The more I focused on decolonizing my classroom and speaking about balance and equity to others, the more pushback I received. And the more that I mentored students grateful for seeing themselves in the lessons and readings, the harder I worked to expand where they could see themselves on campus. This took a toll on my body and my mind. Change couldn't keep up with the actual needs of BIPOC, queer, and disabled students, and sometimes necessary change was refused. Then one summer, I attended a book group my community hosted on leadership in our communities. One discussion reminded me that sometimes we cannot change the system from within, especially when the system's foundation isn't Good-Minded.

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This is erasure at a deep level that will take time to illuminate and change for the better. Quick fixes and band-aids will not work. Large, general changes will not increase justice work, but rather dilute it. I believe strongly that we can all work together to communicate better and collaborate on how to rebuild systems individually one organization at a time and one person at a time. So I carved a new pathway and began to grow a business centered on culturally sustaining practices structured from the foundation to the support trusses. I could then instill the Good Mind throughout everything that I do and from there teach sustainability of connection in the workplace and in academia to others. I have not left teaching, I am adding on to where I make deep changes. My teaching background as a BIPOC woman makes me uniquely qualified to train and mentor others in this important work.

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We can better institutions by not simply checking a "diversity" box, and instead by fully engaging all programming with supportive justice and relationality. I use the Good Mind to restructure your institution through knowledge and relationship building--ways that offer stronger and safer spaces for everyone.

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I live what I teach. Modeling diversity and inclusion does not end for me once I leave work. I extend the care and the ability to listen to others to those I interact with daily, with how I spend my time in volunteer work and work within my community, and with how I speak to friends and family. I choose my activities based on how I find balance in my own life, but also consider a service-driven life. I strongly believe that if we carry out our Good-Minded ways in our every day, we become stronger each year at evolving and growing how we understand differences. It is with this philosophy that I develop my training , workshops, and mentoring.

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In my spare time, I garden, walk my dog on the beach, and write Indigenous Futurism novels imagining the better worlds I hope to build right here that I so strongly believe are just within reach.