Ep. 108 IMPACT: Creating a Plan for Meaningful Change with Christen Brandt of She's The First
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Happy #SeekTheJoy Tuesday!
On the podcast today is Christen Brandt, impact advisor, self-defense instructor, girls’ right advocate, Co-founder and Chief Programs Officer at She’s the First, and co-author of Impact: Your Step-by-Step Plan to Create the World You Want to Live In, available today!
At She’s the First, they team up with local partners to ensure girls are educated, respected, and heard worldwide.
In this week’s episode Christen and I chat about She’s The First, her new book IMPACT, and how you can begin to support the world you want to see by crafting an impact plan, finding your North Star, building a community around you, and sustaining your efforts through self-care and resilience. Christen shares her advice for anyone feeling pressure, shame or guilt around impact, powerful strategies for tackling “the shoulds”, and why it’s important to stay curious and recognize our role in creating impact. Plus, we chat about the role of community and collective action, Christen’s biggest dream, and so much more!
I’m so excited to share this week’s new episode with Christen, and I can’t wait to hear what you think! Make sure to join the conversation on Instagram, Facebook and Twitter!
“No matter what your cause or area of interest is, we’re going to help you figure that out and create a sustainable, ethical plan, one that’s really accessible and that you can actually do, in order to create change in that area.”
“You don’t have to keep going going going. It’s ok to pause and take a deep breath, look at that to-do list, and figure out what your plan is. It’s ok to adapt the plan and change the plan too. When you feel like you’re hitting that wall, if you make a plan to keep it going, it both gives you the momentum you need to take the next step while giving you the grace to stop, take a breath and say, what comes next?”
Christen Brandt experienced an upbringing surrounded by women who built one another up as the men around them tore them down. This deeply shaped her perspective on the world. It’s what has made her an ardent advocate for girls’ rights and has allowed her to connect deeply with the girls and women she meets in her travels around the globe. She believes all girls deserve the right to be safe and loved.
In the past decade as She's the First Co-Founder and Chief Programs Officer, Christen has revolutionized outdated models of philanthropy by shifting power to the most vulnerable. She is skilled at breaking down complex issues with her sharp thinking and nimble action. She puts into words what others want to share and guides others on the journey from intent to impact.
When she isn't jet-setting on site visits, Christen teaches empowerment self-defense in Brooklyn, NY through the Center for Anti-Violence Education. In 2016, her Facebook post about catcalling went viral, kicking off a worldwide conversation on casual street harassment that reached media outlets from Brazil to Afghanistan.
“If we all do our part toward making the world better in ways that are most meaningful to us, then we’re going to arrive at a world that actually is better all around. You can give yourself the grace to focus on the things that matter most to you.”
Christen works internationally to promote girls' voices and the development of programs that support them directly, whether through She’s The First’s local partnerships, conferences, or trainings, or through consulting for organizations looking to create deeper impact with and for girls. The global challenges girls face have local solutions; and Christen’s favorite part of her work is finding and mapping out those solutions to be able to collaborate on what works for girls, whether they happen to be born in New York, Nairobi, or somewhere in between.
Impact is something that fascinates Christen, which is one reason she’s written a book on the very subject. Impact: Your Step-by-Step Plan to Create the World You Want to Live In. In it, Christen and her co-founder Tammy Tibbetts and dive into how to create an impact plan while teaching you about some of the larger concepts behind social change. This ties into some of her consulting work, too, for organizations and for individuals looking to go deeper with their impact.
In IMPACT, Christen and Tammy show readers how to devise a long-term, sustainable plan to make real and lasting change in the world… exactly what they did 10 years ago when they built She’s The First (STF) from the ground up making it a wildly successful girls’ rights nonprofit. STF teams up with local organizations around the globe and directly impacts more than 11,000 girls. Tammy and Christen’s work is supported by Michelle Obama, the United Nations, Diane von Furstenberg, major brands, 200+ campus chapters, and hundreds of thousands of everyday changemakers worldwide.
“All of the systemic issues that we’re facing on a country wide level, statewide level, or even in your own community, these things that feel too big for you to take on yourself, that is where collective action is so incredibly important. That’s where you look for the organizations who share your values, who share your north star, you look for the movements and the activists who are working towards those same things, and you link up with them. Because that is how we work to create change on a systemic level.”
Everyone wants to create meaningful change, but most people aren't sure where to start. IMPACT offers guidance on how anyone, anywhere can make reasonable adjustments to their lives to support the world they want to see, and live lives they’ll be proud of fifty years from now. This book teaches how to:
Identify the issue(s) that light you up and motivate you toward change (Finding your North Star)
Decide where to put your energy and resources and learn how to stick with it (Craft Your Impact Plan)
Design a network to support your goals (Create an Impact Advisory Board)
Build resilience and grit (Make Plans to Keep Going)
To connect with Christen visit her website https://cjbrandt.com on Instagram @cjbrandt Twitter @cjbrandt and you can connect with She’s The First on their website https://shesthefirst.org and on Instagram @shesthefirst Twitter @shesthefirst Facebook @shesthefirst YouTube @shesthefirst
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