Freedom Dreams in Philanthropy

We had such a timely conversation with Fatima Angeles, MPH, executive director of the Levi Strauss Foundation (Levi Strauss & Co.), about #democracy and its role in the long work of building a future where everyone is included and able to thrive. Listen here: https://lnkd.in/gFHrcEBw #BTVPodcast #Highlights #Philanthropy

We're learning that asking the #question - the one you're afraid to ask because of its almost childlike break from our understood reality, what we think is possible - helps us tap an innate capacity to #dream and begin to identify levers for agency and change. Our conversation with Robin Kelley at the JAMES AND GRACE LEE BOGGS CENTER TO NURTURE COMMUNITY LEADERSHIP underscored for us that asking "what if?" is not only our birthright as humans, but the key to our survival. "The only way we can survive is by asking the right question, and sometimes asking the wrong question, to produce a new question. To ask the question also is to use your imagination; the question is always an abstraction, it’s wondering about something beyond the surface of what you see. Sometimes it's about knowing the interior of a movement, a person, a space that's not evident." #FreedomDreaming #Philanthropy #CollectiveLiberation

We so enjoyed our conversation with Rickke Mananzala, President of New York Foundation, on Becoming the Vision. Hearing about his journey from organizing to philanthropy clarified the importance of #remembering; how it inspires deep solidarity with communities and can gift purpose and direction to leadership in the sector. Listen here: https://lnkd.in/eshriGac #BTVPodcast #Highlights #Philanthropy

We're learning that realizing our collective liberation rests on us #remembering who we are, remembering as an act of resistance, and as a reclaiming of our identity in the face of systems that encourage us to forget. #BlackFeminism #CollectiveLiberation #JustFutures #Philanthropy

When we tell the #truth we risk making a statement, but we also honor who we are, our humanity, and create possibilities for change. #FreedomDreaming #Philanthropy #BlackFeminism #CollectiveLiberation

At the inaugural session of Cultivating Communion, a virtual space for freedom dreaming in philanthropy, we reflected on the wisdom of Harriet Tubman's body. As our speaker Ra Malika Imhotep noted, Harriet's body underscored the importance of #rest and #dreaming, which facilitated visions of our #liberation: “Before emancipation she was getting some longed for rest, and she rose from that rest announcing ‘My people are free! My people are free!’ speaking in the present tense despite still living in the time of enslavement…She had what we would now call narcolepsy; so she would fall into rest at the will of her internal body chemistry. What does it mean that this abolitionist heroine had a body that insisted on rest?”  For more on Ra Malika Imhotep's work: https://lnkd.in/g3yhDwUu #FreedomDreaming #Philanthropy #HarrietTubman #Abolition #CollectiveLiberation

Check out our updated website to learn more about our work, our story, and how to engage: https://lnkd.in/gdHJGU4c #FreedomDreaming #Philanthropy #News

Having a practice around #authenticity in a culture that encourages us to perform keeps us whole, imbues our work with purpose, and inspires shifts in our habits of thought and practice that collectively can reshape our sector in radical ways. Thanks for the reminder, Brenda S. #BTVPodcast #Highlights #Philanthropy #CollectiveLiberation

In conversation at the JAMES AND GRACE LEE BOGGS CENTER TO NURTURE COMMUNITY LEADERSHIP, Robin Kelley affirmed us in our sitting with questions in a sector all about answers and "expertise." We're dreaming about a philanthropy as apt to invest in inquiry and introspection. “Proof of intelligence, knowledge, and success is having an answer, not asking the question. And we are dying because of that. The only way we can survive is by asking the right question, and sometimes asking the wrong question, to produce a new question. To ask the question also is to use your imagination; the question is always an abstraction,  it’s  wondering about something beyond the surface of what you see. Sometimes it's about knowing the interior of a movement, a person, a space that's not evident. I think in terms of the future of philanthropy, if there's such a thing as a freedom dreams oriented philanthropy, it's one that always elevates the question above everything” #FreedomDreaming #Philanthropy #CollectiveLiberation #RacialJustice

This season of Becoming the Vision we set out with the intention to honor the insights and experiences of leaders of color in philanthropy. We trusted that they knew something about how we might make the dream of racial justice and collective liberation a reality; that they could at least point us in the right direction, show us how to move within and think beyond philanthropy as it stands. We started with a simple question: What’s a word that you’re meditating on these days? What we heard—crossroads, sparks, open-heartedness, democracy, remember, inspire—was an emerging roadmap to freedom. Tune in for our closing reflections on these guideposts so generously offered by our guests: https://lnkd.in/gF7g3cSJ #BTVPodcast #Philanthropy #FreedomDreaming