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I’d like to share a personal story from my time as a CEO/Executive Director.In February 2020, I was three years and one ...
07/16/2026

I’d like to share a personal story from my time as a CEO/Executive Director.

In February 2020, I was three years and one month into the role. That may sound like a long time, but many seasoned CEOs will tell you it takes at least 18 months to fully onboard at that level. Some say it takes a good three years.

Having lived through it, I fall closer to the three-year mark.

There I was, a still relatively new senior leader who had taken the helm of an organization on the verge of collapse. I don’t say that lightly.

At my first Board meeting, just three weeks into the role, our primary funder asked to attend. They told the Board that if the organization did not get its act together, funding would be pulled.

At the time, that funding represented 93% of our revenue.

Needless to say, I inherited some serious challenges.

I was brought into the role to be an agent of deep change. Three years in, I finally felt like I was finding my footing. We had made important changes and developed clear plans for the deeper, systemic work that could turn the organization around for good.

Then COVID-19 hit.

I was leading a midsized, direct-service nonprofit that provided safety and support to survivors across 5,000 square miles of mostly rural Minnesota. We were already in the middle of significant change, with major system issues still to resolve. Now we were facing a global pandemic.

During that time, I found Brené Brown’s framing helpful. She called it everyone’s FFT, their First F Time living through a global pandemic.

Even for seasoned leaders.

What I came to understand was that nearly every new obstacle was an FFT. Healing complex organizational trauma and dysfunction has a way of bringing the unexpected around every corner, no matter how long you have been leading. It was truly a trial by fire.

Now, here we are in a world that is metaphorically and literally on fire.

Once again, we are doing this for the First F’ing Time.

One of the most helpful things I have learned about navigating an FFT is this: do not do it alone.

Build a good team if you do not already have one. If you do, lean in together.
Find a good coach.
Find a good therapist.

These supports are not optional when leading through unprecedented times. They are part of what makes it possible to remain grounded, human, and whole.

With that, I offer a heartfelt prayer for the world during this time:
May people come together, face what needs to be faced, and live with a sense of purpose that supports the shared future of life on this planet.

Over the last month, I’ve been spending a lot of time growing with the season. Summer is a time when the life forces are...
07/10/2026

Over the last month, I’ve been spending a lot of time growing with the season. Summer is a time when the life forces are at their strongest and, therefore, it’s a powerful time for connection and personal growth.

I’ve spent time behind the scenes planting new things, working on myself, attending ceremonies, being in nature and with family, and picking berries… so many berries.

A few pieces of nourishment I’d like to share:

Sometimes we are faced with our own deepest wounds at powerful times of the year. This is a gift. A reflection from the sacred. Be grateful for being able to see the work in front of you and steadfast in taking it one step at a time.

With ceremony and all things sacred: Have fun, but don’t make fun of it. Don’t play with it. In other words, don’t use it for selfish purposes. Use it for healing and to live a good life while you’re here. Use it to benefit the community and the collective. A critical difference between new age and traditional ways is that one uses spirituality to benefit the individual, and the other is all about benefiting the collective. Also, these things are for living a good life while we’re here on earth… to be a good relative to all life. It has nothing to do with shaping where you go when you die. The ancient ones will take care of that…

The most powerful medicine is love and the relationship between all things. Some people seek power or powerful experiences. But that’s not the point of real sacred practices. Sometimes you’ll witness the miraculous. Sometimes, you will see things that make the sacred undeniable. But that’s not the point. Focus on what matters.

Lastly, I’ve been planning a trip back to some of my ancestral homelands. I’m fortunate to come from many places, but I can’t visit them all at once. So, I’m starting with the land that has called to me by sending a powerful messenger into my life. This trip has been years in the making, even before I realized it. I’m looking forward to visiting the traditional lands of Sapmi in the coming weeks – Lands now known as Norway, Sweden, and Finland. I’m sure it will be something of dreams. I’m grateful to my friend from there, who will be traveling with me.

As another friend shared with me, sometimes things happen that are so profound you could not have orchestrated them if you tried. That’s how you know when something much bigger is working through you.

I’m so deeply grateful to all who have been a part of this journey. All who have helped and offered perspectives. May I pay it forward to the collective future of life on this wondrous living planet.

Follow your dreams. The world is alive and powerful, no matter who or what is trying to destroy it. We are all spirit weavers. It is time we take that seriously once again.

Last week, I finished a co-facilitated training series with my dear friend and colleague, Johnanna Ganz.Together, we hav...
06/22/2026

Last week, I finished a co-facilitated training series with my dear friend and colleague, Johnanna Ganz.

Together, we have been building work around Dreaming in the Dark and what it means to embody liberatory values in our leadership and organizations. This series was powerful, not only because of the content, but because of the people who entered the space with such honesty, courage, and care.

Some participants joined us for all three sessions. Some came for one or two. Each person brought something real into the room. A question they were carrying. A pattern they were noticing. A tension in their organization. A hope that leadership could be practiced differently.

One thing this work keeps teaching me is that so many leaders are hungry for real change. They are not pretending the barriers are small. They know the cycles that keep organizations stuck. They can name the urgency, fear, disconnection, and old habits that keep showing up in their systems. But they are not willing to stop at naming what is broken.

They are stepping in with reflection and sincerity. They are asking what it means to practice liberatory values not only in theory, but in the daily life of leadership. In decisions. In relationships. In accountability. In conflict. In the way power moves through a room.

That kind of work creates ripples. Sometimes they begin quietly, with a different question in a meeting, a pause before reacting, a braver conversation, or a leader choosing repair instead of defensiveness. But those small shifts matter. Over time, they change the conditions people are working inside.

Those ripples are part of what I live for, and they are a big part of why I have chosen this work. When leaders begin to embody their values more fully, organizations change. When organizations change, communities feel it.

I am deeply grateful for everyone who joined us in this chapter, and I am excited for what comes next in this work with Johnanna.

For now, I am sitting with this reminder: even in the dark, people are still dreaming. And those dreams are already beginning to move.

This week, I had the pleasure of joining Praxis International once again for a panel discussion on The Impact of Organiz...
06/18/2026

This week, I had the pleasure of joining Praxis International once again for a panel discussion on The Impact of Organizational Practices on Rural Survivors and Advocates.

It was an honor to be invited by an organization I have respected deeply for many years. Praxis has contributed so much to the field, and being asked to sit alongside other leaders who are still close to the work of domestic violence survivor services felt meaningful in ways I am still reflecting on.

That field shaped a great deal of who I am as a leader. It taught me about courage, complexity, grief, trauma, resilience, and the steady strength it takes to keep showing up in systems that are often under-resourced and overburdened. There are parts of that work I still miss. At the same time, I feel incredibly grateful that I still get to support organizations doing that critical work, even if my role now looks different.

What stayed with me most was being part of a room full of people serving rural survivors and communities across the country. It reminded me how much organizational practices matter. Mission does not only live in a statement on the wall. It lives in supervision, decision-making, communication, policies, boundaries, workload, and culture. It lives in whether people feel supported enough to keep doing the work with care and integrity.

Over the years, across different roles, I have learned that values need somewhere to live. They need systems that can hold them, cultures that can breathe, and leaders willing to look honestly at what is helping people thrive and what is quietly wearing them down.

That is the work I love most now.

Helping translate mission and values into organizational systems and cultures that support deep transformation. Not just so people can sustain the work, but so they have a real chance to thrive within it.

I left the conversation feeling grateful, humbled, and renewed. Some work stays with us. Some fields shape the soil of who we become. And sometimes, we are fortunate enough to keep tending that soil in a new way.

05/29/2026

We are living in a time
when our truest purpose can no longer stay hidden.

Something in us is being called forward.

To listen more deeply.
To remember what we carry.
To heal what came before us,
and what still moves through us.

This is the work of Oorlog,
the deep inheritance of our lineages,
the patterns, wounds, strengths, and stories
asking to be met with courage.

We do not find our way
by abandoning who we are.

We find it by living our values.
By embodying our truest gifts.
By following the quiet call
that has been stirring since we were children.

And somewhere along that path,
we begin to touch Wunjo.

Not happiness as escape.

But the deeper joy
of uncovering our belonging
in the great web of life.

A joy that remembers us
as we remember ourselves.

A year ago, I was entering the final 30 days of leaving a role that had shaped almost a decade of my life.At the time, I...
05/27/2026

A year ago, I was entering the final 30 days of leaving a role that had shaped almost a decade of my life.

At the time, I was focused on leaving well. Supporting the transition. Making sure the organization, the team, and the work had what they needed to keep moving forward.

Now, with more space between me and that season, I am able to give voice to the many lessons I learned.

I remember how often I felt too busy. Too busy for reflection. Too busy for my own development. Too busy, sometimes, to even notice how much I was carrying.
There was always something urgent. Significant organizational change. Hiring and onboarding. Leadership development. Internal systems that needed to be built or rebuilt. Grants that suddenly dropped with only weeks to apply. Budget cycles. Board development. Strategic planning. Donor meetings. And, because of the nature of the work, safety situations involving our staff or building that could become serious very quickly.

In those seasons, my own growth felt like something I could come back to later.

I also absorbed a message that many senior leaders in nonprofit and human services work know well: the mission comes first, and you are the one who has to sacrifice for it. I never thought of myself as a martyr. But the current of martyrdom in mission-driven work is real. It can pull you under quietly, especially when the work matters and the stakes are high.

That is something people outside of nonprofit, crisis, and human service leadership do not always fully understand. Sometimes the pressure is not theoretical. Sometimes the decisions carry real consequences for real people. Sometimes it feels like life and death, and it is.

But one of the things I learned, slowly and not always gracefully, is that those are the exact moments when leaders need development, support, and reflection the most.

Not when things calm down.

Not when the calendar opens up.

Not after the next crisis passes.

Right in the middle of it.

It took me years in that role to understand what leading by example really meant. It was not just about working hard or staying committed. It was also about showing that the mission does not require us to abandon ourselves.

That lesson still sits with me.

I see the same struggle in many of the leaders I work with today. Brilliant, committed people doing critical work while quietly pushing their own development, well-being, and reflection to the margins.

I know why they do it.

I also know the cost.

I am grateful now to hold space for leaders in those moments, the way others held space for me. Especially when it feels like there is no time for it.

Because the time to slow down and focus on what truly matters is not somewhere beyond the chaos.

It is here, in the middle of it.

That is where leadership is actually formed.

I want to share this personal story with you all: I had coffee recently with a retired coach and consultant. It was one ...
05/20/2026

I want to share this personal story with you all:
I had coffee recently with a retired coach and consultant. It was one of those conversations that reminded me how much wisdom lives in people who have spent decades paying attention. She knew the organization I used to lead. Not just the version I was part of, but its longer history. She knew some of the challenges that had been there for decades before I stepped into leadership.

At one point, reflecting on how the organization had changed during my time there, she said, “I don’t know what you did, but it was nothing short of miraculous.”

I have carried that with me since.

Not because I think I did it alone. I absolutely did not. We built an incredible team. People who cared deeply, stayed close to the mission, and kept showing up for the hard, quiet work of changing culture from the inside.
Many of them are still doing that work today.

A week or so later, I spoke with someone who remains closely connected to the organization. They shared that the change work we began has continued to grow and evolve in the direction we had hoped. Even with significant external threats and pressures, the organization remains strong overall and committed to critical community work.

That may be one of the things I’m most proud of.

Leadership is often measured by what happens while we are in the seat. The decisions we make. The problems we solve. The outcomes we can point to.

But I think one of the deeper measures is what continues after we leave. The leaders who keep growing. The culture that keeps strengthening. The mission that keeps moving because the roots are strong enough to hold.

I feel honored today to do similar work with other leaders and organizations, especially those carrying important mission-driven work in difficult times.

Because real transformation is never just about one leader.

It is about what becomes possible when people build something together that can keep growing beyond any one person.

I often work with senior leaders who know exactly what needs more of their attention.They know the conversations they ne...
05/07/2026

I often work with senior leaders who know exactly what needs more of their attention.

They know the conversations they need to have.

They know the patterns that need to shift.

They know the deeper work that would actually move the organization forward.

But their days are full of administrative tasks, program demands, urgent decisions, and the steady weight of keeping everything moving.

The plate is not just full.

It is overflowing.

And after a while, it can start to feel like this is simply how leadership works.

Every time you create a little space, another wave comes in.

Every time you try to step back, something pulls you back into the current.

This is where I love to work with leaders.

Not by adding another framework or telling them to manage their time better.

But by pausing long enough to understand what is really happening.

What is draining energy?

What patterns keep repeating?

What systems are quietly reinforcing the very conditions you are trying to change?

Often, the leader already carries the knowing.

They can feel what needs to change.

They have tried to name it before.

But knowing alone does not always create movement, especially when the systems around them keep pulling them back into the old rhythm.

So we work on both.

The leader and the system.

The inner pattern and the outer structure.

The way decisions are made, energy is spent, boundaries are held, and responsibility moves through the organization.

That integrated work is where deep and lasting change becomes possible.

One step at a time.

One pattern at a time.

One honest pause at a time.

What knowing are you already carrying about what needs to change?

And what keeps making it hard for that change to stick?

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