13. The Spread Sunshine Gang: Part Two

Here we talk about everything Grief , hope , illness , work , family tragedy , possibilities , fun stuff and not so fun stuff . It's all on the table . Let's take a look at our lives and work to Heal Grow together . I'm so glad you're here .

So last week I talked about how my nonprofit , the Spread Sunshine Gang , started and how awesome it was for a very , very , very long time , and this week I'm going to talk about why we are currently inactive . Maybe we will always be inactive , like maybe this is it , i'm not sure . Maybe we're just inactive for a little bit . I just don't know yet .

So I was doing a show . As you know , i'm also a musical theater performer , or maybe you didn't know that . So there you go . That's possibly some new information for you And I had been doing two contracts back to back , working for about two years , which is wonderful , like that's the dream , right ?

And I was just getting a little bit burnt out , so I decided to take a break . Now , keep in mind that this was February of 2020 . That the show closed and I decided I was going to take a little bit of a break And I was going to focus all of my energies on the Spread Sunshine Gang .

I had even started paying myself a little bit of money , which was awesome , and so I had not just I . I have staff of volunteers .

We had decided on our programming for like the next , i would say , nine months , and then , as you all know , covid hits in March of 2020 , which , of course , i was absolutely one of those people that thought that COVID was going to last for like two weeks . Oops , i guess I was wrong about that .

Anyway , covid hit and we scrambled and we turned a lot of our events into virtual events , and then , in May , george Floyd was murdered here in Minneapolis , and if you're not from around this area , it was horrible . You know this man is brutally murdered by the police Because it's COVID .

You know , everything's really kind of quiet here And then , and then George Floyd happens and gosh . I'm a little emotional about that , as I should be . What ended up happening here is that , amidst all this unnecessary trauma , our communities pulled together , and that's not something that I think was focused on in the media , but everyone was united .

It certainly felt that way , to me at least . Maybe it's just because of the people I associate with . People were united in their anger , of course , but also in their how can we help out ? There were many riots , in Minneapolis specifically . Businesses burned down , homes burned down , and people got into action .

So there were plenty of opportunities for everyone , including the spread sunshine gang , to get involved and to help out . And you know , people showed up all over .

People showed up to help because they were able , because they had the time , because it was COVID , and so I just saw organizations , people , individuals , churches , just everyone come together to help support other people , to help lift up our communities And , in spite of the reasons why George Floyd and COVID it was really beautiful to see people show up And the

spread sunshine gang was happily inundated with people who wanted to help . I mean , it was amazing . It was like how can we help ? And all of a sudden it turned into we heard that this place needs this . Okay , let's send five people over there to do this . Oh , this place needs this . At the same time , okay , let's send three people over there .

I mean , it was just like incredible to be able to help . And you know , if the spread sunshine gang couldn't help with something specific , there were so many other ways that people were helping that I could say we can't help you , but you can go to these three other places . It was just I don't really know how to describe it .

I mean , it was awful because of what was happening And it was beautiful because everyone was available to help . It was just incredible . And when that's sort of cooled down a little bit , there became a time and it took several months , but there became a time where the communities that were in the most dire need were not in need anymore .

And so , when that all cooled off a little bit the spread sunshine gang , the staff we decided to start something called an ambassador program , which meant that we had , instead of just making a call out for any volunteers to show up , we had specific people that we called on and we said okay , you're an ambassador . They had to apply to be an ambassador .

So we knew that they were serious about their commitment And you know , so we had . We said we have like a list of I don't know 15 , 20 ambassadors and it was so helpful to just be able to call on that group of people and say , okay , we have this event coming up , can any of you come ?

or we're having a food drive , can we drop off a bin at your house and you can do the collecting , and then Nikki will come pick it up , or it was just .

It was incredible And we were really proud of that work And the thought that that is , that everyone would sign on for a calendar year , i think , or maybe it was just a school year , i don't remember , i don't remember . So we had some meetings and stuff and we knew everyone was committed and it just was super great .

And we start the ambassador program and within the first six weeks I couldn't even get a hold of two of the people anymore . Like they just sort of disappeared . I didn't know these people personally . They were people that were on our newsletter list or followed us on social And you know , for whatever reason , they just completely stopped communicating with us .

I want to be really clear before I go on that I hope I'm hopeful I don't come across as shaming people who have their reasons for sort of disappearing and ghosting . Lord knows . I've done that before , especially at a party . I will not say goodbye to you at your party , sorry , i will just leave , but I will text you and say I had a good time .

So I don't want to sound like I'm shaming people , but I do want to tell the truth of this process . So we miss the two of them And slowly , as the year goes on , we start losing more and more people And No explanations , no explanations at all . For a while I was very concerned about one person in particular who just was gone And it just happened .

Throughout the year More and more people dropped but didn't tell us that they were dropping And I started to even a couple times . The staff didn't respond to stuff and I just was like okay , we are burned , we're burned out . Volunteer burnout is like a real thing And I guess people were feeling it .

I mean I have to assume that right , but I don't really know that because people didn't like tell me No , like I'm sorry , i can't do this anymore or I have too much going on , just radio silence , which I actually for a while .

This just tells you a little bit something about me that I took some of it personally , because I thought , wow , i really thought that we've created this environment where you can be open and honest and just say I'm sorry , i can't do this anymore .

But no one said that And , to be fair , this wasn't everybody , but I would say it was at least half half of our group And I realized that , you know , running the organization wasn't really fun anymore . It had become this job that I thought that I'd wanted .

But once I had it I realized it's just a lot of work for our tiny little staff of volunteers And I also just didn't have the desire to find more people because I was sort of afraid that people might ghost us again .

And then I realized that I have been sick for a while which I understand , i keep teasing on the podcast , but I will actually talk about it But that I you know my health wasn't wasn't good And that I was giving my all to this organization And I wanted to do that . Let me be clear , i'm not blaming anyone or anything .

I wanted to give my all to this organization No one was making me And I loved it so much . But it just wasn't sustainable anymore And so we've slowly stopped doing events . We haven't done anything since November of 2022 . And there's a part of me that is really , really sad about this And there's a part of me that is okay letting it go .

So right now we're in limbo . I'm not ready to be done with it , but I'm also not planning anything for the future . I don't really know what I want . I can't decide like , do I want someone to take take it over ? And I just waiting for myself to get motivated again .

I'm very unsure of of my feelings , but there are a couple of takeaways for me at this moment . It's that I had an idea And I just started . I had no skills to back it up . I had no business plan , nothing . I just thought it was a good idea .

And then I shared it with other people and other people thought that it was a good idea and they came on board And together we created something really spectacular .

And then we turned it into a nonprofit and we did good work for our communities , which ended up being good work for ourselves , and it was so joyful and so affirming that you can create an entire business out of an idea . And my other takeaway that it's okay to let something run its course . It's okay to change your mind .

It's okay that something that once gave you joy is now sucking the joy out of you and you can stop doing the things that are sucking the joy out of you . You can just stop and say thank you for this experience , thank you for this opportunity .

I'm so grateful for everything that has been , and now it's time for me to move on , and so if the spread sunshine gang is supposed to keep going , either with me or with someone else at the helm , then it's going to keep going , and if it's supposed to stop , it will stop .

The answer is going to become clear at some point , but I am really bleeping proud of what we all did together . I really am so proud of all of us for what we accomplished . If you liked this episode , will you please share it with a friend ? Next week I'm going to read something from my book , so grab your copy so that you can follow along .

The link to purchase my book is in the show notes . Thanks so much for listening . Thank you so much for healing and growing with me today . I'll see you soon . This podcast is for informational purposes only and should not be considered legal , health or professional advice .

I am not responsible for any losses , damages or liabilities that may arise from the use of this podcast . This podcast is not intended to replace professional medical advice .