the world, and you've inherited this work, work, power, power through kind of ethic, from our masculinized culture, there is a terrible tendency toward burnout. And we need to value our own instruments. As we navigate this arduous transition. We're all in. So that's what I would offer.
Paul Zelizer 52:11
Nina, thank you so much for being on the show today. I so appreciate it.
Nina Simons 52:15
It's such a joy to be with you, Paul. Thank you for all the ways you do this. It's beautiful.
Paul Zelizer 52:22
So listeners again, check the show notes, go check out pioneers, go get the book, tell your friends about it. Lots of other good resources in the show notes. Before we go, I want to remind you we love I mean, love listener suggested topics and guests. So if you have an idea, just go to the AWARE partners website and on our contact page, we have three simple criteria or guidelines. Here's what we're looking for. If you feel like it checks those boxes, please send in your ideas. So for now, I just want to say thank you so much for listening. Please take really good care in these intense times. And thank you for all the positive impact that you're working for in our world.