Jamila NaserianAxis

07/29/2026

NEW Episode ALERT!!!

New episode is live 🎙️✨

This week on Naserian Rises, we sat down with Elon — founder of Culture Meets Community culturemeetscommunity to talk art, identity, and what it means to build a space for East African culture to thrive in the diaspora 🌍

She shares the story behind launching her platform, why East African culture deserves its own spotlight, and what it’s really like navigating dual identity as an Ethiopian American.

It’s a conversation about belonging, representation, and using art to reclaim the narrative 💛

🎧 Full episode link in bio
Drop your flag 🇰🇪🇹🇿🇪🇹🇺🇬🇨🇩 🇧🇮🇷🇼in the comments if this resonates with your own story!

07/23/2026

Free gift, they said. 🎁 It'll be great, they said. 😩

We took the "free" add-ons from a service provider and ended up paying MORE than if we'd just picked the plain plan and minded our business. Then had to switch providers anyway. False advertising dressed up as generosity.

New business rule: if it's free, ask what it's actually costing you.

This is one of the funniest-in-hindsight, most expensive-in-real-time lessons from Episode 3 of Naserian Rises 🎙️ dropping August 4th

07/19/2026

Exploring Cinnaholic bakery in Maryland!

07/14/2026

"GESI Advisor." "Gender Focal Point." "WPS Specialist."
If you've seen these job titles and had no idea what they meant, here's the frame. 👇
GESI = Gender Equality and Social Inclusion. It's the field that makes sure development programmes (health, education, governance, economic development) actually reach the people they were built for - women, girls, people with disabilities, ethnic minorities.

Why it's a specialist role: institutions design programmes. Institutions have blind spots. The people affected by those blind spots are always the same people that are not in the room at design stage.

A GESI Advisor is a structural conscience for a programme.

Work in CSR, philanthropy, or social impact? This is how it connects to you.
What's the equivalent "structural conscience" role in your field? Tell me below. 👇

07/13/2026

Budget cuts = gender gone from the design table - but it’s a costly mistake 💸🤔

Tag someone who needs to hear this: cutting gender inclusion doesn’t save money, it just pays more later.

When organizations cut women out of the design process, they’re not just losing diversity they’re setting themselves up for bigger costs down the line.

It’s not a resource problem, it’s a sequence problem. Ignoring gender at the start only leads to expensive fixes later.

The real money-saver? Centering women in the design from the beginning, it’s smarter and cheaper overall.
Worth thinking about.

What’s your take on prioritizing gender in early design stages?

07/03/2026

06/30/2026

A lot of mothers, myself included, know this moment: you're a mom, and then you're... figuring out who else you still get to be.

It's messy. It's not linear. Some days you don't know. Some days you do.

But you can be deep in motherhood, building something, going back to school, whatever your version is, and still be exactly who you were before. Still be badass. Still be you.

This is a glimpse of what's coming with Naserian Rises, our podcast launching this July. Real conversations about the things we don't say out loud enough.

Follow so you don't miss the launch.

06/23/2026

A program can report: "500 women attended training."
And still leave every single one of those women in exactly the same position as before.

Same pay. Same say. Same constraints at home.
Attendance is not the same as change.

Here's the question to ask about ANY program, a work training, a school initiative, even a gym challenge: "What's actually different now that wasn't different before?"
If the answer is "more people showed up," that's not the win they're framing it as.

Save this question. Use it at your next review meeting.

06/23/2026

We talk about rights and equity like they belong in conference rooms. Like they're a "development sector" thing that doesn't touch your actual life.

It's not. It's about your pay. Your safety. Your say in decisions that shape your life, whether you've ever sat in a policy meeting or not.

This shouldn't only live in jargon. It should be for everyday women, the ones actually living it.
Because once we understand it, we can all be in this together.

This is a glimpse of what's coming with Naserian Rises, our podcast launching this July. Real conversations, no jargon, for the women this is actually about.

Follow so you don't miss the launch.