Episode Shownotes:

Last week Lisa talked about the women who stop showing up for you. This week, she’s talking about why YOU don’t stop — even when it’s thankless, even when it costs you friendships, even when you’re exhausted and nobody’s clapping. Inspired by a blog post she read about justice and why some people are wired at a deep level to fight for fairness, Lisa breaks down the difference between ambition and a calling, why women in impact work burn out, and how to build sustainability around the fire inside you.

She also gets into what happens when the people around you feel threatened by your growth, and why their reaction is never about you.

If you’ve ever laid awake thinking about funding, programming, and why the city council still hasn’t emailed you back, this is Part 2 of a two-episode series. Start with Episode 60 if you haven’t heard it yet.

Main Topics Discussed:

• The difference between ambition and a calling, and why it matters for how you build
• Why some women are wired to fight for justice and literally cannot look away from unfairness
• The burnout trap: how “I’ll just do it myself” keeps your impact small
• What happens when people around you feel threatened by your growth
• How the 4 P’s framework turns your calling into something sustainable and scalable

Resources Mentioned in Today’s Episode:

• Impact Build Intensive – Build impact into your business without burning out

Ways to Keep Working with Lisa:

• JOIN MY FREE TELEGRAM COMMUNITY · Where I drop resources, answer questions, and connect with women building impact into their brands and nonprofits. 
• IMPACT BUILD INTENSIVE · 90 minutes, one-on-one. We map your next moves and how to incorporate impact into what you’re already building. You walk away with a plan you can start right away.
• MOMENTUM · Two days one-on-one with me in California wine country. We build your six month strategic roadmap for the brand or nonprofit. 

Connect with Lisa:

• Instagram: @lisathestrategist
• LinkedIn: Lisa M. Avila
• TikTok
• YouTube
• Email: hello@poppygrovellc.com
• Website: www.poppygrovellc.com

Episode Transcript:

Lisa Avila (00:00.15)
Welcome back to the Rich Nonprofit. I’m Lisa Avala. And last week I talked about what it feels like when women around you don’t show up for you. The loneliness of being a leader and the hurt of pouring into people who disappear once they level up. And if you haven’t listened to that episode, episode 60, go back and take a listen first because this is sort of a part two. Okay, for those of you who did hear last week’s episode, I know.

I know it’s stirred up a lot. I heard from women. Women are pissed off. They are hurt. And they should be. Because this is happening. And it doesn’t get talked about a lot. So I’m glad that I brought it up because I’ve been there. I’ve felt it. And it does hurt. And here’s what I want to dig into today. Even with all of that. The frustration. The hurt. The feeling sometimes that nobody has your back. You’re still here.

You are still doing the work. You have not walked away. And I want to talk about why. Why do you keep showing up for your community even when it’s thankless? Even when it costs you friendships? Even when your family doesn’t fully get it sometimes? Or even when you’re exhausted and nobody’s clapping for you? Why don’t you just stop? Well, I read something just this week that’s really, it’s been sitting with me.

It was a blog post about justice, not the legal system kind, but the deep gut level kind. The kind where you see something wrong in the world and it physically bothers you. You can feel it in your body. And the writer was talking about how some people are just wired this way, not because they are better than anyone else, but because somewhere deep in who they are, fairness matters so much.

that they can’t look away from unfairness. And I see this in myself. I see it in my clients. And it was like, wow, words were finally put to how we feel. You know that feeling when you see something unjust happening. It doesn’t even have to be to you. It can be to someone you’ve never met and your whole body reacts. Your chest maybe gets tight or your brain starts spinning.

Lisa Avila (02:26.69)
You can’t scroll past it. You can’t just say, well, that sucks. You’re not gonna just move on with your day. Something in you says, no, that is not okay. Somebody needs to do something about this. And then you realize, like it or not, you’re that somebody. It’s not a personality quirk. It’s not you being dramatic or too much or overly sensitive. That’s who you are at your core.

And I think a lot of women who are drawn to impact work, who are drawn to building nonprofits, or using their business as a force for good, you’ve probably been like that your entire life. You were the kid who stood up for the other kid on the playground. You might’ve been the teenager who couldn’t keep her mouth shut when something wasn’t fair. And now you’re the woman in the meeting saying the things everyone else is thinking about but won’t say.

You’ve always been this way. And people have been telling you to tone it down for probably just as long. But what I think is really happening when you feel like you can’t stop, even when it hurts, even when it’s lonely, you’re walking a path that most people aren’t on yet. Not because you are better, not because you’re more evolved, more enlightened, anything like that. It’s because something in your life, maybe a lot of things in your life.

taught you what injustice feels like. And once you know that feeling, you can’t unknow it. You can’t unfeel it. And you definitely can’t sit still while it happens to someone else. The women I work with, they didn’t wake up one day and decide, I think I’m gonna start a nonprofit. Something happened. They saw a gap. They experienced a loss. They watched their community struggle.

was something that nobody was fixing or if they were trying to fix it, they weren’t doing a very good job. And they said, well, if nobody else is going to do this correctly, I will. Yes, that’s ambition. It’s also a calling. And I think that there’s a difference here because ambition says, I’m going to go build something impressive. And a calling says, I have to build this or it’s going to eat at me. Ambition?

Lisa Avila (04:47.758)
Maybe you can still take a day off, but a calling is going to follow you into the shower, into your car, into your bed at night when you should be sleeping. But instead you’re thinking about how to get more funding for that program or how to reach more people or why the city council still hasn’t responded to your email. If that’s you, you’ve been called. But here’s where it gets complicated because having a calling doesn’t mean you have unlimited energy. And this is where I see a lot.

women run themselves into the ground. You feel the pull to do the work, you can’t ignore it, so you say yes to everything. You take on everyone’s stuff. You show up to every event, you respond to every message, you carry the weight of your community on your shoulders because somebody has to and you’ve always been the somebody. And then you burn out. And when you burn out, you don’t just lose your energy, you start to lose yourself.

You start to resent the work that you love. You start to resent the people you’re serving. Ouch. But, needs to be said. Probably start resenting your team if you have one. And it’s a terrible feeling because now you’re not just exhausted. Then you start to feel guilty for being exhausted and for feeling resentful. And you feel like you’re failing your mission. I’ve had seasons where I was so deep in my advocacy work.

that I forgot why I started it. I was running and going and I was getting tired and resentful that no one else would show up to school board meetings and no one else would speak to banning books. And I just kept going out of sheer stubbornness and that is not sustainable at all. So my last episode was about the loneliness of leading.

And this episode is about the sustainability of leading. How do you keep answering the call to lead without it destroying you? You don’t have to carry it all. You’re not supposed to carry it all. And I know you might be sitting here thinking, okay, but if I don’t, who will? And as I just said earlier, I’ve felt this, so I get it. I’ve said those exact words, but you trying to carry everything?

Lisa Avila (07:16.416)
alone isn’t noble. It’s actually a bottleneck and it’s keeping your impact smaller than it needs to be or that you want it to be. Because we women who try to do everything ourselves, sure we’re helping dozens of people, maybe even hundreds, but women who build systems, build a team, build models that can run without her, that is how you help more people. That is how you help thousands.

millions. And it’s also going to outlast you. That’s what my 4P framework is about. Purpose, people, profit, philanthropy, your platform, your visibility. When all four of these are working together, you are not just surviving your calling. Ooh, that is not going to last. You are building an infrastructure around it. You’re making it sustainable. You’re making it scalable.

And you’re making sure that the fire inside you doesn’t burn out. And you don’t want that to happen. And I want to talk about something else that comes with this territory, because it’s not just the burnout. It’s the way that people react to you. When you are someone who fights for justice, who speaks up, who gets on stages, writes those letters, and you challenge the system, people have opinions about you. Some people are inspired, some are intimidated, and some…

feel flat out threatened. You know the ones I’m talking about. The ones who tell you or say to a friend, wow, she’s a lot. The ones who question your motives. Why is she really doing this? The ones who assume you must want something, attention, money, power, because they can’t fathom that someone would put themselves out there purely because they believe it’s right. And sometimes, and this connects right back to what I talked about last week, sometimes.

Those people are in your own circle. They are the friends who get uncomfortable when you grow. They are the family members who wish you would just calm down. Or they’re the colleagues who liked you better when you were quiet. And that reaction, it’s not about you. It’s about them. When someone says you should tone it down, what they’re really saying is you’re making me uncomfortable with my own inaction. You standing up is a mirror and not everyone likes.

Lisa Avila (09:41.41)
what they see. So you have a choice. You can shrink down to make other people feel comfortable or you can keep standing. But I think you already know which one you’re going to choose because you’re still here. You’re still listening and you haven’t stopped yet. If you are a woman who feels this pull, this deep unshakable need to make things right, to fight for your community, to build impact and to leave your community better than you found it, you are not alone.

You are not too much and you are not wrong for wanting to use your business, your platform, your voice, your life to create change. But you have to do it smart. You have to build the structure. You have to protect your energy and you have to surround yourself with people who understand, who are in the arena with you, not watching from the side and critiquing your form. And you have to stop trying to do it all by yourself.

If you know you are called to this and you want to build impact into your business, but you don’t know how, you don’t know how that structure would look or how it would work. This is exactly what I do with clients in my brand impact strategy. It’s how we take the inside you and turn it into a framework. We take that vision and we make it real. The purpose, the people, the promise, the platform.

all four working together. You can find out more, the link is in the show notes, or you can DM me on Instagram anytime and let’s chat about it. And if this episode hit home, share it, send it to a friend. There are so many women out there who are feeling this and I want them all to know they are not alone, that the impact that we are all creating is important. We are leaving legacy for ourselves, for our kids, and I want more women.

to find us, to know that they can keep growing their communities out of love. And I will see you next time on The Rich Nonprofit. Thanks for spending time with me today on The Rich Nonprofit. If this episode hit home for you, I bet there’s a woman in your circle who needs to hear it also. Please share it with her. And don’t forget to rate and review. It helps other women find me and I appreciate it more than you know. And if you wanna keep the conversation going,

Lisa Avila (12:06.873)
Come on over and join us in Built for Bigger. It’s my free telegram community. We chat about strategy, business, life, mindset, and everything it takes to grow. The link is in the show notes. And I will see you next time.