Cancer Made Her Leave Law to Save 8,000 Kids - CHRIS 180 CEO Cati Stone

[0:00]  [music] Welcome back to another episode here on the Heart and Hustle podcast. Today's guest, they actually told us she might not make it and that's when she decided I was not playing small anymore. So Katie, I appreciate you coming in here. When you heard the words you have cancer, what belief about your life broke instantly and what was the belief that actually took its place?

[0:33]  Oh my gosh, the belief that broke was just the idea that there you could rely on anything and including your own body. Um, but I didn't I didn't change my life. I just said what is what's going to come from this experience and how can I come out of it healthier, happier human being? And that's what I did. You know what I love about most and I've been talking to a lot of leaders is how someone like yourself not only overcomes caner right and beats it but you you were in the nonprofit space you actually were in the courtroom and when I talk to other leaders I say hey there's leaders that are actually leaving the courtrooms I mean I've heard judges I've heard you that say hey I have a bigger purpose and it's not putting people away it's really helping people before they get to the courtroom. Um, was that the really the change to get you into more of the giving nonprofit space or how did that all come about?

[1:22]  Yeah. Well, you do a lot of soulsearching when you're in the chair having chemo for, you know, three months. Um, and I just started to think about what really made me the most happy in terms of how I spent my time outside of my family because obviously family always comes first, but it was all the nonprofit work I had done starting back when I was in high school through college, law school, all the way through. And I really just felt like that's where my heart was. And I'd never considered it as a career option. I'm not sure why. But I used that experience to say, if that's really what gets me out of bed in the morning is helping other people, how can I do that full-time? And I just jumped right in.

[1:59]  What did you feel? You felt freedom? You felt fear? Did you feel both? I mean, a hard decision to just walk away from that. I mean, two careers really. You had a one career that was probably great. There was a lot of money. I always say the paycheck, but then you decided to chase purpose.

[2:12]  For sure. Well, chasing purpose is always a little hard and there's fear associated with that for sure. But for me, it was about can I do it? Do I have transferable skills? I mean, things you just start to doubt yourself. And there are enough people out there that'll doubt you for you. You really shouldn't be doing that for yourself. And I just said, I'm going to use this experience as a great excuse to try this out and I'm going to believe in myself and let's do it. And it worked out.

[2:37]  And how long has it been now? Oh my gosh, that was It's been 12 years in the nonprofit world.

[2:43]  And never regret not making the decision, huh?

[2:45]  No. I mean, there's certainly things about my law career that I miss, but I don't miss arguing for a living. I can tell you that. [laughter] Um, and it was great training for the work that I'm doing now. So, I don't regret a moment that I spent with my legal career, but I certainly get so much more out of the nonprofit world from a career standpoint, and just fills your bucket every day.

[3:05]  I love it. I I you know you mentioned a little earlier that you didn't know it was a career and I don't think a lot of people know that you can get into the nonprofit space and really make it a career. So that now that I work with the you know high school students I always say like there's opportunity in the nonprofit world. I mean especially nowadays with our young leaders being so creative, so passion driven to go and change the world. Like why do they not get into the space? And it's really because we don't ever talk about it. We don't say go to college and learn nonprofit, but there's so many people that get into the nonprofit space and just are excited and truly make it a career. If you had to speak to a young leader that is kind of saying nonprofit, like why? What is what your why behind that?

[3:43]  Yeah. Well, I mean, first of all, the using the term nonprofit is really just how we talk about our tax status. I mean, nonprofits are highly complex businesses just like other private businesses and you can learn an awful lot in from an experience with a nonprofit organization. So, one, we need to talk to people about that, but two, it's all about combining that passion for helping others with the passion you have for supporting your own learning and development. And you really can do both of those things in the nonprofit world. It just feels good every day. And you meet incredible people who really just want to open their hearts to the world. And it's hard to replace that in the corporate environment.

[4:22]  As you mentioned, it just helps you fill your cup up at night, right? like it truly does when you know that you're making an impact in life and someone's life has been changed or even when you know you're fighting for someone to better their lives as you mentioned it's it our lives are so um it's not up to us when when life ends while we here what are we doing with that time and and did you mention I'm in my purpose which led you to Chris 180 is that where you left when you left that career did you get straight into Chris 180

[4:46]  no I actually left my career and went to Susan Gcom and the breast cancer foundation and was there

[4:52]  a long time and then I've been then made the switch to Chris 180 in October of 2024 and it's been a great experience.

[4:58]  What led you to Chris? What was it that decision maker to say, you know what, let me uh kind of move the needle a little bit.

[5:05]  Yeah. Well, my last role at Susan Gman was an incredible role, but it was a national role where I was supporting people with their community health needs from a breast cancer standpoint all across the country. And I would not trade that for the world. But I'm really excited now to be supporting a mental health organization that focuses on mostly the kids, but the youth and the families of metro Atlanta and to see that impact on a smaller geographic um footprint is really nice. And so I'm just really excited to have this opportunity to lean in in this way. And if I'm not mistaken, if my stats are correct, six serving over 6,000 kids. I mean, there has to be a story that really resonates with you and just makes you feel like, man, I'm so happy that I'm here and I'm making this impact within the organization.

[5:50]  Yeah. I mean, in 2024, we served 8,000 individuals, 6,000 of whom happen to be kids. So, we are a mental health organization with a sweet spot for kids. It's kind of how I like to say it. But there's one story just recently that touched my heart so much of a young man that we started working with when he was 12 years old and he was having some challenges in school. But it turns out that he was having challenges with his home life. His mother was um facing some mental health challenges and so the family was homeless from time to time and they would sleep in the park across from his school and we stepped in to help support him. But not just him, the entire family. Worked on housing security for them, of course, mental health support for him and his mom. And he just graduated from high school and he's going to college. And it was so cool because our team was with him and bought him a really great suit to wear to prom. And I have all these photographs of him in his cap and gown. And it's just the coolest thing because yeah, we were there to help support him for sure. But it was about more than him. It was about him. It was about his family. It's about the community. Ultimately, he'll be pushing all this goodness out into the world. And it's this ripple effect of uh goodness that this organization made happen. Now, he made it happen, too. But we did it together. And that's so cool.

[7:10]  Yeah. I It's always great to just have support system, you know, and I I think about um myself in high school, someone that barely graduated, someone that was going through, you know, sex abuse and adoption at home. Um but I had a good support system. It was great teachers. They were great friends um that really just kind of seen the good in me sometime before I even seen the good in myself. Right. And as you mentioned, I I would remember just um helping another friend out as well. So even though I was kind of not that I was a bad kid, right? It's just life was lifing. So I was still helping classmates. So my best friend till today, she did not have a cap and gown and she was, you know, like I I'm graduating but I don't have a cap and gown. My dad's not supporting me. But I went to this teacher to this day that's still school secretary and I says hey this is happening and that school secretary 35 years right now in that school and she says don't worry we'll take care of her and I just see the how people just give just because as you mentioned it's it's just a purpose in life it's a passion now she's leaving 35 years the school system and she's like I don't even know what to do with my life because all I knew to do is to give back and and you're in a sweet spot where not only you giving back but you helping with mental health something that really wasn't a buzzword until pidemic happens. Like why is that so important to you when you talk about mental health and and in our young adults? I think that's really like huge in our in our youth especially because they did experience that co time.

[8:31]  For sure. Well, I mean, if you think about mental health, it's on par with physical health and those two things really have to work together in order to make people as happy and healthy as possible. And you're so right. During COVID, people were for the first time really talking openly about mental health challenges because we were all going through the same thing together. I think maybe is what made that discourse a little bit easier. But our young people, I have a 16-year-old daughter and she talks about mental health challenges all the time with her friends, with her teachers in the school environment, and that's huge because there's no stigma attached to it. Now, I don't know a single person that's not had a mental health challenge throughout their lifetime. I mean, life is hard sometimes and just if we talk about it and feel like we know that we're not alone and that there are resources available for us, that is big. So, it starts with the young people and then they teach us how to do it, you know? I love that.

[9:25]  What are some of the programs that Chris 180 is offering? How do you guys get involved? What does the audience look like so people that are listening can understand what Chris 180 is actually about? Yeah. Well, we are um that first and foremost a mental health organization and we serve everyone in metro Atlanta who needs us. But we do it in several ways. One, we have counseling centers set up around the metro area where you can go in and meet with a therapist right there in person. We do a lot of teleaalth, too. But we also have counselors in 80 schools across the metro area where kids can access a counselor right in their school environment. So, we become a part of that school ecosystem. helping not only the kids but the teachers and the administrators and we help create tools for them so that they can help support the mental health for these kids. But then we also show up in community. So what I like to say is we are where you are and we're out and about partnering with other community organizations. For example, on the west side of Atlanta, there's a really amazing program called the App Promise Centers, which is a community center right in the middle of the community that's accessible for all. and we show up there and are the mental health provider for the community. So, it's all about meeting people where they are. Um, a couple other quick things that we do is foster care and adoption placements, which that's where Chris 180 started 44 years ago. And so, that's really important. Clearly, a mental health support component there. And then we have a drop-in center for homeless youth and a 41 apartment complex where we help kids who are aging out of foster care um create independent living skills and we provide them with safe housing, mental health counseling, again, life coaches, all the things that they need. Um and again, back to that foundation of mental health. We want to make sure everyone has what they need to um get through this life and be happy, healthy.

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[11:49]  You you mentioned something that I'm very familiar with, which is foster home, right? Foster kids. And a lot of times you'll see them aging out um sometimes 17, 18 years old. What does that moment really look like from the eyes of a 17-year-old? A lot of times you hear the story of just walking away with a trash bag of clothes and really nowhere to go.

[12:08]  Yeah. Well, there's a lot of fear associated with it for sure. And

[12:12]  um the idea is to make sure that we start working with these individuals when they're 15, 16 to start creating their path for the future. But think about it. I mean, your guardian is the state. And what must that feel like? There are a lot of mental health challenges and traumainformed um modalities that we can step in to help support these kids with, but it's all about setting them up for success into the future. And I'm so proud of the work that Chris 180 does there because it's this wraparound care. It's how can we help you get a job? Well, first of all, what do you want to do with your life and how can we be there to help you do just that? uh because we know at least in Georgia about 20% of kids that are aging out of foster care at age 18 wind up homeless within the first six months and that's not okay. So we have to make sure that we and the full community are there to set them up for success

[13:04]  and and really helping those individuals feel seen, right? A lot of times

[13:09]  you know a lot of times the hardest part is watching someone go unseen and for a very long time. I mean I think I even experienced that as someone that was adopted is feeling that unseen. But the most beautiful part is when you finally are they're seeing themselves, right? Like uh when you think about that, how does that make you feel? And what are some of the things that you guys work on to just kind of get into that point where maybe they didn't feel seen but now they feel seen and as you mentioned we now have a young kid. I think you mentioned he was what you guys 12 14 years old and now he's graduating because he felt seen. He was seeing himself. He realized, oh, there is actually something within me.

[13:41]  Yeah. Well, I mean mostly it starts with being really clear and one-on-one with them saying you matter and making sure that they know that they matter and then creating this plan for their future together. are obviously they're in the driver's seat, but we're there to help put those pieces together for them. So, you know, if you have to dream big, but you have to know that you've got a support system behind you that allows those dreams to come true. And that's really where um we step in. And it's not just us. There's a whole ecosystem of organizations in Atlanta that are stepping in to provide those pieces. Um sometimes we're just helping kind of orchestrate, you know, the man behind the curtain, as they say. Are you are you I'm guessing you're the man behind the curtain that people probably don't see, right? You're you're a lot of times are you still working the front line? Is that something that you're still passionate about? I know a lot of times when great leaders and I'm can imagine yourself don't like to just hold the title. Like I want to get involved because I didn't get here for the title. I just happen to have a title and I'll take it. But I really just want to lead and make sure that our our youth um and our community is being impacted. Is that correct?

[14:44]  Yeah. I mean, title Schmidt, that's kind of how I feel about it. Um, and when I introduce myself to anyone, I'm always like, "My name is Katie and I'm I work with Crystal Wood. It doesn't matter what my title is." Um, but I'm loving being in this space because this mental health space and learning so much more about our systems for adoption and foster care and independent living, it's new to me, so my mind is expanding every day. Um, but it's also about making sure that these kids are being supported by the experts. So those who have this trauma-informed training, which um frankly that's not me. So I'm the wind beneath the wings of our frontline case workers who are doing this work every day.

[15:22]  Katie, I appreciate it. And and for someone like yourself that continues to have a grind, something that we glamorize a lot, right? But you choose really, as we mentioned a little bit earlier, you choose purpose over paycheck any day. Yeah.

[15:33]  What does success actually used to mean to you? And how do you even define it now that you're in this role and in the nonprofit role for so long?

[15:39]  I don't know if success the the definition for me has changed all that much. It's just the feeling that you get from this more purpose-driven work. For me, I've been a lifelong learner. I'm a generalist, so I like to know a little bit about a lot of things. And when I was practicing law, I was able to do that. And it was incredible to be able to see those things. um learn a little bit about something that you never would have thought you would have known before, put that into practice, and then move on to the next case. Here though, it's a little bit more of a lifelong learning in a space that really can drive impact in a very different way. In the courtroom, sometimes it was about dollars and cents because I did defense work for multi-billion dollar companies. Great work, great learning, but I don't know how great it felt on the inside. I wasn't really helping individuals. Now the work that we're doing even the things that are you know annoying like the paperwork or that kind of things has a purpose to then impact the life of someone uh someone that we really care about and that's I mean that just feels good. So to me success remains the same. I want to be successful. I want to keep learning. I want to push out goodness into this world. But I'm it's just so much more palpable now to see that impact when I'm doing this purpose- driven work to use your terminology here in the nonprofit world.

[16:58]  I love it. And the last time that we spoke, which I think it's really good, some people have to hit Brock Bodin to make changes. You said, "Don't wait for a lifealtering moment to choose meaning." I mean, your exact words, but why do so many of us need that earthquake or, you know, the uh falling on our behinds to really make the move? I think there's just a lot of fear involved. People don't like change. My daddy will tell you that nobody likes change other than a wet baby. Um, and some people, you know, move through change more easily. But making bold changes are it's just hard no matter what stage of your life that you were in. And sometimes I think you go through something like for me it was a cancer diagnosis that gives you that excuse to do it. But if we could all just figure out how to make the change we need and we know we need to make in our lives right now, even small things, how much better would this world be? So that's always my challenge for everyone. I mean, it could just be a tiny little thing that you change that puts you on that path to just being a happier person. And I just wish we would all do that for ourselves and then encourage others to do it, too.

[18:01]  And you come across it. The first time I met you, you had a big smile on your face. Today, the first thing I see was a big smile on your face. Like truly happy, you know? It's because purpose driven. I'm not sitting here just collecting a paycheck. You mentioned something a little bit earlier which is um doing like admin the repetitive task. A lot of people are looking for AI to actually take care of those repetitive tasks that admin work so we can actually do more work of the things that we we love to do. Are you guys already looking or dipping your toe in AI when it comes to how do we continue to do what we love but just also help us kind of scale and grow?

[18:33]  Yeah, I mean it's it's funny. I was just at a conference with a lot of other mental health and child serving providers and we talked about AI for a good 45 minutes and how to best use it because we are in the hightouch business but you have I think to to survive and to be as effective as we can be we need to bring in that high tech high tech so that's that high touch high-tech analysis that we have to do um but we've got a lot of privacy concerns we want to make sure that people are coming in to talk to a real person who can help them not talk to a computer, but there are a lot of back-end operations I think that we'll be able to lean into from a paperwork standpoint or from making sure that people are scheduling in the right way, making the best use of the time of our clinicians, those kinds of things. But it's going to take a little bit of time in the mental health space, I think, for us to figure out how to do that because it's so precious the work that we're doing and we want to make sure that we get it right.

[19:28]  I love it. Are you using any AI now? chat GPT uh co-pilot, any of those things?

[19:34]  Yeah. Okay. So, just yesterday I made on ChatGBT the most amazing picture of my dog um as a prince with the crown and the the gorgeous u robe and everything. But in terms of workrelated, which I know is more likely what you're asking about, I I do use it a lot. I'm an English major at heart, so I I like to write my own things, but I often put things in a chat GBT and say, "Eedit this for brevity and clarity because I want to make sure that what I'm pushing out is clear and short." Um, and that we get to the point, but I'm still learning the best use cases and the prompts. I mean, you really have to understand how to prompt AI to get out what you need. Um, but I'm I'm on the learning curve for sure.

[20:14]  So, what was the prompt for the dog? the dog. [laughter] I uploaded an amazing picture of him and I said, "Make him look regal with a with a crown." Um, and then one picture popped out and it made him look too stocky and I said, "Let's lean him out a little bit."

[20:31]  I don't I don't know. I was just playing around with it, but I I'll I'll send you offline a picture because it's pretty incredible.

[20:37]  No, that's cool. I I love, you know, when I see stuff like that, like the images that it make, it's the funniest thing. Sometimes like I'll have an image of myself in there and then it'll try to pop out a different image and it's not me and I'll show my wife and she's like, "Oh my god, that is not you." And I'm like, "This is too funny." Cuz it's not always accurate, right? But when it comes to like dogs, it could be more accurate just because it's a dog, you know, right? It's a human.

[20:58]  Well, I put in one not that long ago. Um, we were having a rock paper scissors tournament as part of our all staff meeting and I wanted a graphic for it and it gave me a graphic of people people playing rock paper scissors but they all had either six or seven fingers in each hand [clears throat] like it was crazy. [laughter]

[21:14]  Yeah, that's one of those things man you got to be very mindful. I I still think that people What's really funny is that I can tell when people use chat GPT

[21:21]  when they send me things, right? And I'm like, "Oh my god, this is so chat GPT." And and I'm like, "We have to understand to still put it on words as you mentioned. I'll put it in there, but I still have to make it myself. I still have to even after they gave me something, I still have to tweak. You can't just copy and paste. But I love you also mentioned prop. So for those that are thinking about AI and haven't utilized AI, prompting is everything. If you want something out of it, you got to make sure you've given it exactly what you need to get out of it. And sometime it is talking it, you know, for some time. I love I love now what I've done is the text to speech. I used to type everything out, but now I just text to speech because why sit here and type a whole paragraph at times because sometimes it is a paragraph. I need to tell chat DVT something really good. So, I love that you're in it and you're testing it. I think um the nonprofit world is one that has and healthcare world has sat behind when it comes to technology and innovation for so long, but I think there's so many nonprofits that are like AI, this is great. We want to be ahead of the curve and AI is still new like it has been here for a long time. But when we talk about the businesses implementing it, it's just cool that you guys are at least testing the waters and figuring out how does that help us and navigate um just reassurance that everything is actually accurate because a lot of times you could also one of the best things I've actually seen is I I was creating this journal so I was like send putting in these screenshots and it found something that I didn't even notice and it was you know sometimes you add a text it automatically gives you like gibberish. It was like somewhere on the paper, but when you're looking at something over and over and over, you don't see it. But it actually called it out. And I'm like, man, without Chad GPT calling it out, I would have never known. I probably would have published it like that. So, it's really good. It's cool how some people are actually using it.

[22:58]  I think so, too. But we need some private business who has the capital to create these modalities to help then serve the nonprofit world because every dollar that comes in to Chris 180 and our brother and sister nonprofits across the country is really precious and we want to push that out immediately to help people. Um so I'm really hoping that the private community will step up and say we're developing all these tools for our use. We're going to gift this to you nonprofit so that you can help people with it.

[23:26]  I love it. Hey, you never know. you might have just planted a seed here. So, somebody's calling. Somebody's knocking on your door, Katie. I love it. I love that we're talking about it. When we talk about what Chris 180 is doing, what are some of the places that you can find 180? Um, I know you said Atlanta. Is this ole in Atlanta? What is social medias if people wanted to kind of tap into it?

[23:45]  Yeah. I mean, we're our website is chris180.org. And it's chis180.org. and we serve the metro Atlanta community with our direct services, but we also have a really amazing training program where we are able to provide trauma-informed care trainings to people across the country, no matter where you live. And it's one thing to be able to provide amazing care yourself, but we can't provide care to every person that needs it, but we can share the goodness of training with people no matter where they are. And so that's a really exciting thing for us. So, you know, we're we're metro Atlanta based, but we have a much bigger footprint in terms of our ability to support people with their training and learning needs.

[24:27]  That's so good. I can't wait till you guys start to really um expand. And I can see at first hear that you guys were just in Atlanta. All of a sudden, you're in all states. How cool would that be?

[24:38]  That would be cool. Let's do it.

[24:40]  You've seen what Halen really looks up close looks like up close. If every listener just took one action today, what would change the game for a kid at Chris 180?

[24:50]  Well, I mean, obviously every nonprofit, including Chris 180, could use financial contributions in order to make this work possible because if you look at our workforce, we have 250 people that work at Chris 180. 75% of those are folks that are out providing direct care one-on-one for these individuals who need our support. And so, it all goes back to that. But if I had a more sort of metaphysical ask of everybody, it would really just be to think about your own mental health and take care of yourselves, but also take care of those you love. So if you see someone struggling, talk to them about it and let them know that there are resources out there for them. And that resource if you're in the metro area is Chris 180. If you're somewhere else, there are great resources available. And we just have to take better care of our mental health to make sure that we're seeing that in parody with our physical health. I mean, what a better world we would live in if everyone had what they needed to be happy and healthy.

[25:47]  True. I I actually this this this next question is going to be a selfish question for all the leaders that are actually watching and listening. We're in a place right now where it's like, how do we continue to raise funds, right? We all have the typical gallas. Um we have the silent auctions, but some are trying to figure out how to be innovative. Is there anything special that you guys love to do at Chris 180 that you would love to share? because maybe there's a secret that you're like, wait, can't tell you all the secrets. Is there one in particular?

[26:12]  Well, we're really limiting the event space. We know that events for nonprofits will eat you for lunch in terms of how much time and effort it takes to actually put the event on and then reap the benefits from the donations. So, we're scaling back and we're going to do one big event. We have our it's called our crystal ball coming up in August. Um Okay. And it's actually the 25th anniversary of that event. We're really excited about it, but you can only do one event and and otherwise you're taxing your team with so many other things. So, what we're doing mostly is we're going out and about and having a lot of one-on-one conversations with people to talk to them about who Chris 180 is now and what we need in terms of their support. Does that take time? Absolutely it does. But what we're seeing is that having those direct genuine genuine personal conversations is having those ripple effects that we want because then later we'll have another conversation. They'll say, "Oh yeah, we heard from so and so about Chris 180 already." Um, so we're just trying to amplify the message of who we are and do it in that oldfashioned grassroots conversation kind of way.

[27:18]  Funny thing is I'm right with you in line. um uh planning a gala

[27:22]  and we're celebrating 30 years organization, right? So, I'm with you. And then one of the biggest things that I've heard from another leader was like, "Make sure you're at the chamber meetings. Make sure you're at those community meetings." I'm like, "Yeah, why are we not at the chamber?" You know, I recently took over this organization, but as you mentioned, when you show up and you have these conversations, you're building partnership. You're you're building awareness. And then if you come with multiple people of your board now, they see, oh my god, there's there's a lot of them and and they really care. they're passionate about this and that's where we talk about planting seeds and I don't know that enough people do that. They're just kind of waiting, you know, doing these events and expecting that the return just happens. But no, I I love exactly what you're saying. We're having those conversations. We're communicating with them. We're wanting to know um you know, long-term this is going to be a great asset to us and you'll know that by having those conversations. So, I'm with you. The gala is a lot of work. My organization was a little scared. I'm like, we got this. Okay. How long in advance? See, we just started. So we're what the end of June. Ours is in October or sorry early November. So about 6 months planning. Would you say that was enough time? I mean for someone that wants to plan a gala. What is your thoughts? To me is enough time but

[28:29]  well I mean then then great you must be highly efficient and amazing but for us um generally we'll have the event and then a couple weeks later we'll start planning the event for the next year. Um it just takes a lot of time and effort. It's worth it. And then you get the community together and everyone is seeing the impact all together. And there's nothing quite like that feeling when everyone has goosebumps because they they really hear the story that changes everything for them as it relates to why they're a part of that community. Um, so I would never say replace the gayla ever because it's it's awesome. Um, yeah,

[29:04]  but I am like you, looking forward to new and innovative ways to get people involved because with all the change in the world and all the uncertainty and the changes in funding for nonprofits, now is the best time for people to really get involved because their donation now is going to make a such a difference in a way that it may not have um even six months ago. So, we really need everybody open up.

[29:28]  I'm going drop this one. I'm gonna drop this one for you. And this may be like a low hanging fruit. You never know, right? Think about this one. So, what I've done is I realized we don't So, the organization I have is attached to a school. So, it's the Edgewater High School Foundation. So, it's still 501c3's own entity. So, we still work with the school. And I realized there's no alumni merch being sold, right? So, why are we not selling on alumni merch? But I think about your case as well. One of the shirts that I wear, and I should have worn it today, but I I wear it proud. It says adopted across the shirt. Oh, cool.

[29:57]  Because I I love that. I love that. It's a conversation starter, right? Right. So just imagine adapted maybe a QR code on the back or story on the back. Um the mental health, right? How do you make mental health where people can purchase a shirt? I always wear this shirt know your worth and people it's a conversation starter. It allows a great shirt. What do you do? Get it? Or I walked into a Popeye's one time and the guy seen me and yells from the back of the uh line, I know my worth. Yeah. And I'm seeing like I love it. So when you think about like it's it you could do uh drop shipping. So it's not like you have to print it. Just find a site that does everything for you. So, I don't know. I may have just put some in you, but why not? You know, there's young kids that would love to just show that they're adopted. To me, my my neighbor laughs. He's like, "Man, I I didn't realize that you one, you were adopted, but that you just wear it so proudly." I'm like, "Yeah, man." Because when I see another one and another person that was adopted, it's almost like finding a brother and sister. And he's like, "I'm adopted, too." I'm like, "You, too?" It's an exciting thing. For a very long time, as I was growing up, I didn't like to tell people I was adopted. You know, I used to always remember my my my cousin, which I call my sister, would say, "Oh, we this is my cousin. We adopted him." But I'm calling her my sister. So, I hated that terminology. But now, I'm like, "Oh, I don't care." Like, I wear proud and loud. So, I don't know if you do it.

[31:11]  I love this idea. I'm totally into it. But what changed for you? When did you change to being loud and proud about it?

[31:18]  Um, I would say when I was an undercover boss. I was 19, 20 years old and I had the opportunity to be an undercover boss. And that's the first time I really kind of share that story national TV, but realizing how many people actually reached out after the fact and say, "Thank you so much for being the voice of the voiceless, right? Because now we we we have a we are the testimony. I'm I'm a big believer in the stories that we share are testimonies for others." So that's really when it was like, "Oh, I'm cool, you know, let's do it." Other people feel that and they looking at me now. I'm a leader in this space that I got to let them know like it's okay, you know, to to feel um there was so many things I I felt um not wanted, right? I felt like why me? I used to hear things of like I got picked up off the street um or I only got adopted for the money. So all that, you know, I was kind of hearing and it's crazy that, you know, and I shank your head, right? So I speak to my brother. My brother was the one telling me that. It's my older brother and he didn't know the impact he was making until I was like 30 years old and I finally confronted him about it because I wouldn't there was so much animosity I was having towards him. And um I finally, you know, we we started to really build a relationship, but I still felt I had to let him know. And I told him, "Hey, I wanted you to know that there was the time in our lives that you probably thought it was funny, but for me it wasn't." And he said that he's like, "I didn't know realize it was hurting you." I said, "Because you weren't in my shoes. you had your mom, you know, but for me, for when you're talking about pick up off the streets or adopted for the money, that hurt me because I didn't have my mom, you know, and I was always kind of going through this forever. I mean, today, 35 years old, I'm still holding to that thought in my head. So, once I started to hear that, I'm like, I got to be the voice for others and and let them know today someone may be writing your story, but that doesn't mean that's forever, you know? So, I think it was when I actually started to live my own life where I realized what was I actually stressing about the whole time. to me it was a second chance in life you know the way I looked at it so um that's why I wear it so proudly

[33:11]  but that's so cool though I mean but you also saw and recognized that like as a trauma and you understood that why you felt the way that you felt and then how you yourself could change your own mindset um that's one tough

[33:23]  that's just one of the things that Chris that I've really learned about trauma-informed care and the importance of that where you talk to someone and instead of saying what's wrong with you you say what happened to you and how has that trauma affected your life and I don't know I'm I'm really impressed. I mean, you you worked that out on your own, but um not everybody I'm a big believer you said mindset. Mindset is everything. It's it's the way that we see ourselves, believe in ourselves. Um just believe in life, you know, and I I'm a big believer that we're here for reasons. You know, I believe that God has chose his strong ones to go through some of the things that we've go through to continue to share that story. You know, I would remember my wife was going through miscarriages and she'd understand why and she's hurt. And I said, you know what? Maybe one day our daughter will have to go through this and you can actually speak to her from something that you've experienced yourself. And I'm a big believer we experience things so we can help others along the uh the way. And that's just how I look at my life now to the point where I created a 30-day mindset journal for those reasons. And this is more like tailored to seuite executives. Uh but it's affirmations. It's prompts. These are the things that I was telling myself because as you mentioned there's so many things you're going to do in your life that you have to take the leap of faith on and it's not easy at all. It's very very hard but your mindset has to be good as well because if you allow people that negativity that the noise it would allow you to think that you you can't do it. So, I had to shut the noise and and and really just be, you know, I would like to say the horse, you know, how they put blinders on the horse and just be really focus on what that end goal was. So, anybody that's watching that's in the foster um, you know, system or those that may be experiencing um, feeling alone, you're not alone. There's so many people that experience this that are in their minds talking to themselves. People say, "Do you talk to yourself?" You're damn right I do. You're damn right I do. You know, so I I love that you're kind of in this space and it really puts a smile on my face that we have people like yourself that you're not doing this because of a paycheck. You're doing this because you really want to see people's life change and getting your cup filled every day. Yeah. How how cool is that?

[35:29]  It is cool. Who wouldn't want this? I mean, how lucky are we, me, you, so many of us, to be able to do this work? And somebody told me um a really wise man told me the other day, I was challenged myself about something that I needed to do for this job that I didn't know how to do. And he said, 'You know, they hired you for what you know how to do, not for what you don't know how to do. And it resonated with me, not only in the workplace, but also people are around you and want to be friends with you for who you are, not for who you aren't. And I think if we could all like just hold on to that and let go of our insecurities or the things that we allow to hold us back, I mean, we're our own worst enemies sometimes and we don't have to be.

[36:11]  Well, it's funny. I just opened the book today one based off what you just said of the journal and one of the things that it says is I am more than my title. I'm the foundation that built it. But the root of reminder actually is you brought value to the room before they even knew your name. And that was you. You were bringing value to a room before they even knew your name. All right? And a lot of times we don't realize that. Like there's so much value. Just because you went from being in a courtroom to being a nonprofit leader doesn't mean you don't have any value. A lot of times we have so much value because now we come from an outside perspective. And so many times when you're just doing the same thing over and over and over, you get so comfortable. Which is why when we think about building a board in the nonprofit, the best thing I can always advice I give is have business leaders that are from different, you know, uh, careers and have them all at the table because now you are seeing from all different point of views. So I love that. So what you said, you know, those are things that I was telling myself, Katie, for those that really think that is not mindset, it is completely mindset. Like there's more, right? physical, but mental is everything to me. Especially when we're go when we're we're battling something that we think we're battling alone. You have to one drop ego. You have to drop the pride and really tune in to your the mind and allow yourself to think more positive. Talk to yourself more positive. Say things out loud more positive. I'm a big believer what you say out loud, someone's listening. So if you're saying these negative things, you're living in a negative mindset. You'll see negative things happen around your life. I've never seen someone be in a negative mindset and say negative things about themselves and good things happen. Right. So, and and and you've been there. You weren't saying negative things in a life where life was just happening to you. No, you were saying great things. You were happy thoughts, you know, positive attitudes. And here we are today. So, I love it. We can have this conversation forever when it comes to mental health. I'm a big believer mental health mindset is all together. Um, as we we are closing off, can people find you on LinkedIn? What is your LinkedIn? Um, I think you already gave us a website. Are you guys on Instagram, Facebook for people can be able to find you and kind of tap into what you guys are doing as well?

[38:13]  Yeah, we're on Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn for sure. Um, and would love for people to follow us and provide information about what they're struggling with. Um, ideas. I mean, I'm totally into your ideas from earlier today, by the way. You should have kept those for yourself because you may [laughter] we may see some of that happening.

[38:30]  I love it. Listen, I am so excited if you guys do it. Um, a matter of fact, if you do it, I'll be your first person to purchase a shirt. How about that? Let me know. Send me the link and I'm purching a shirt to support.

[38:41]  Amazing.

[38:41]  Um, people love shirts, especially if it's a good shirt that, you know, now when I think of our youth, they're so bold. They don't mind wearing it, you know, and and and it's, if it's fun, if it's, you know, fits well, they don't mind wearing it. Um, if they can support another friend that's in a situation, they don't mind, you know, putting it on. So, yeah, I'm excited for it. If you guys go down that route, uh, let me know. I am buying the first race.

[39:05]  Okay. All right. All right.

[39:07]  So, I give you to the blind question. I have to start wrapping up here. What's one truth about leading with empathy that no, no one really warned you about, but you learned the hard way anyway?

[39:16]  Oh my gosh. Um, leading with empathy, it's just that it's hard. Um, it's hard and you have to meet people where they are. And if you're leading an organization, there's exactly no one there that's exactly like you. So, you really have to make sure that you're meeting them where they are and really think about how to support them. At Chris 180, we work with unbelievable, empathetic, wonderful people who are there to care for people. And as a leader who has to keep an eye on the business, it sometimes changes the way that I deliver a message, for example. Um, whereas I might otherwise talk about it in a very strict business-like term, I got to break it down and talk about how the impact of this decision is going to impact the lives for the better of those we serve. So, I think um that's a mindset change once you come into the nonprofit world. Something to think about.

[40:06]  Okay. All right. And what's your blind question to the next leader we have here on the Heart and Hustle?

[40:10]  Oh my gosh. How are you being bold in the care of yourself?

[40:15]  Oo, okay. Hey, put it back on self. I love it. That's a good question,

[40:20]  Katie. It's been um

[40:22]  it's been great conversation. Sometimes I have these conversation, it just goes too quick. We can do this forever. Um and and we we didn't really tap into I think a lot that we could have, but this is great because people can connect with you on LinkedIn. Um is the same Katie Stone on LinkedIn as well if they wanted to connect.

[40:38]  It's Katie Cat Ti Stone. Um connect with folks and learn from them and continue to learn from you. I got to get my hands on this book.

[40:48]  Oh, I I'll send it to you as well. It's a little journal. It just I think it's sometimes we as leaders, what I realized is that no one has taught us how to pour into ourselves or pouring into others. And that's why I've created this journal because it was me having to pour into myself while truly still coaching others and and helping them scale and speaking to other leaders. And a lot of times we show up like that. We show up helping and and a smile on our faces and in reality we're going 100 miles per hours in our brain and and we're going home asking ourselves what are we doing? Am I even doing the right thing? And these are conversations I had to myself. So, and I'm pretty sure that you can also attest to Yeah, we go through that. Don't look at us as leaders and think that we got it going on and that we're no and don't ever be afraid to have conversations with us. One of the biggest things I heard from someone that I used to think there was no way I can have a conversation. It's like so many successful people are wanting you to ask how do they do it or just ask a questions. They're more they they want to talk to people but it's like that's why I uh funny thing before I let you go. I go to the high school and I dress you know down. I'm not in a button up. I'm just probably long shirt says Edgewater on it. And the principal looks at me because we're doing like senior um awards and we're passing out some scholarships. And he says, "Uh, I can get you a shirt like a polo, a nice polo or anything like that, man, and all this other stuff." And I'm look, you know, just smile just like you did. I look I'm like, "You don't like my outfit?" And he's like, "Oh, I'm just saying." I'm like, "No, man. I feel comfortable actually. I think I'm actually probably more appropriate for the kids this way." You know, and and it is. You don't want to sit here and come across of high and mighty when in reality I want kids to come and have a conversation. And if I dress a certain way, sometimes it actually allows them to feel, man, maybe I shouldn't go to that person, you know, cuz look where they're at. Look where I'm at. When in reality, it's not even the case. So when you say meet them at where they're at, that's part of it. Just meeting them at where they're at. It's being okay. You don't have to come across as a suit and tie type of guy all the time. So

[42:47]  anyway, uh anything else you want to leave the audience before before we head off here?

[42:52]  No, just thank you everybody for making one decision today to make yourself happier. Little decision, big decision, you choose. But I I just want to challenge everybody to think think about what today's decision is that's going to make you happier.

[43:08]  Guys, I appreciate it. Another great leader in the on the hard hustle podcast. My name is Ephrain. This is Katie. We'll catch you guys in the next episode. Latest.