Being a Systems Doula with Stephanie Kimou

Featuring: Stephanie Kimou, Director, PopWorks Africa and Co-Founder, Black Doula Project

English [00:00:01] We can't fix the world alone. But collaborating isn't easy. And systems are allergic to change. So how do we do it without losing our damn minds?

Jeff [00:00:11] That's what we're here to find out.

English [00:00:14] I'm English. Saul.

Jeff [00:00:16] I'm Jeff Walker. Welcome to System Catalyst, the podcast that cracks the code for making the world a better place. Hey, English. .

English [00:00:29] Hey, Jeff.

Jeff [00:00:30] Great to see you. Well, guess what I did.

Jeff [00:00:34] Tell me.

Jeff [00:00:34] I went and saw a pink concert. It was my granddaughter's first concert ever. She's seven years old, and we brought my daughter, her mom and my wife. And so we were all wearing pink, and we went to see pink. It reminded me of my first concert when I was on my cell, the Allman Brothers, in 1972. So 50 years, you know, back to back, so curious English, you know, have you been to a concert recently? And you had that that amazing feeling.

English [00:01:02] Number one. Do you have pictures of you dressed in pink? Because please send. And yes, I did. Back in August I got to go to the Eras tour, the Taylor Swift Show in LA. And it was it was spectacular.

Jeff [00:01:19] But English. I hate to say it, you don't really sound like Taylor Swift, but you do sound like Miley Cyrus. What's going on there?

English [00:01:25] God, I wish I sounded like Taylor Swift. Wouldn't that be the greatest? Yeah. I don't know my voice. I just I think that's the weather changing. My voice sounded like this, actually, when I recorded this episode. When. So, yeah, I don't know, maybe I'm going to go try to get a record deal one of these days, because now I've got this sort of Miley Janis Joplin thing going.

Jeff [00:01:45] Well, aren't we all a little bit of a a musician at heart as we're catalysts, you know, and it's to me and what they do with the audience, you know, here you go. 70,000 people with Taylor Swift. And she has them all singing together and all aligned and all in the moment and, and loving each other. And can you can imagine if, if all our catalyst had those skills and those powers and I think you you may have one coming up. So, let's hear about that.

English [00:02:11] Well, very nicely done, Jeff. You set me up perfectly to introduce this amazing, amazing guest. Our guest today is is Stephanie Keyamo, and she's the director of Pop Works Africa and the co-founder of the Black Doula Project. And Stephanie has just been an amazing, you know, friend, colleague, mentor to me for such a long time. And I'm just I'm really excited for y'all to hear this episode.

Jeff [00:02:38] Well, tell me what you learned from her. Pop Works Africa, but you know what she's doing and applies to everybody and everywhere, right?

English [00:02:44] I mean, completely so, you know, Pop Works Africa specifically- what they do is they really go into organizations. They run these amazing months long learning journeys that are really designed to find and get rid of racist language, to really start to understand what it means to be anti-racist. And I think that, you know, you really be shocked at how much they find and they really bring to bear, especially with organizations that we work with, like within the global South and really trying to stir change. And, I will say that this episode. You know, we do talk tactically about what that looks like, but we also relate things up to a much higher level, some broader changes that we'd like to see in the world of philanthropy.

Jeff [00:03:34] Sounds like an example of, the movement to go proximate. So if you're doing work in Africa, get Africans to be involved and doing the work. If you're having someone who's suffering and maternal health, get mothers to help you work on these kinds of issues. Right. Going going local is possible. Is that fair?

English [00:03:51] Well, absolutely. And I think what you're going to hear today from Stephanie is that she wears so many hats. Being really understanding and inside the world of philanthropy, you know, being in this world of also an activist. She's a self-proclaimed witch, which you'll hear a lot more about in the episode. There's a lot of magic going on and just really excited to sort of connect these dots and sort of tell the story of what's happening now. But also what could the future be, especially if we just all use a little bit more magic.

Jeff [00:04:27] We need a little more magic in the world. Awesome.

English [00:04:29] Let's do it, guys. Take a listen to Stephanie Kino.

Stephanie [00:04:37] So our science. Let's begin our science. English.

English [00:04:41] Let's start right now. Okay. So on that note, can we start off talking about how you have just now put on your Instagram that you're a, witch.

Stephanie [00:04:53] I did put on Instagram, that I'm a witch, and I put that probably a year ago because just so many ways I feel like I get to manifest and call my ancestors and call spirit in. Call myself my own divinity, and to really manifest what I want for myself and for my community, which is resources for liberation, whatever that looks like for all of us. So I'm a witchy, witchy woman, witchy Aries.

English [00:05:25] I love that. I tell my kids I'm a witch, and now they they've started telling their friend and teacher at school that I'm a witch. And also they're very aware that, like, you know, the last couple of years, I got my PhD. So they're like, my mom is a doctor and she's a witch. She's a witch doctor. So now I have a third grade teacher texting me, being like, so you're witch darling, what do you do for a living? Like I'm a little confused and I'm like, you know what, I don't know. So from the knowledge.

Stephanie [00:06:04] Of my dream, my dream job, a witch doctor, you are a witch doctor, a PhD in this political climate. So good for you.

English [00:06:14] I'm excited for us to take this moment to, number one, talk about all of the amazing. Systems change efforts that you've been a part of, from Pop Works to Black Dial a project. But I also really want to bring in some of the very real and important conversations that you and I have had the privilege to have over the last couple of years around. You know, the efforts of changing systems, the efforts of presenting the emerging future of liberation, and what it means for a white woman to be working with a black woman to do that and do that in a real, authentic way and think through. How does race factor into this? How does white privilege factor into this, especially when we're talking about philanthropy and how philanthropy can be a catalyst for positive change, and how it can also pose a lot of negative externalities that you and I've had very real conversations about.

Stephanie [00:07:17] First of all, I love the concept of this podcast. I was listening to the girl track episode Another Amazing Black Woman led for Black Woman by Black Woman institution that is saving lives in ways that feel accessible and community oriented.

English [00:07:38] Hey everybody! If you want to listen to this episode from season one, please follow the link in the show notes.

Stephanie [00:07:46] Systems changes for me always have to happen, because I've never encountered a system that felt nourishing for me. Going through the immigration system coming from Cote d'Ivoire was definitely not a nourishing system going through, you know, public health system when I was pregnant with my child, not a nourishing system going through the university system, the higher education system, one of the most traumatic processes of my life to get my masters. And so I've never encountered again systems that have benefited me on site. When I put my ten toes down, it was ready to welcome and nurture and nourish a black immigrant mother, which, you know. And so systems change for me is a constant process. I'm always in real time editing systems and spaces so I can feel more comfortable in them. And to have a podcast that is elevating how we each do it on an interpersonal level. On a structural level, I love it. So thank you for having me on and I think you are such a good host for this. Also because you have such 1000 foot view of different systems that someone like me is not privy to. You know, when you talk about philanthropy being useful. I don't want to use that as a blanket term. I don't want us to, like, have that be our starting point, because philanthropy can only be used for when the philanthropists are truly part of the ecosystem, the communities they're seeking to serve.

English [00:09:40] What Stephanie just said sounds obvious, right? If a nonprofit or some other organization wants to help a community, it should at the very least understand that group of people and ideally be part of it. But that's hard to do when many people running these organizations are white, wealthy, and live far away.

Stephanie [00:10:02] I really do navigate the world, not experiencing the most welcoming circumstances as a dark skinned, bald head, black woman, you know, immigrant again in DC. And so I feel like I'm always trying to think about the different modalities that we can world build on our own individual and community levels. And so when you enter the world and you keep meeting systems that are not working for you, you have to start world building. And so for Pop Works Africa, I had to create Pop Works Africa because I was really tired of being the only black African person on the international development staff or board or space being tokenized, having to listen to people speak about African people in a certain way, because we were all in DC and they were so far away and they were the beneficiaries of the intervention. I have so many horror stories from a lot of white women, honestly and in international development that have that pushed me out of working at Angola. I have been running Pop Works since 2017, and I started it because I thought there was a way we could approach international development interventions from a place of humility and understanding of trauma, and letting those things be fuel for solution building, radical collaboration. And I never felt that in the international development systems, the philanthropic systems I was entering. And so I said, you know, I don't want to, as my therapist says, I could feel better about this. I could feel better about working in international development if I can create my own way of working. And so that's why I started Pop Works. I started Black Doula Project because doulas felt like a luxury for a lot of black people. I knew, and I didn't know a lot of black birthing people who were wanting and willing and had the means to pay for birth and postpartum doulas. And so again, I turned to world building, as most black women do, as the women and girl track did as well. And I said, I'm going to fund for my community. And so we've been funding. Am I allowed to curse on this?

English [00:12:35] I think we can't. Yeah. I think you need to speak to speak your truth.

Stephanie [00:12:38] Speak my truth chat. Okay. So both of those kind of entities, Black Doula Project and Pop Works, are both created to try to make the world a softer landing space for black women and girls and femmes and and queer people. That's really my ethos. You know, you've sat with me for hours at this point and really understood why I am so passionate about just paying for people's doula fees. That's it. I'll die on that. How can we just pay for their dualities, this small, tiny intervention that so many people are able to do for others? Honestly, so many black women are already doing for each other. But, I really think all of the trauma. And the trust issues that you described with white women. Was the fuel I needed for healing, and I spent a few months near healing after George Floyd was killed. And that led me to a place to understand that for me to be a catalyst or a site for system change, I really have to think about healing myself, focusing on healing my community and be part of different modalities for system change.

English [00:14:07] 70 just for those of us who might not know, can you describe a doula? Yes. Can you just tell us what Warrior Dula is and what they bring to the world?

Stephanie [00:14:16] Doulas are non-medical birth workers who are really called into birthing spaces to ensure that what the birthing person wants to happen happens and they feel safe, they feel nurtured, they feel knowledgeable, and they feel that they know and are conscious of what's going on during their birth. And also, doulas postpartum are there to literally save lives. You know, when I was having my caesarean, my doula was able to support me in checking my incision, holding the baby, helping me with, you know, breastfeeding. And so doulas are really there to usher the baby and the parent into a new relationship. So the Black Doula Project, again, is the fun that black people in DC, Maryland, Virginia can go to and ask themselves, what is the experience I want to have when I'm birthing? And then we fund their their doula directly, whichever tool that they choose. And I think what I've learned from doulas, so many things, English, so many things from I cannot let my definitions impact this person in this moment. If I define pain in one way and they're defining in another way, that can be catastrophic in a birth. Right? And so my definitions of what's good, painful, right, wrong have no space in a birthing area. The only definitions that matter are the person is the person doing the laborious work of birthing this human into the world. I learned that keeping information from people you care about to protect them is never a protection. Keeping information from a birthing person about their health that you may, as a doula, have heard from a doctor. Another catastrophic way to ruin the birthing space. Trust the vulnerability. But the thing that I learned so much as somebody who has worked very hard on the continent of Africa, in the diaspora to support people, is that the work of birthing a child is going to happen whether I'm in the room or not, as a doula. And it really took me back to my NGO work, where I traveled all over Africa. I think I count, and it's up to like almost 30 something countries, you know, doing a lot of white people. I really thought, and this is the indoctrination of white supremacy, but I really thought I was so important that when I left, the war might not happen anymore, or if I wasn't there, you know, to do this training on advocacy around family planning, maybe the advocacy wouldn't happen. And it dawned on me during my doula training years later that, the work happens with or without you. You're not even here. You don't even live here. And doulas will say, like, I love this work, but I'm not birthing the child. There's no science that would connect those two. Maybe you need spiritual support, but there's only one person in the birthing room birthing a child. And that connection that I made during my doula training after almost a decade of working in GEOs, it was the point of no return for me. It's when I developed some of my e-learning programs. It's when I started writing a little bit more. It's when I really was like, I want to capture this as an example for other philanthropies, NGO workers, government, you know, civil society. There's so many people who could learn that that's what solidarity could look like.

English [00:18:23] I find this idea fascinating. How can we apply a doulas mentality to philanthropy and systems change? How can we both care for and empower communities the way a doula cares for and empowers women? Well, thankfully, Stephanie has already started doing this in her work to decolonize organizations. Okay, so on that. In that vein, though, what does what really does the decolonization of the philanthropic sector look like?

Stephanie [00:18:55] I think the decolonization of any space is to take away all the ways we want people to be the same as us. I think philanthropy asks so much and so many of us to be the same, to strive to be educated in the same way, speaking the same language with the same accent, with the same career, with the same again education and mannerisms and lexicon of words. Philanthropy and Ingles want us all to be the same. Decolonization is just saying that is not the case. The case is we all have a mission, and we all will be resourced in the ways we need to be to achieve the mission. And so decolonization, for me, as someone who has lived as a black woman and seen black woman do this, these are my ancestors who have decolonize spaces. It makes a lot of sense for philanthropists to seek the counsel and the guidance of the individuals who have been doing it forever, if they have the capacity to share that. But I really do think it's a culture, this future of what if philanthropists could conduct themselves like doulas? It is a future that is battles against capitalism, because doulas also don't believe that they are better because they have more money than the people in front of them. And that's the issue with philanthropy. Yeah, I can fly to Kuala Lumpur and sit criss cross applesauce with them in their communities, but there's still this weird hum that no one wants to talk about. And philanthropy is that when you have money, people see you and treat you like you are more valuable and you can decide who is good enough to receive your your money. It's not a resource that you open up. You ask people to prove their validity again and again. Human beings. So yeah, going back to your quote, the quote of the podcast, the human experience is not in philanthropy. And so I don't know how many resources I can create to try to bring that into the space and try to, you know, create this world where we could really feel like my resources as somebody who is a writer is just as valuable as yours because you have more money than me. And so that's that's the tension.

English [00:21:36] I think that what you're saying is the thing that also keeps me up at night. Right? It's the distance that stands between this moment right now. And the world that we want our children to live in. Through Pop Works and through your work there, has there been successes in those conversations?

Stephanie [00:21:57] I get that question often. Every time I start with a new client, theres like, what are the best practices to decolonize? It's like, oh, everyone's still learning. Everyone's still learning what that looks like for them. And so for me, the first success is any institution saying, we want to interrogate. We are curious. There are very few institutions who are curious if the ways that they're working are racist, are problematic, are colonial like pop works. We usually do 12 to 18 month learning journeys and then, you know, English. You've been a part of my other learning journeys, which are just about a month or so. Yeah, for anybody. But I think that's that's step one. I think starting successes have come in the forms of things that maybe are more optics, declarations, promises, reefs, words. You know, I still consider those reference points. I've seen philanthropic institutions change their rules around what language people can apply to. I've seen philanthropic institutions create RFP platforms, meaning they didn't even have a way for people to say, can I access your funds? They were the ones who had to go directly to the people and choose their exemplars and say, Will you apply to to get my funds? And so to see an institution go from that to we now are, you know, have, a communal decision making structure for how we grant make is it's amazing. And so I think wins might feel micro, but as somebody whose target is always to make things more accessible, it is the tiny things. Like, if you're Kenyan, you can now apply to this in Swahili to access this $20,000. I love to see it. There just needs to be people like that, like me, who are just toiling away at those small like, you know, pegs, because that opens up truly millions of people. Yeah. To that. And it's not a big deal. I mean, I'm being hyperbolic, but that's how I see it. That's how I see the work. If I can create new ways, new strategies, new tactics that will make these rich white people's money more accessible for people who look like me, I'm in that place. I'm in it. I'm in it to win it.

English [00:24:36] Stephanie, I really don't want to stop talking to you. So maybe we'll just off the recording. We'll keep going. I don't know, but this has been amazing. And just for all of our all of our listeners, please check out Black Doula Project. Please check out Pod Works. Please just bring Stephanie into your life because I learned so much from Stephanie and moment by moment and honored to have you on this podcast, and I'm honored to have this conversation with you. So I just want to say thank you so much.

Stephanie [00:25:03] Thank you for having me.

English [00:25:16] That's it for today's show. Please don't forget to subscribe to System Catalysts so you don't miss out on a new episode. Also, do us a huge favor by rating our podcast and leaving us a review. Thank you all so much for joining us, and we'll catch you all in the next episode. Before we go, we'd like to thank our producers at human Group media. We'd also like to thank our incredible network of partners who are supporting our mission the School Foundation, the Aspen Institute, Echo and Green, DRK Foundation, Maverick Collective, Virgin Unite. Charlize Theron Africa Outreach Project, Boldly Go philanthropy scenarios for Global Nexus and new profit. If you are interested in becoming a system catalyst and would like to learn more about our partners, please visit Systemcatalysts.com.