Good Life Project - Maggie Doyne: BlinkNow Founder On a Life of Service.

Episode Date: January 22, 2019

At 18 years old, Maggie Doyne, decided to take a gap year that turned into her life’s work.Traveling to India and then Nepal, she felt called to make a difference in Nepali children’s lives. So, she took her life’s savings, then $5,000, moved to Nepal, bought property there and co-founded the BlinkNow foundation (https://blinknow.org/pages/our-history) along with a Nepali friend, Top Bahadur Malla. Their vision, to provide kids with a safe home, medical care, an education and love, so they will grow up to be adults with a social conscience and the skills to continue the mission of ending the cycles of poverty and violence in the world.Working hand-in-hand with Top, and a team that is 90% Nepali, they built a children’s home, where Maggie and a team of caregivers, cooks, “aunties and uncles” take care of their family of more than 50 kids. They then built a school, staffed by an all-Nepali faculty that serves more than 350 kids, along with a health clinic and women’s center for the Kopila Valley area in Nepal. Maggie received the 2015 CNN Hero Award and her work has been recognized by the Dalai Lama for her work.In today’s conversation, we explore Maggie’s decision to take a gap year that turned into a life she never imagined living, what drew her to Nepal and the moment that awakened her to a deeper calling. We also explore the challenges along the way, the importance of working in close collaboration with the community. We also talk about a moment of profound loss that incapacitated her for months, how that experience changed her and shifted the direction of her life.It’s also important to note that, while this conversation is largely about Maggie’s personal story, and the life and contributions she’s made in Nepal, Maggie is also very clear that, from the beginning, everything has always been a collaborative effort, working hand-in-hand with her Nepali co-founder and their local team on the ground playing a huge role in every aspect of what’s been built.---------Have you discovered your Sparketype yet? Take the Sparketype Assessment™ now. IT’S FREE (https://www.goodlifeproject.com/sparketypes/) and takes about 7-minutes to complete. At a minimum, it’ll open your eyes in a big way. It also just might change your life.Thank you to our super cool brand partners. If you like the show, please support them - they help make the podcast possible. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

So at 18 years old, my guest today, Maggie Doyne, decided to take a gap year that turned into her life's work. She traveled to India and then Nepal, and while there, experienced some things that led her to feel really called to make a difference in the lives of Nepali children. So she took her life savings, then $5,000, moved to Nepal, bought property there, and co-founded the Blink Now Foundation along with a Nepali friend, Tap Badahor Mala. And they had a vision to provide kids with a safe home, with medical care and education and love, with the intention that they will grow up to be adults

with social conscience and the skills to continue that same mission and help end the cycles of poverty and violence. She has since then been working hand-in-hand with her co-founder, Tup, and a team that is about 90% Nepali. Over the last decade, they've built a children's home where Maggie and a team of caregivers, cooks, and what she calls aunties and uncles take care of their family of more than 50 kids. They then built a school staffed by all-Nepali faculty that serves another 350-plus kids, along with a health clinic

and a women's center in the Kopila Valley area in Nepal. Maggie, back in 2015, received the CNN Hero Award, and her work has been recognized by folks like the Dalai Lama. In today's conversation, we really go deep into Maggie's decision to make a very different turn, to take a gap year that turned into a life she never imagined living, one that drew her to Nepal and even the moment that awakened her to this deeper calling. We also explore a lot of the challenges along the way, the struggles, the importance of working in really close collaboration with the community. And we talk about a moment of profound loss that actually pretty much incapacitated her

for months and how that experience changed her and really shifted the direction of her work and life. It's also important to note in this conversation that while much of it is about Maggie's personal story and the life and contributions she's made in Nepal, Maggie is also very clear that from the very beginning, everything has always been a collaborative effort, working hand in hand with her Nepali co-founder and their local team on the ground, always playing a huge role in every aspect of what's been built. So excited to share this conversation with you. I'm Jonathan Fields, and this is Good Life Project. We'll be right back. The Apple Watch Series X is here. It has the biggest display ever. It's also the thinnest Apple Watch ever, making it even more comfortable on your wrist,

whether you're running, swimming, or sleeping. And it's the fastest-charging Apple Watch, getting you 8 hours of charge in just 15 minutes. The Apple Watch Series X. Available for the first time in glossy jet black aluminum. Compared to previous generations, iPhone XS or later required. Charge time and actual results will vary. There are so many places I want to go with you,

but first, it's just really great to be hanging out with you. I've been following you, your work, your story for a number of years. So inspired, always moved, just on so many different levels. So it's nice to just be in a room sharing energy and space with you.

Thank you. This is awesome. Yeah. So, and you, while you spend most of your time now in Nepal, and you're heading up this amazing foundation and building incredible things there, and we're going to talk about all of that, you actually started out pretty much around the corner from New York City. I grew up in a small, all-American suburban town called Mendham, New Jersey. Yeah. What kind of kid were you?

Soccer playing, highly driven, very, very motivated. I think if you saw me as a high schooler, you would have seen that kid carrying a lacrosse stick around that had college pretty much written on their forehead. I was one of three girls. I grew up on a cul-de-sac with a soccer goal in my backyard and a trampoline and two amazing parents. We were pretty much your average typical family. And I'd say I described myself as an average, typical girl with nothing really too special going on. Well, clearly something was brewing inside underneath that. I mean, when you were, when you're sort of like growing up in that prototypical suburban life where everything is as it should be, was there ever anything inside of you that that's sort of said, like, maybe there's a different path for me or was it not really a part of your sort of in the conversation then? I think my parents were really progressive.

They raised us with a sense of adventure and you can do anything and go take on the world. And that it was definitely, that's a privilege sort of way to grow up, right? But they also instilled the sense of like, you're going to have to work hard, you're going to have to get a scholarship to go to college, you're going to have to, you know, really get good grades. And that was also in me from a really young age. So I wouldn't say there was anything, you know, any flair of, you know, go out there and, or any prediction of what was going to happen. I think it was like, do well in my SATs, get into AP courses, sort of the average typical suburban kid in public school

that was just trying to make it to college. So it's like the standard measures of success, you know, like check these boxes. Yeah. I mean, starting in sixth and seventh grade, they tell you if you're going to get on this track, if you want a good job, you have to go to college and you have to go to a good college. And that was my upbringing. You have to be a good athlete. You have to be well-rounded. So I think if you could put me in any box, it would be that of just like get that resume, make sure your essays are good, make sure you have a good GPA.

Right. So you end up following that path and then apply to colleges. What happens? I apply to like this host of very preppy Northeast schools, having no idea how I would pay for it or why I was applying to the list of schools that I did other than everyone else was applying to them. And I get into some, I don't get into others. And all of a sudden, I'm starting to look at it like from above, bird's eye view. And I have this moment in my stomach where I'm just like, what am I doing? I know so much about like AP history and memorizing facts for bio and who I'm supposed to be and this person, this cookie cutter person that is on this path to college. But I have no idea who Maggie is on the inside or what I want to do with my life. And it was that question that made me just stop. And I needed to. I needed to just stop and look at who I was

and what I wanted to do. Yeah. What was, at that point, because you have to make a decision, sort of like, okay, so I am accepted to some of these schools, but at the same time, your mind is like, why would I even go? Who am I?

What am I here to do? But you have to give a decision like yes or no to the schools. And, and that's a pretty, you know, like that's a final call, at least at that age, especially kind of think of it. Yeah. And that age, it's like every day is such a big day and you're the center of your universe. It's like, I've worked so hard to be in a position to be able to like do this and be accepted. Yeah. So I basically wake up one day and I'll never forget it. I walk down the stairs, my parents are in the living room, reading the paper, drinking coffee. And I say, mom, dad, I don't want to go to college. And my parents are super cool. And they're like, okay, let's look at what that looks like. And they knew about gap years as an opportunity and we started

looking and we went down to Princeton and they have a gap year center and we started looking up on the internet and looking at what the possibilities were and they both raised us like in nature and going on adventures and believed in the beauty of travel. My parents had bicycled across the country and taken us on camping trips. And they were like, you should do this. This is the right way. And then I tell my guidance counselor later in the week. And it's suburban New Jersey. So they're pasting where everyone got into college on the outside of the counseling center.

And they're like, 96% of Mendham High graduates go on to four-year university. So I go downstairs and I'll remember it so clearly. It was the state championships for lacrosse. And I marched down to guidance. I get called out of biology class. And I say to my guidance counselor, I don't want to go straight there. And I'm not ready to make this decision. And she's like, I think you're making a really big mistake. And I start questioning it all over again, but long story short, decide to do the gap year. Yeah. I mean, do you think it was your parents' belief in the possibility that this was a good decision that allowed you to sort of look at the guidance counselor and say, you know, like, look, your life is your life,

my life is my life, and this is what I need to do. A hundred percent. My parents, and I talk to parents now and I tell the story and they're like, I wouldn't have let my kid do that. And it's funny, like I'm a bad spokesperson for gap years because as you know, I didn't ever go back to college. And I'm that typical fear of like, if my kid doesn't get up here, I'll never go back or they'll never go back. But it was the best thing I ever did. Yeah. And I think that argument, you know, like if, you know, what if they never go back to school is so specious because, well, the reason they would never go back to school is because they found something that was so compelling to them that they wanted to keep doing it. And isn't the point of going to school fundamentally

to find that thing that you want to keep doing, except you spend four years doing it and pay like multiple six figures to like take it instead of, so if your kid finds out like, you know, within that first year, it gets like a strong sense. Isn't that a good thing? Yeah. That's college. That's education. Especially now where so many, I mean, people change careers. I think the last stat I saw like eight different times minimum. So whatever expertise you get in college is not going to be the thing that you're doing for very long in your career. Yeah. It's really interesting. I think there's an interesting corollary when I sort of like talk to organizations and they're like, well, if you walk somebody through a process of awakening, they really figure out, what if they really figure out what they want to do and then they want to leave?

And you're like, but that's a good thing, right? Because you want to bless them on to go do the thing they want to do. And then you want to have somebody who really wants to do that thing in your organization. But it's kind of like a sort of like five years down the road analogy. It's so true. So true. So what's the move from there? So I go take a typical gap year. I'm with 12 other kids. It's like on a quote official program. Yeah, official program. It was called Leap Now at the time. And it's just like many of the other gap year programs out there, Global Roots or Where There Be Dragons. And one week we're rebuilding a seawall in a Fijian village that was destroyed by the tsunami. And the next we're meditating with Buddhist monks and learning Buddhist philosophy.

And the next we're doing outdoor leadership and survival skills and scuba diving and conservation work with the Maori tribe and that passion for education. I think the true definition of education came back. I was like reading and so into it. And I think it had kind of been beaten out of me a little bit, like reading for pleasure and joy. And so that's the first semester. And for the second semester, you kind of revisit it again. And I was a babysitter growing up from the time I was like 11 and a half. And you start as a mother's helper and then work your way up to babysitting. And we were three girls and they called us. So you had like the franchise. The Dwayne girl franchise. And so I've been babysitting and I always knew I had a knack for kids. I was like a camp counselor. And I said,

I really want to go somewhere where I can work with kids because that was where I had been the happiest. And so I do that. I go and work in a program in Northeastern India that was serving Nepalese refugee children primarily. And again, my world completely flips upside down. We had more kids coming into this program than we could support. Kids were fleeing as refugees across the Nepali border into India in search of work, finding themselves in really dangerous situations. Families were sleeping under plastic by the side of the road. We had an intake of a kid whose entire family had lost his entire family by the side of the road.

And this kid from suburban New Jersey, just like, what? I had no idea. The director there, the project was called Ramana's Garden, and she takes me under her wing, really believes in me. And I start working there and I extend my semester to another year. I start learning everything there is to know about children's homes and rural health camps and supporting refugees and nutrition. That's where it all sort of begins. Yeah. If you zoom the lens out, what's actually, you said there are Nepalese refugees coming into India. What's actually going on that's driving them? What sort of bigger picture in the country at that time? So there had been a 15-year civil war, and a group of Maoist rebels were attempting to overthrow the government. And their strategy in doing so was to go to remote and rural Himalayan villages and recruit a child from each and every family. And there was conflict and war.

And what we know about war, obviously, is that it really seriously affects women and children. And so everyone was sort of scattering and trying to get to India for work, but also just for peace and a sense of security. So there was a lot of family separation, families sending their kids to God knows where just to kind of get them out of the country or out of these rural villages, and families leaving and trying to resettle. And I couldn't have even picked out Nepal on a map. I mean, we hear about Mount Everest and trekking,

but I had no idea until I started meeting these families and these people and hearing their stories. And at the same time, I was seeing orphanages and the orphan care world, and I hated it. I just did not like the model. What were you seeing? Kids being served food that looked like slop on a plate, terrible conditions. Kids within an orphan facility are more likely to get an infectious disease than on the outside. Kids often leave orphan care and they're right back where they started, back on the streets. Orphanages being disguised as child trafficking rings,

family separation, they become these drop-off areas for kids who are abandoned. And I just felt like it could be done better. And so that was also happening. And these two sort of storylines are coexisting. And then I decide with my friend Sunita, who is also a young woman my age who left her village when she was eight years old at the start of the civil war, we decide to go to Nepal. So what's that like? First time you go? We're on a bus for like 24 hours just to get to the border. And then we cross over the border on a mule cart and, you know, get the passport stamps and get on another bus to go up into the foothill region. And we ultimately get to this sort of mountaintop and the bus driver looks back and says, all right, girls, it's time to get out.

And we retrace her footsteps from the village that she left for two and a half days through a mountain pass on a footpath being passed by goats and women with big baskets on their back. And after the hardest trek of my entire life, missing toenails and really, really sore legs, we reach Sunita's village up in Kalikot, which is a rural village in the Karnali Midwestern region of Nepal. And I see it. I see civil war up close and personal. And there's ransacked homes and schools that have been shut down and temples that have been burned. And also just the stark contrast of beauty and resilience and strength and simplicity. It was a subsistence village where all of the food was grown right outside of these huts and water was carried from the river and people needed to work together to survive. And those two things coexisting at the same time and also just feeling a sense of home, watching Sunita find her home and learning that it had been taken over and converted into a malice rebel base camp and watching her go through the process of finding her family. Did she eventually find her family?

Oh, she did, yeah. It was this beautiful sort of story of watching her find her aunt and her uncles and her cousins and sharing stories from the other side of the border and just sitting with the women and telling stories by the fire late at night. And yeah, it was just beautiful. It was no other beauty I've ever seen or experienced. And meeting these people and hearing their stories and their journeys and meeting the kids firsthand and realizing that the Orphan Stat was one million orphan children. And that's when

the wheels started turning and I started connecting refugees back to sort of the bigger picture of getting them back to Nepal, looking at why children leave their villages in the first place and how do we get Nepal back. And this was in 2005. So back to that big picture lens, there was an armistice and there was peace and the border had opened up and peace negotiations were happening. So this was when I took that trip. I mean, is there, as you start to think about, okay, is there a better way? Like, what does this look like? And is there a voice inside of you at all that it's also saying, yes, I can see the pain, I can see the suffering, I can see the possibility, but who am I? Yeah.

I mean, that number one million. And worldwide right now we're at 140 million orphaned children. And you can't even begin to grasp it. And you feel so small. And I think therein lies the issue of humanity in our world. And there was a moment for me. And after two weeks in this rural village, we go back down, we take the bus to this little town called Sirkett. And I was walking across a dry riverbed and on the bank of the river there were dozens of children breaking rocks. I mean, it's shocking. It stops you right in your tracks and you see three-year-olds, five-year-olds, eight-year-olds, teenagers with mallets picking up huge boulders and cracking

them with a hand mallet and breaking them into small pieces to sell as gravel. I just look at that dry riverbed and the children and watch everything inside me started to just crack open. And all of a sudden I look to the left and there's a little girl, a little rock breaker in an orange tattered dress. And she smiles and says, Namaste Didi, the biggest, brightest smile. And I thought at that point, and in that moment, I saw this little girl, her name was Hema. And I was like, she's me. We're the same. I was just brought up and born into a different circumstance and I can do something. And so all of the research at that time was pointing to education and you could see that violence and poverty is generational and leads back to literacy and education. And I decided to enroll Hema into school. And I was like, I can't do anything without a million kids, but maybe Hema's life could change with a uniform

and removing all of the barriers that she has in her life. And what if she just didn't have to break rocks all day? Yeah. What did it actually take to send one kid, to send Hema to school? It was like a $7 admission fee, a uniform, a book bag, a set of books, and some counseling with her single mom. And she was one of six kids and kind of just convincing that the investment of school was worth it and removing that big initial financial barrier, which is a lot for a family living in poverty that needed that dollar of gravel selling.

And so that happens and everything about Hema's life. I just watch that transformation and it becomes like my new vision. And I'm like, I'm going to work on this and get kids into school. And I think, I don't know, at this point, I look on that riverbed and I kind of decide it'll be easier to stay here and try to do something than it would be to go back and forget about what I've seen. So you make the decision right around then to say, at least for the, you know, for now or for the near future, this is where I'm going to be? Yeah. So I start enrolling kids into school and I start with all of the rock breakers and one by one, kids in the bus park, kids living in the local slum, kids breaking rocks by the side of the riverbed. And I start to learn and work with the local

government. I also realized that going to school and getting an education for kids at this level of poverty is like the biggest dream and wish and outstretch of the imagination in the world. And what a lot of kids needed was just their basic human needs met. A home. Kids had lost families. They didn't have a place to live, food, clean water. And so the second part of the vision becomes to build a home. And at this point, my co-founder, Tope Mulla, comes into the picture. He's amazing. He's an orphan himself. He's Sunita's uncle who really wants to come back to Nepal. And he'd been running Ramana's Garden, the refugee program.

In India. Mm-hmm. So we start kind of like putting our heads together. And we find this piece of land for $5,000 right in the town near that dry riverbed. And we're like, we need a home base here. And I have exactly $5,000 saved up of babysitting money from when I was 12. And I call my parents from a phone booth. And I'm like, Mom, Dad, I need you to send me my babysitting money. Mayday, mayday.

We've been compromised. The pilot's a hitman. I knew you were going to be fun. January 24th. Tell me how to fly this thing. Mark Wahlberg. You know what the difference between me and you is? You're going to die.

Don't shoot him, we need him. Y'all need a pilot. Flight risk. The Apple Watch Series 10 is here. It has the biggest display ever. It's also the thinnest Apple Watch Series 10 is here. It has the biggest display ever. It's also the thinnest Apple Watch ever, making it even more comfortable on your wrist, whether you're running, swimming, or sleeping.

And it's the fastest-charging Apple Watch, getting you eight hours of charge in just 15 minutes. The Apple Watch Series 10. Available for the first time in glossy jet black aluminum. Compared to previous generations, iPhone XS or later required. Charge time and actual results will vary. And they're like, can you tell me a little more? I know, you have a daughter this age, right? I'm thinking like, okay, as a dad getting that phone call. Because as a parent, you're thinking, okay, so I'm completely down with a gap year.

Like I'm a huge believer in being a global citizen and understanding our privilege and our role and being of service. And I'm thinking also, I'm like, I'm wondering what would happen if, you know, a year and a half in or something, I got that call from my daughter. I would imagine I would have such mixed emotions at that point. There were mixed emotions on that phone call and a lot of listening on their part. This is where I really handed off to my parents again. And they're like, ask me all the questions they need to ask. And at the end of the call, they say, yeah, it's your money. We'll send it over. But they're really not saying it's your money. They're saying it's your life. I don't know if they knew that at that exact moment. I had a pitch and you were prepared in case that came up. I was like, mom, dad, I'm going to do this. And

then I'll go back to college and I need to do this. And this is why. So in your mind, it's still, you're also just personally not at the place where like, no, I'm like, I'm in this for the long haul. Like, it's still like, I have a project to do. I have something to do. There's something to build. And, but then sure, you know, like I could see myself then going back to school. Like once I'm done with this. Yeah, exactly.

People often think about my journey that it was this, like I put a pin on a map and I'm like, I'm going to go save kids. And it's the exact opposite. It was like little by little, step by step. And this babysitting money step was just one piece. And so they send the money. We purchase the land. We start registering an NGO. We're so close with the local community.

We all start working together and sketching up plans. And literally there's a picture of me in a hole. We're digging the together and sketching up plans. And literally there's a picture of me in a hole. We're digging the foundation with shovels. Yeah. And then. What was the intention? Like what were you actually, so now you have a piece of land. What did you actually want to make? What did you want to make happen? So we decided let's build a home for kids who don't have families. And this is going to be a home and this is going to be a family. And we're not even going to use the word orphanage. We're going to really support the kids who, in addition to schooling, need a permanent place to live and a family. And so we just sketch

up this home and I could see it in my head. I could see the tree in the front yard with the swing set and kids running around the side yard and this big yellow house and laughter and music and just a house like similar to what I grew up with. And so we run out of money though. Like we just have this vision and all of the villagers are excited and the local government's into it. And then I have to go back to New Jersey and I decide I'm going to babysit for the summer to raise the rest of the money to build this house. So did you? I got every babysitting gig in my suburban town that I could. I dog sat. And each week I just start sending little bits of money

back. Ultimately, we need a septic tank and it's like $2,200 and I just, I can't do it anymore. And Tope's sending his paycheck over and all of his savings. And I do a garage sale. And at the end of the garage sale, we get the money for the septic tank. There's a little piece in local newspaper and the families that I'm babysitting for are like, you need to do something more. sale. We get the money for the septic tank. There's a little piece in local newspaper. And the families that I'm babysitting for are like, you need to do something more. You need to register this. Think about registering a nonprofit. I can help you. One of the guys I was babysitting for had some experience. And we start the Blink Now Foundation, changing the world in the blink of an eye. Over the period of about six months, we raise about $25,000. And I'm sending the money over and we go back and finish the house. By January of 2007, I'd taken our first little girl named Nisha.

What's that like when you finish it, you're ready, you open the door, and the first child comes? It made it real, I think. I remember that first night so well, and I remember meeting Nisha. I don't know if I could even, looking back, I know the future, but at the time it felt simple. It felt like this is right and Nisha has a safe place to be and she can go to school and she's so smart. And our little family sort of started to come together and there was

no paint on the walls. We had no electricity. We didn't have a water line yet. So yeah, we just kept our eyes on finishing up the home. And by the next month in, we have two kids and then three. So where are the kids coming from? So we were supporting kids by enrolling them into school. But a lot of the kids, like I said, were homeless or working as domestic servants or in situations that were unsafe. And so with a partnership with the local government, we start selecting those kids who really truly had no one and nowhere to be. And that was our initial pool. To this day, we are very selective about who comes into the home.

It's really meant to be a place for kids who it's their last option. I mean, that's got to be on the one hand amazing. But on the other hand, you know, to be so selective also means that there are likely, I'm assuming, far more kids who would like to be a part of this than you have the ability to say yes to. How do you handle that side of it too, just personally, emotionally? Yeah. The initial days were very emotional and it was a lot of decision-making and setting of criteria and local partnership. And our approach was very family first. So keep a child within their family. Maybe they lost parents, but they could have a grandmother. And again, that child might be a good candidate for a scholarship.

And that was what we saw as best practices. So we just make the calls with the team and go with our guts. And we set an age criteria initially. Like we were looking for the five to seven-year-old range based on some data. And for other kids, we thought, let's support them with a school scholarship and see what happens. In the beginning, not that many people knew about us. So we weren't as inundated as we later became. But as the years started to roll on and we became one of the only placement facilities for children in the population we were working with, it got emotionally very, very hard. You know,

we'd get babies or really serious cases. And that's when we started to have to build a better team and really be more selective with our board and everything. Yeah. So as you're growing and more kids are coming to the home and they're, you know, they're living with you, they're spending their lives with you, and then you're, you're helping educate them at the same time on a personal level, what's the role that you take on there? Or is it just everything to everyone? Because I would have to imagine, yeah. And how old are you at that point? 20. Which blows my mind. So you're 20 years old and you have started a

foundation. You're in a sort of remote-ish area in Nepal. You've built a home and sending kids to school. And as more kids are coming, how do you, I mean, your average 20 year old in the United States is still in the beginning of being emotionally equipped to be okay, just in the life that they live here, which has like great benefits and great privilege, but to be 20 and to be there and to see so much need and so much pain and so much suffering and being a part of it and knowing that also people are starting to look to you to make everything okay, like as a 20-year- you realize that you don't know everything and that you need to ask for help and you need to start finding the experts and reading everything that there is to read. And that's where kind of like that passion for education came back. So I start reading.

I start studying best practices. My co-founder is incredible. He was an orphan himself. He's a leader in the region. And we start building a strategy and building a team. And you don't have, for example, I didn't have any money. So it's like we have to find, we just have to hustle. So you've got your grit, your hustle, your hard work, you're pulling all-nighters, you're building this team around you. And that's what got me through those initial stages is just like really putting that plan together. We also got lucky, I think,

really early on Cosmo Girl magazine. They have this, they say, they put out an ad that's like are you changing your community or the world and my one of my best friends sends it to me and is like you should submit like you just submit a photo and a paragraph about what you're doing and so I do it I submit to Cosmo Girl magazine sure enough we're selected as Cosmo Girl of the. And I have to get a makeover and fly back to New York City. And all I want is bedrooms for the kids. I'm like, I need more bedrooms. I want to build the second floor. And I have to go back and get the makeover. And it comes with a $20,000 prize. And I'm like, yes, we're going to build more bedrooms and I'll do this makeover. But then the piece comes out and I realized that girls all over the world just read that story and want to help. And so that was kind of the beginning of realizing the power and sharing the story and the importance of it and how young people were just starving for realizing that they could make a difference. And so that happened. And then Glamour picked up the story. And then the Do Something Awards happened, which came with a $100,000 grant. And our story on the back of the Cool Ranch Doritos

flavor, we start kind of garnering support. And we raised100,000 and we get these grants and we build this incredible school out of bamboo for super cheap, but amazing. And we put a plan together and we start executing it and people want to support us. Yeah. Those early days were fun. At the same time, I'm becoming a mom. Yeah. Tell me about that part of it. Well, so we're learning Nepali. I'm learning Nepali. The kids speak all different dialects as they come in. Yeah, I think we were up to like 15 or 16 kids. And every single night we do satsang, which is a Hindu practice. It's everyone sits in a circle and you sing prayers and bhajans and you do a little meditation and we would practice English in Nepali and sing row, row, row your boat and talk about what we were grateful for and talk about our days. They, all of the kids led by Nisha,

my oldest, say, we really all thought about it and we want to call you mom. Yeah, it was their decision and that kind of became my role in a way. And the love was there. I mean, you watch these kids come in from such extreme circumstance and loss and going through grief and come in to a family of other kids who've been through these things and the music is playing and they're all playing marbles and we dance every night and play music and we all cook meals together and we started to become a little family. What's that like when they sort of approach you and say, we all thought about it and we

want to call you mom? What's that like for you in that moment? It was definitely, that's when it became my life. I think just, I couldn't have predicted that in a million years, how close we would become. And that mother role and that relationship, because it initially started as, we're just going to be a house and it's going to feel like a family. And then I became mom and the other families who were there supporting became auntie and uncle and we all just became really close. And yeah, it was the journey to motherhood. I mean, I had to start like reading behavioral books and finding

counselors to work with the kids and reading Dan Siegel and just doing absolutely everything I could to be the best parent I could given the circumstances. And I also just got really lucky. Nepali kids are amazing. So you're, it's like you're, you're growing these two things simultaneously. One is a foundation and building homes, school, and places of refuge. And at the same time, you're a mom. But you're not a mom of one or two kids, of dozens that start to grow bigger and bigger and bigger. And I mean, any one of those individually is a massive responsibility. And then to sort of play both of those roles on the scale that you're playing them simultaneously

as a 20-something who is operating outside of your country of origin, outside of all the normal support mechanisms, just physically, psychologically, were you okay with that? I mean, was it, did, I mean, there's gotta be so much joy and celebration, but at the same time, it's gotta be brutally hard. It's brutally hard. There's so much pressure. I mean, I remember months where I was like, I just have to get to next month, make sure I have next month's operations in the bank. And I think at this point, it was also my co-founder, the families I was working with, the local government that we were partnering with. We had teachers that were coming on. And yeah, I think the best move was early on just realizing that it couldn't just be about me,

that it wouldn't have worked. And also that I wanted the local community to one, really feel a part of it, that it was theirs because it ultimately has to be. And this is a really big, important step in development. One, you have to have local ownership. It has to be, I wanted my kids to not just see this foreign woman with white skin coming in and, you know, being mom. I wanted them to see Nepali women and Nepali men and that it was a real true community effort. And that was important. Number two, my co-founder. Like, he is a force. He's so smart. He lived that life. He had this experience. And the two of us made a really dynamic partnership.

We build a board. And so, yes, there was a lot of pressure on me and it was really hard. But I do think this is when it got so hard that I realized again to have that team. Yeah. It just takes more than one person. So as you're starting to grow and more and more kids are coming, I mean, eventually this becomes, how many kids are there now? 50 something? Yeah. So at this stage, we have taken in over 54 children and there are 500 children in our school. And to this day, there's not a single kid breaking rocks on the side of that

dry riverbed. It's definitely been an evolution. And I don't know, I think back to that dry riverbed moment. And I remember thinking someday I want to walk across this riverbed and I don't want to see a single child breaking stone. This really pure belief that we could create the world that we wanted to live in. And it took many, many years and lots of hard work, but we've done it. Coppola Valley is, Coppola Valley is the local name and it's become that place of refuge, of safety, of home. I'm really, really proud of what we've built. Yeah. The Apple Watch Series 10 is here.

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Compared to previous generations, iPhone XS or later required, charge time and actual results will vary. Mayday, mayday. We've been compromised. The pilot's a hitman. I knew you were going to be fun. On January 24th. Tell me how to fly this thing.

Mark Wahlberg. You know what the difference between me and you is? You're going to die. Don't shoot him, we need him. Y'all need a pilot? Flight risk. When you think about, do you ever walk across that drive-over bed now and just pause and almost see a flashback and just reflect on what's really happened?

Every single day. In fact, to get to town, like downtown Surquette, I have to walk across it. And now they built a bridge. And so it's like looking at it from above. And I think about it all the time. And Hema is in 10th grade now. And I think about her every time I see her and her smile and her face amongst, you know, 500 other kids. And Nisha, my daughter, who's on a gap year right now, just to come

completely full circle and going off to college next year. Yeah. I think about that moment all the time and it's that blink of an eye decision and yeah, the fact that it could have gone differently. Yeah. I guess I'm curious also, what was sort of the cultural approach to education for women and girls too? Because I know a lot of times that is women are just viewed as, or girls especially, like, well, we don't send them to school. Like if we have money at all to send one child to school, it's going to be the male child.

I don't know the culture there. Was that the same thing or was it different? Yes, it's the exact. It's the problem around education that so many of us are working to address. It's changing because of, you know, girls getting into school and being the proof of concept. And I work with a lot of women in their 30s and 40s. We run a women's center now that supports mothers. And they say, not a single child, girl child, was enrolled into school when we were little. And now we go back to our villages and girls are in uniforms and going to school. The enrollment rates have increased tremendously.

And I think that the world is about to see a major shift because of that. Women are being educated at higher rates. But yeah, women are definitely second class citizens. Sons are worshipped as like, you just want to have a son. And girls are often sent off and married away at a really young age in rural Nepal. And so often seen as less than or less valuable. But this is changing. And it's changing because of the work of nonprofits and governments and the NGO sector.

And I'm really, really proud to be a part of that. Yeah, that's amazing. You were there, so this starts in 2002, 2003? Yeah, so it starts in about 2005. Okay, so sort of officially 2005. Earthquake in Nepal hits 2015 from what I remember. Were you affected at all by that? No, luckily the epicenter was to the east and Nepal hits 2015 from what I remember. Were you affected at all by that? No.

Luckily, the epicenter was to the east of where our school and our home is based. I mean, we felt it, and it definitely shook the entire country, but the epicenter was to the east. And so, I mean, we were affected in the sense that there was a blockade shortly after India shut the border down. And it was hard, not like the country is so small. So everywhere was just rushing to help. And, you know, everyone was trying to do what they could to help in relief efforts.

And we did the same. But yeah, the natural disasters and earthquakes are a very real threat. And we were in the midst of building this dream school of ours. And we had to go back to the drawing boards completely and look at earthquake-proof technology and rammed earth, which is what we did at that time. And yeah, the earthquake was serious though. Yeah. I mean, it also adds the element of, wow, it's sort of like a real representation. I mean, I don't know if there were smaller ones before that, but it's a reminder of at any given moment, we are in the middle of a zone where there's not only natural devastation and extreme poverty, but also there are big events, you know, extreme poverty. But also, you know, there are big,

there are big events, you know, geothermal events that happen here that can be incredibly dangerous. I mean, did that, did that scare you? Did that make you rethink anything or no? Yeah. I mean, every day in Nepal, I have a moment where I'm just like, is this real? Like, I should be reading about this in the New York Times. Like, it's, yeah, you're in it. You're in this very, very harsh reality. It's a country that's landlocked, that's rural, that's food deficit, that's reliant on its borders, which are completely covered in Himalayan mountains to the north and to the south, you know, the plains of India, you know, then you throw flooding or a natural disaster on

top of it, cultural issues, lack of education and development and violence against women. And the days are just like some days I feel like I'm just living in a dream. They're so, so hard and the challenges are so, so real. But yeah, I think it also creates an opportunity to create real change and be a part of something. And that's what I love about the work. Yeah. Do you feel like the kids that are your kids and then the 500 kids that have gone through education through you, it seems like a lot of them are now sort of like they're starting to reach sort of like the college age and they're leaving Nepal to go to school, which is an incredible opportunity. Is it your sense that that will be their first step out of

the country and that many of them will stay out of the country or that there's an intention to come back. Yeah, so we've had, I think we're on our fourth batch of graduates now. And out of about 100 graduates, only three have gone internationally. And the majority of our student population is really, really passionate

about our community. We're looking to educate changemakers. We're looking at kids who really want to stay within Nepal, create change in Nepal, become activists, become the first in their generation, oftentimes to become educated. So what we're seeing actually is a real desire of kids to, and these young people, they make me call them young adults now, to really stay in the country. To roll their eyes and like, bomb. We're young adults. It's like the universal response.

Yeah, so that's been really hopeful. We have graduates. We run a Blink Now Futures program, and they're studying agriculture and going to nursing school and becoming health assistants and going into finance and banking and science and engineering. And it's been so much fun. This stage of, you know, once you get through the teenager stage, I think it becomes the becoming age and they are becoming who they're going to be. And they're rock stars. And it's kind of coming back to my beginning too of college drop-offs and college applications. My daughter, Nisha, who did end up applying to go international. She came downstairs to me one day and she's like, mom, it's college essay. Like they say you should write about this like real experience. I don't know if I want to write about what happened to me and, and this and that. And I'm like, well, don't write about something else, write about something fun. So she goes back, she writes her college essay. She comes down, shows it to me, and it's, I'm the oldest of 50 kids is the first line. And then my husband and

I dropped her off at her gap year on a college campus earlier this year. So it's kind of reliving that initial part and that start of my story through our children, which is magical. And no matter whatever they decide, some of them are doing internships. Some of them will do vocational school. Some of them will go on to college in Kathmandu or in India or internationally. And it's watching their journeys kind of take flight. Yeah. It's exciting. It's amazing and beautiful. You mentioned your husband.

And so you're married now and actually you're a new mom of your first child who actually is biologically yours. Congrats. Part of that story though, I know this is not the easiest thing for you to talk about, was a couple of years back, you lost a child in Nepal. Are you okay talking about that? Yeah, I can talk about it a little bit. Yeah, I lost my beautiful 20-month-old adoptive son. His name was Ravi in a really tragic accident. And it, yeah, it was the hardest thing I've ever gone through. Hopefully it is the hardest thing I'll ever have

to go through. And it definitely shook who I am and who our organization is. And he was the love of my life. He was everything. I'd had him since he was two months old. And he came to me as a three-pound, severely malnourished infant who'd lost his mom and dad. And obviously that comes with a lot of closeness. We were in the NICU. I was skin to skin with him for months and watching him sort of overcome that malnutrition difficulty. And he was our youngest and my baby. And when I lost him, it felt like the end of everything. And I thought it was over. I thought my life was over. It's taken me on a journey through grief and through, I wouldn't even say I'm through it or that you'll ever get through it, but a journey of healing. And I kind of had to stop everything. And it was a really difficult thing that our family went through and something I wouldn't wish on anyone

joining that horrific club. You went, you actually, you returned, you came back to, to your parents' home or to New Jersey? Yeah, I had to be basically carried out of Nepal. And I had to come home, and it was a very, very dark period in my life. And, yeah, I had to be pretty much spoon-fed. I was in therapy and grief counseling constantly. I couldn't be left alone. I went through the darkest period of my life and try to get to the sort of light at the end of the tunnel is I had just won CNN Heroes,

which is this big humanitarian award. And part of CNN Heroes is that you do this Annenberg training to kind of help your nonprofit. And it was a couple months after we lost Ravi and it was in LA. I like, my team's like, you have to get out of, there was a snowstorm. They're like, you have to get out of the cold. Like you have to get out of your house. You have to stand up and get out of bed. And by some miracle, I get on the plane. And I remember the check-in. It said, are you traveling with an infant on your lap? And I was like, that's it. I can't do it. I'm going to go back. And I ultimately get through it. I get on the plane. And I am meeting one of my board members out there. Her name's Libby Delaina. She's like, let's go out.

I'm going to take you out. You haven't been out of bed in days. So we go out. And that night, I meet my husband, Jeremy. That was like my first night out of bed in months. And he was in LA. And yeah, we met. And later that weekend after the training at Annenberg, he asked me to go to Joshua Tree and we go out camping and climb on the rocks of Joshua Tree in the sun. And we've kind of been together ever since.

Did he know at that moment what you were going through? He knew we'd met about six months prior at the due lectures. And so we had known of each other. And yeah, he'd been following a little bit about what I had been going through and we'd been in touch. And yeah, it's interesting when you go through grief and loss. I had a few counselors who told me, you know, people who you think are going to be the ones that are there for you and by your side are often disappointing. But at the same time, people will show up out of nowhere, out of the woodwork and be by your side and they're going to help you get through this and they'll be the most unexpected people. And he was that person for me. He just somehow knew what to say and knew how to be there for me in that

moment. And there was a connection that, I don't know, it made me believe in something again. I don't know what it was, but it felt to me like a miracle of sorts. Yeah. As you're back in the States and recovering and connecting with a new love, what's happening with the kids and with the 50-something kids who call you mom in Nepal? Yeah, I start writing them love letters. And I start, you know, just FaceTiming with them. And I was still in therapy. And Jeremy and I start together planning a trip back. And he says, you know, I'll come with you.

And we decided to go back together. But in that few months, it's the longest time I've ever been away from my children. Yeah, I start to write them love letters. And they knew. I think they knew what I was going through. And I still have some guilt about leaving them in that moment. But at the same time, I tried to tell them like, this is what I need to do to get through this and I'm going to come back. But yeah, it was a really hard time. And luckily we have other house parents

now. Sakshaman and Kriti and the aunties and uncles were in the house, so they were well cared for. And it was a bit of a test, but we got through it. And eventually, Jeremy and I came back to Nepal, and we were together. And it validated even more that he could fit into the picture. And we got back to Nepal. What's that like when you and Jeremy drive back up to the home and come out and see all the kids and the aunties and uncles for the first time? It was both hard to be back, but also just beautiful to hold the kids and make it back to Nepal and back home. And knowing that it would be different, but that I would be okay and I could be there again. The healing, just another step, I think, in the healing journey.

Yeah. And at the same time, you and Jeremy are falling in love. Yeah. Love, I mean, with great loss, you know, love is the scariest thing ever, right? Like, love is the reason why grief and loss hurt so much. And so to think that I would do that again, like fall in love again with another, a different kind of love. But yeah, it was, it felt scary too and brave. And I also didn't, you don't always have a choice when you fall in love. And, but slowly I felt like laughter and joy and music in the house. It all sort of started to come back. And that's what it does. I had another mom who told me like, it's this like letting the light in little, little by little. And you'll notice these moments where

you're just like laughing again or where you're able to sort of feel the grief lift. And that's what happened, I think, Jeremy, definitely. And being with the kids again helped get me to that place where I could function and get back to my work and get, I don't know, you always say get through it, but I'm not. And you just keep going somehow. I have a friend of mine who lost a husband very young and actually has sort of become a bleeding voice in grief. Yeah. And she's like, you don't ever get through it. You're different because of it. You carry it with you for the rest of your life. It changes you. Exactly. You're different because of it. You carry it with you for the rest of your life. It changes you. So as you sort of reintegrate almost into the family in Nepal and with Jeremy now.

So because Jeremy is from Canada, one of the nice ones. Yay, Canada! All of the nice ones, actually. So now, I mean, it's got to be interesting, too, because you not only fall in love, you get married. And as we mentioned, you have a child together. And so now you're, okay, so you've got your kids and your family in Nepal

and you've got your work in Nepal and you've got your great work, which is expanding and starting to move out beyond the boundaries of that. And you've got Jeremy and you've got your new child. When you, so it's not, you know, now you're sort of making decisions also as a team within a bigger team.

When you think about the life that you want to create with Jeremy and your daughter, and then the life you want to create with your kids in Nepal and the foundation and everything that you want to build, the impact that you want to have. Do you look far out into the distance at this point or is it more living day to day? What's your approach? I think when you have a child, biological or otherwise, you look at them and their innocence and their purity and you just think I want them to grow up in the best world that they can and you know every time you have a baby or

a child of any sorts you're just like I need this world to be better for them and so I think it only deepened my mission and our work as an organization. And when you hold that precious life and you realize, yeah, just the world that you want your child raised in. And I want to believe in a world without war and without extreme poverty and suffering, in a world where we can care for our most vulnerable and for our children and to raise our children with having their most basic human needs met. And every child, I mean, we always say our own child or our biological children. I think what we need is to redefine what family is because our children are our children in Nepal, here. And until we're able to truly expand our definition of family and who we consider ours and what we care or don't care about, I think we're going to continue to let our children down.

And that's how we've gotten this place of children suffering. And so, yeah, I think having Ruby and having Nisha and Padam and Santos and Asmita and Maya and all of my children, I look at them every day and I'm like, this is why. And I think, you know, that's what having a child does. You're just like, I'm doing it for them because that love goes so far. Yeah. So I think what having my biological child and Jeremy really illustrated for me was just, let's do this. And to do it together with a partner who makes you breakfast and brings you coffee. And he's a filmmaker, so that's just extra awesome.

Right. You guys are actually making a documentary together, which is amazing. We're making a documentary, and he's constantly getting footage and doing projects there and back and forth. So, yeah, it's all come and fit into the puzzle and only made our mission, our vision and our plans for the future all the stronger. And, yeah, we've got so much more work to do in this world of ours, I still believe in that bigger picture of children being educated and cared for and safe and loved. And I think we can do it in our lifetime. I really can. I think we're going to inch our way there closer and closer, little by little. So as we come full circle, if I offer out the phrase to you, to live a good life, what comes up? Hmm. Empathy, caring for others, children, and joy, and laughter, and hope in the future.

I think holding on to hope for sure. Thank you. Thanks. Thank you so much for listening. And thanks also to our fantastic sponsors who help make this show possible. You can check them out in the links we have included in today's show notes. And while you're at it, if you've ever asked yourself, what should I do with my life? We have created a really cool online assessment that

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