Pause On The Play

Getting involved in the speaking industry is one way to build your thought leadership and support yourself or your business. 

But that journey isn’t the same for everyone. There is more work that needs to be done to make the speaking industry more equitable.

Danielle Tucker joins Erica for a conversation about the speaking industry, building thought leadership, and how people of color can be more visible and get paid well for what they do.

In this discussion:

• Where more accountability and responsibility are needed to bring equity to the speaking industry

• Why making change in the industry requires collaboration between speakers of color and allies in positions of influence

• How to build your visibility in ways that feel good and support your goals

• What it means to be a thought leader in a beneficial and impactful way

Connect with Danielle Tucker:

• Professional Speaker Websites

• Expansive Thought Leadership

• Connect with Danielle on LinkedIn

Resources:

• Danielle’s 25 Speaking Essentials Checklist

Ready to dive deeper?

If you want support in broadcasting your brilliance join Danielle and the other amazing members of The Pause on the Play® Community.

Get the knowledge and support you need to bring your voice to the world in a community that is working together and invested in each other’s success and wellbeing. 

Learn more at pauseontheplay.com/community

We tend to think of being a leader as something someone is or isn’t.

But a concept of leadership that focuses only on the individual misses the inherently social nature of being a leader.

Erica discusses what it means to be in leadership, why leadership is social, and why leaders must consider the collective whole.

In this discussion:

• How the common conception of leadership reinforces white supremacy culture

• Why leadership is inherently social

• Why leadership requires acknowledging and working toward the collective good

We tend to think of being a leader as something someone is or isn’t.

But a concept of leadership that focuses only on the individual misses the inherently social nature of being a leader.

Erica discusses what it means to be in leadership, why leadership is social, and why leaders must consider the collective whole.

In this discussion:

• How the common conception of leadership reinforces white supremacy culture

• Why leadership is inherently social

• Why leadership requires acknowledging and working toward the collective good

Resources:

• What Is Leadership? Kevin Kruse

• Understanding Leadership, W.C.H. Prentice

Ready to dive deeper?

The Pause on the Play® Community is a space where we come together and share with one another what we are experiencing, what we’re feeling, and what we’re doing to be different and do better.

Sharing these stories and experiences gives us an opportunity to connect on a deep human level and be reminded of the hope and the possibilities in humanity. 

Learn more about our community at pauseontheplay.com/community

• What Is Leadership? Kevin Kruse

• Understanding Leadership, W.C.H. Prentice

Ready to dive deeper?

The Pause on the Play® Community is a space where we come together and share with one another what we are experiencing, what we’re feeling, and what we’re doing to be different and do better.

Sharing these stories and experiences gives us an opportunity to connect on a deep human level and be reminded of the hope and the possibilities in humanity. 

Learn more about our community at pauseontheplay.com/community

While many business owners want to do business differently, there is no one-size-fits-all checklist for building a business that supports collective liberation.

But there is plenty of shame, guilt, and expectation around how to do business. Yet shame and guilt can actually stifle our growth and perfection is neither a reasonable goal nor expectation.

Jeffrey Shiau joins Erica for a conversation about building a liberatory business, what it means to honor your capacity and the humanity of your team, and why we need to reclaim pleasure and care as we work toward liberation.

In this discussion:

• How small business owners’ identity and values are impacted by white supremacist, patriarchal culture

• Why we have to let go of shame and expectations of perfection for ourselves and others

• What it means to honor your capacity and the capacity of your team

• Why we need to re-humanize our business relationships

Connect with Jeffrey Shiau:

• Unconventional Agency

• Instagram: @UnconventionalAgency

Resources:

• Read Emergent Strategy, by adrienne maree brown

Ready to dive deeper?

If you want to support change, break barriers, and vote with your dollars, you can make a financial contribution to support the show. Your contributions help offset the costs of production, show notes, and article writing, and keep the Pause on the Play® podcast a free resource for 200 episodes and counting. 

Take action toward being part of a more equitable future by making your donation at pauseontheplay.com/show

Many of us live lives that are disconnected from the land and our environment.

The process of learning about the traditional stewards of the land you’re on, and honoring the environment can have impacts that go beyond land acknowledgments.

India joins Erica for a discussion about acknowledging and honoring the land, what Erica has learned about gardening, and how she’s evolving in her work and relationships.

In this discussion:

• What Erica and India have learned since researching whose land they’re on

• How growing and tending plants has evolved Erica’s relationship to the land and her ancestors

• How Erica’s professional training has impacted her personal relationships and the way she shows up for her children

Ready to dive deeper?

When we’re thinking about topics that aren’t widely discussed, it can be challenging to know where to search for information, or even the right questions to ask. And that’s where the power of community comes in.

In The Pause on the Play® Community, we ask questions, and share our journeys, resources, and knowledge. There is so much power and opportunity for growth in being in community with people who share your values and allow you to reconsider your normal.

Learn more at pauseontheplay.com/community

Resources:

Find out whose land you’re on: https://native-land.ca/

Learn more about caring for plants with Hilton Carter, The New Plant Parent, and The Plant Rescuer

Labels like co-dependent, perfectionist, and people-pleaser get used constantly. We’re told we shouldn’t be those things.

But for many of us, those labels stem from survival skills we learned in our early lives. And reliance on labels can actually undermine our ability to heal from these behavioral patterns.

María-Victoria Albina joins Erica for a discussion of survival skills, authenticity, embodiment, agency, and choicefulness within the systems of white supremacist patriarchy, colonization, and capitalism.

In this discussion:

• How labels like codependent, perfectionist, and people-pleaser undermine healing

• Why problematizing the survival skills many of us learned as children is problematic in itself

• How white wellness’s emphasis on authenticity diminishes the multi-faceted nature of being human

• How our nervous systems impact embodiment, agency, and choicefulness 

Connect with María-Victoria Albina:

• Website

• Instagram: @victoriaalbinawellness

• Feminist Wellness Podcast

• Anchored: Overcoming Codependency

Resources:

• Download María-Victoria’s Free Meditations and Exercises

Ready to dive deeper?

Joy and connection can provide powerful counterbalances to the systems of white supremacy. We need reminders that it is possible to recenter, repair, and restore what has been stolen, damaged, or degraded by white supremacy.

Counterbalances that remind us that we never have to allow our humanity to be on the table for negotiation provide us access to action that move us further away from white supremacy.

We are addressing these counterbalances and navigating change together in The Pause on the Play® Community.

If you’re looking for a supportive, centering space on your journey, learn more about The Community at pauseontheplay.com/community

There are words that we use so often that we rarely stop to consider the impact that they can have.

The word but is often used when we discuss things like Black History Month. “It’s important but, it’s the shortest month of the year…” The word but negates what comes before it. When you use the word but you may be negating the lived experiences and realities of others without even realizing it.

For the final episode of Black History Month, Erica discusses why we need to be more conscious of when we use but.

In this discussion:

• How the word but negates experiences and realities

• A case for keeping history, heritage, and cultural months on the calendar

• Why using the word but doesn’t soften the impact of your words

• How to use language as a clue to how you’re processing

Resources:

• Learn more about land acknowledgments at native-land.ca

• Listen to Erica and E.K. Powell on African American Vernacular English

Ready to dive deeper?

Any time that we discuss language and word choices, it’s important to consider how it impacts people and the intended or unintended harm that can happen when we are not mindful with one of our most important resources: our words.

Inside The Pause on the Play® Community, we have our guide to problematic language and alternatives, which is a crowdsourced document that you can learn from and contribute to, so we can all work on recognizing that our language is powerful.

This is one of the many resources available to Community members, along with community conversations, office hours, workshops, and more.

Learn more at pauseontheplay.com/community

Black History Month often curtails the true scope of Black history to a few key periods of time, but Black history is much more than the history of enslavement or the Civil Rights Movement.

Black history is full of innovation and joy, and it’s being made all around us.

Erica and India discuss the importance of recognizing and celebrating Black joy during Black History Month, and all year long.

In this discussion:

• Why it’s vital to recognize the throughline of innovation and joy in Black history in America

• Why it’s necessary to amplify Black innovators and creators working in spaces outside of music, movies, or sports

• Why allies need Black friends, not just educators

• How to witness, support, and share Black joy

Resources:

• Listen to POTP Episde 94. Celebrating Black Joy for Black History Month

• Learn more about Ron Finley, the Gangsta Gardener

Ready to dive deeper?

Podcasts, books and articles are the places that we start, but they have to become a part of how you take action, part of how you learn and unlearn so that you can live, lead, and love in a more equitable way.

You can support change, break barriers, and vote with your dollars via a financial contribution to the Pause on the Play® podcast. Your contribution goes towards podcast production, show notes, and article writing expenses necessary to continue providing this free resource to those seeking to take action and create a more equitable future.

You can learn more and submit your contribution at the dollar amount of your choice at pauseontheplay.com/show

Getting clarity on how you want to be in community–whether one-on-one, in a group, or taking time to process on your own before coming back to the group–helps create interdependence by fostering a community of choice that benefits that collective whole.

Erica digs into showing up as yourself and how fostering interdependence creates counterbalances and safety nets as we navigate liminal spaces, planning for the future as we understand the present.

In this discussion:

• Why you need clarity on how you want to show up in community
• How interdependence founded on active choice benefits the collective whole
• How interdependence creates counterbalances and safety nets that support our forward movement

Resources:

• Listen to Ixchel Lunar on Decolonizing Time and Relearning Indigenous Cyclical Time

Ready to dive deeper?

The Pause on the Play® Community is about more than just business, it’s about connecting with people in a holistic landscape, where you are allowed to show up exactly as you are in that moment.

The community fosters interdependence and provides support as we navigate counterbalances and create safety nets, as a way of life.

Join the conversation at https://pauseontheplay.com/community

Systemic biases can have profound impacts on how we receive medical care and support. 

Members of marginalized communities may be brushed off, misunderstood, misdiagnosed, and mistreated within the medical system, sometimes with catastrophic effects.Andrea Nakayama joins Erica for a discussion about bias, medical gaslighting, a systems approach to health, and how to advocate for yourself in medical settings.

In this discussion:

• The three tenets of functional medicine
• How systemic and implicit biases show up in medical care
• The sometimes subtle impacts of medical gaslighting
• Three steps to advocate for yourself in medical settings

Connect with Andrea Nakayama:

• Website
• Instagram: @andreanakayama
• Meet Andrea Nakayama | Founder and Lead Instructor for FxNA
• The 15-Minute Matrix Podcast

Ready to dive deeper?

When we’re confronting biases and gaslighting, it can be easy to second-guess ourselves based on what we’ve been conditioned to think. That’s where having a space to navigate what’s happening, what you’re thinking, what you’re feeling, and having a soundboard can be immensely helpful.

The Pause on the Play® Community can be that place.

Learn more at https://pauseontheplay.com/community

A new year is often a time of reflecting on the past and planning for the future, but it’s important to remember that where we are right now matters.

And as content creators, it matters that you share what’s going on with you and not forget yourself in the process of interviewing others or providing value through teaching. 

Erica and India get together to share where they are right now and why it’s important for content creators to let their audiences get to know them.

In this discussion:

• Why content creators should share their personal experiences
• Erica and India’s experiences becoming homeowners
• How Erica put her values into action through her recent move
• A different take on boundaries and how that’s helping Erica navigate online dating

Resources:

• Watch The Banker 
• Use OfferUp
• Buy Nothing Project

Ready to dive deeper?

If you’ve enjoyed the conversations on this podcast, you may want the chance to ask Erica or India your questions, and you have the opportunity to do that in The Pause on the Play® Community. 

You’ll also get to meet and be in community with a global group of values-driven individuals and join conversations and get feedback on situations in your work like hiring or marketing and in your life, like voting with your dollars or the messy middle of moving or online dating.

Learn more at https://pauseontheplay.com/community