336. Bekah's Story: From Burnout to Radical Healing - Bekah Giacomantonio

This episode is part of our Mental Health Week series. Explore all the episodes, find resources + more at weareforgood.com/mentalhealth.

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Overview

Meet Bekah. She’s a self-proclaimed nonprofit dropout and founder of the Interdependence Incubator, a community for white women who crave healing and a space to practice freedom. She’s made us a believer in the power of leaning into healing and making a collective change. She courageously shares her mental health journey in nonprofit and the change it awakened in personal, interpersonal and systemic levels.

💡Learn

Bekah’s mental health journey story
Slowing down as self- & community-care
Advice for leaders looking to foster a culture of balance & well-being
Adopting a curiosity mindset to be “medicine in these fractured and fracturing times”

Today’s Guest

Bekah Giacomantonio, Liberatory Healing Doula & Facilitator

“You can’t lead a community to healing from a broken place.”

— Bekah Giacomantonio

Episode Transcript

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Episode Highlights

Bekah’s story and journey to where she is today (3:00)
Bekah’s personal mental health story and what she experienced in the nonprofit sector (10:20)
Signals of burnout Bekah experienced (18:00)
What Bekah learned in community in Guatemala (22:45)
What slowing down looks like (28:05)
Activation (34:45)
Fostering a culture of wellbeing (41:15)
A powerful moment of philanthropy in Bekah’s life (43:25)
Bekah’s One Good Thing: Go outside. (46:35)

Powerful quotes

“We are human beings and we are in networks. Our emotional wellbeing is so deeply entrenched in the people around us, but also my wellbeing and mental health and emotional agility comes through intergenerationally.” -Bekah

“When you have a nervous breakdown you don’t just slow down, you stop.” -Bekah

“If I’m moving so fast, I can’t actually see you.” -Bekah

“What if for just an hour you lived at .75 speed?” -Bekah

“You can’t lead a community to healing from a broken place.” -Bekah

“The individualist culture we are living in is not surviving.” -Bekah

“We are individuals in a collective.” -Bekah

“There was so much that I did in that time when I was trying to “save the world”, out of my best interest, out of my best intention, because I was on autopilot and wasn’t feeling anything.” -Bekah

“I’m constantly returning to this idea that none of us are free until all of us are free. We need you to be your whole part of this whole. You can only get whole in connection with other people so let's work through this together.” -Bekah

“Belong to yourself first and get the support you need so that you can foster this community of belonging in integrity.” -Bekah

“Every good idea or piece of knowledge that I've had has started because I was hugging a tree, or swimming in the ocean, or just looking out my window at the birds, and really taking the time to slow down again.” -Bekah