Episode 6: Embracing Zones Of Genius w/ Lewis Raven Wallace
“None of this would matter if we were doing it alone. We’re actively resisting the dominant culture through collaboration… which comes with, perhaps, individual risks [that are worth it].”
-Lewis Raven Wallace
In this episode, Mia is joined by independent journalist Lewis Raven Wallace for a conversation about accessing our Zone Of Genius and what it means for the practice of Shared Power in collaboration.
Zone Of Genius can be defined as a flow state that takes you “beyond the sum of its parts,” as Lewis says in this episode.
When each of us resides within our Zone Of Genius, we’re better able to add value to the world, individually and collectively. That’s why we aspire to engage with justice & equity work from that place.
Lewis joins me to discuss how we both engage from within our Zone Of Genius in regular collaboration together, why solidarity is both a skill and a “practice”, and why shared power is a long-term commitment.
Listen to the Full Episode
What You’ll Learn in This Episode:
[11:14] How to partner or collaborate from within your Zone Of Genius
[15:50] Why solidarity is both a practice & a skill
[18:45] Why shared power through collaboration matters (for lasting change)
[26:07] Lewis’s advice for leaders who are trying to engage with justice & equity work from within the Zone Of Genius
Featured On The Show:
Lewis Raven Wallace (he/they/ze) is an independent journalist and podcast host based in Durham, North Carolina, USA. He’s also a 2022 Movement Journalism Fellow with Interrupting Criminalization and the author of The View from Somewhere: Undoing the Myth of Journalistic Objectivity.
Mia Henry (she/her) is the host of the Shared Power Podcast. Mia is the founder and CEO of Freedom Lifted, a training and coaching firm that supports leaders and organizations committed to justice and equity.
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Full Episode Transcript:
Mia Henry: Welcome to the Shared Power Podcast, a limited series for organizations and leaders committed to collectively advancing justice and equity. I'm your host, Mia Henry. I'm the CEO of Freedom Lifted and the daughter of activists, educators, entrepreneurs, and survivors. I've had the honor of teaching, facilitating, and co-leading in nonprofits and schools for over two decades.
I've learned a lot, but it hasn't always been easy. There are conversations that I had, or I wish I had, that create the conditions for more effective collective leadership. In this podcast, we will explore some of these conversations, diving deeply into topics that will help us learn to build trust, navigate conflict, and lead in partnership with one another. If you believe that relationship building is the foundation for effective work for justice, you are in the right place. Join me as we explore the ingredients of leading with shared power.
Today's conversation will feature the award winning independent journalist, and my dear friend, Lewis Raven Wallace. Lewis is a 2022 Movement Journalism Fellow with Interrupting Criminalization. He is also a podcast host and the author of the game changing book, The View From Somewhere: Undoing the Myth of Journalistic Objectivity. I met Lewis when I was working at the Chicago Freedom School, and we were both connected to a dedicated community of abolitionists, thinkers, and doers. Over the years, we've supported each other as friends and as colleagues, including developing training for journalists and media makers. Together, we talk about how great co-facilitations go beyond just working alongside each other. Through the portal of reflection and the practice of sharing power, we can access our zones of genius. When our talents and strengths are aligned and complimentary. Here's my conversation about bringing our best selves to partnerships with Lewis Raven Wallace.
MH: Hey!
LW: Thanks for having me. I'm so excited.
MH: Yeah, I am too. I just have enjoyed working with you. Enjoyed is an understatement. I mean, it's really helped me grow as an activist and as a facilitator to be able to work with you over the past few years. For me, I've brought up this idea of zones of genius, which was a term that was coined by Gay Hendricks. When I think about us together, because I always felt like we were working in flow together, we were always at our best, not just when we were actually in front of people facilitating, and holding space, but also when we're planning, when we're debriefing. When we're cooking up new ideas together. But briefly, I'll go over what the context is for zones of genius. And then let's talk about. I want to hear your thoughts on the magic ingredients for collaboration. Or their intentional ingredients – maybe it's not always magic. So quickly, zones of genius comes out of – it's one of four zones that Gay Hendricks has coined. One of the zones is the zone of incompetence. And in the zone of incompetence, we're engaging in something that we're simply not good at. And there's, of course, a lot of tension with this. This is me trying to play basketball. It is not what I need to be doing. I have no goal for getting better at basketball, so I just need to not do it and enjoy watching others. The zone of competence. When we're in that zone, we can get the job done, but we are no better really than the next person when we're trying to do it. So it's not a fulfilling zone for most of us. We're just going through the motions, if you will. When we're in the zone of excellence, we feel like we're doing something valuable and we feel valued, right? Because we're usually doing something we're very, very good at compared to most people. We're doing highly skilled work. Maybe it's work we have a degree in, or we have a certificate in, and we're usually paid or can be paid to do that work. So the zone of excellence is where a lot of us strive to be in, but it's not necessarily an effortless zone. The zone of genius is less effort and more, like I said before, we’re in flow. This term really applies to when all our talents, our skills, and our strengths are aligned. We're in that zone of genius. We are doing things that we're uniquely good at in the world, and that we simply love to do. And when we're doing that work, it's like time and space disappear. And so this is where we can add most value to the world and ourselves. If we're in our zones of genius, a lot of leadership experts believe that if we can move and we're spending most of our time in that zone, we're not only living our best lives and our work, but also doing the most that we can do for the world around us. What are your thoughts on that whole idea of zones, and how that plays not just in facilitating with me, but in co-facilitation?
LW: Yeah. I mean, I love that idea of a flow state and sort of a mode that you get into that is beyond the sum of its parts. And, you know, I feel like I see that. I can see that in other people, like I see it in my partner who's an artist. I see it in you when you're facilitating. And I can feel it in myself. I think especially in the kind of collaborative space that we have created together that's collaborative in more than one sense because it's what we do is popular education. And so we're sharing things that we know, we're sharing frameworks, and we're asking questions and people are bringing their own wisdom. And for me that, you know, like if I think a zone of excellence for me is probably like speaking in front of people, but I never experienced that and that kind of flow state of. What you and I have done together, which is facilitating a transformative space with people where we're also teaching and learning and something else that feels larger than the sum of its parts kind of emerges, whether it's a sense of community or a feeling that people are actually being transformed in some way that I think can really only happen through collaborative shared experiences. Like reading about an idea is one thing, but kind of processing through it with other people and bringing your own experiences to it is this other level. And I feel like that's something that I really aspire to be participating in and bringing to others that I have definitely experienced in our collaboration.
MH: So I wanted to also talk more specifically about you and I often come back to a particular training that we put together and co-facilitated in Memphis. So this was in late fall of 2019. We had an opportunity to bring journalists together from across the country. Many of them were based in Memphis, but many people traveled to attend that training. What do we call it, Lewis? What do we call the training?
LW: The training was called Transforming Journalism Beyond Diversity.
MH: Yeah, yes. So yeah, what do you think about when you look back at that training and how do you feel like that connects to getting in that flow for co facilitators?
LW: So that was the third time that we'd done some version of that training, and I feel like I learned so much from you in the process of preparation about feedback and kind of like rigorous processes of feedback, because we did the training once at Allied Media Conference, a very short version, and then we did another half day version in Chicago, and then this was the full day one, and everything about the way that we thought through the full day one was based on the feedback that we'd gotten from our participants. And also, you know, sat with each other and talked through what went well and what didn't, so there was a really rigorous process around, improving on the overall idea and that built on an already rigorous process that you'd had of developing a really similar training for people in public libraries that then when I learned about it, I was like, “Oh, we need to do this with the journalists, we have to.” But even though it was sort of a spontaneous idea for a collaboration, the way that we carried it out had a lot of intentionality. And then I think another really key piece of what made the Memphis training powerful was that we had a really great local partner. Through MLK50, which as an organization had really committed itself to anti-oppression work through all levels of the organization, which is essentially what we're teaching in the training. You know, we're trying to give people context and a framework for anti-oppression work across multiple forms of oppression. And beyond the kind of limited framework of diversity, or like get more people in the room and then the work is done or whatever. And MLK 50 was, as an organization, committing to that. And so they were a great host. And then that meant that all the people who came, some of whom were in the same community in Memphis, but working for more difficult organizations, and for white run and white dominant organizations and legacy news organizations. And then people also came from Illinois and Missouri because there was such a need for it. And so I feel like it was that moment of like, who's in the room, that the people there really want to be there, but are at different levels of learning. Something that I really noticed that we were able to make space for that I was really proud of was like, there were people there who'd been in a million trainings. They'd been in diversity trainings and anti oppression trainings before, and there were people who it was their first kind of space like that, and I feel like there was something in it for everyone, which to me, to bring it back to the zones of genius, I think the strength that you and I were bringing, or the zone of genius bit that you and I are bringing, with that is like a genuine engagement and curiosity. Like we had learned new things just for the purpose of that training that day, because we wanted to learn about Memphis and we wanted to learn about anti oppression journalism history that originates in Memphis. Like the story of Ida B. Wells is a key story that we now tell in all of our trainings for journalists, but at the time, was something that we were just integrating in order to connect the geographic context we were in to its history to the larger points that we were making. And so I'm really happy when I'm learning new things and kind of co- learning with people. And I think that, for me, can be like a portal to the flow state, like the sort of sense of like, Oh, and then this, and then this. And so I think my intuitive sense is that we were kind of modeling that in a way that even the people who'd been in a zillion trainings were like, Oh, you know, this is different, or this feels different, or this feels like there's something here for me that it's not like a 101 reciting of, like, here are the rules that you follow in order to be anti-oppressive. It was like, here's the moment that we're in, here are the struggles we are facing, and then here's some pretty deep history and context to help us understand how to develop our own responses. So, I think that all of that, a lot of that was about preparation, a lot of that was about our relationship, and a lot of it was also about our shared kind of passion for history and new learning and engaging with ideas together toward action. Like it's definitely not a lecture, it's a, we're attempting to get people thinking about what they each can do. I don't know. What do you think got us to that flow state in Memphis?
MH: I am just listening. And, I love how you talked about the portal to the zones of genius. I love this. I think I'm wondering about, we are doing all of this work, but we don't spend a lot of time. I've never felt like, “Oh my gosh, we've been planning this workshop forever.” Even in the preparation and, um, just the whole capsule, you know, of facilitating a training – the beginning, middle and end – always feels so smooth. And I'm wondering, I think about what is the attitude that we bring to it. I think you hit on it when you talk about curiosity. I'm wondering if there's anything else there that you feel that comes up for us when – I feel a pure excitement when I know that I get a chance to work with you on something.
MH: Just a quick break to note that the shared power podcast is sponsored by freedom lifted and our flagship training program, Justice at Work. Justice at Work offers blended learning and professional development for organizations and individuals. For strengthening their commitment to justice and equity in their workplaces and in their communities. This training combines discussions with online modules that teach frameworks and critical history to help you examine the relationship between identity and power. You'll even have opportunities to join live group discussions facilitated by me, Mia Henry. Go beyond diversity and inclusion to find your role in building a more just and equitable world. Learn more and sign up@freedomlifted.com.
MH: And so I'm thinking right now about what is the – besides my love for you and trust in you – you know, I can't facilitate everything with you for the rest of my life. So I'm thinking about for the listeners, what do you look for? You know, or what do you try to cultivate in someone that you are going to hold space with? And you are going to create this learning module with. What is it that we have that people should look for in a partner?
LW: Yeah, well I think there's a lot to be said for we knew each other pretty well before we started facilitating together and over a pretty long period of change and growth in both of our lives and careers too. I knew you before I was a journalist, while I was a journalist, and then I got fired. And you were one of the friends who showed up for me so strongly and like set up a speaking gig for me. And then I came to Kalamazoo where you were, and spoke and it was there that we had this idea to start collaborating on stuff. And that was, I mean, we'd done a little bit of work together before on Freedom Lifted, on the app and stuff, but that was our first organic kind of, like, let's build a thing together. So there was a lot of trust, I think, just from seeing each other in community and in the work and seeing how the other person moves and shows up and it's responsible for things and that kind of stuff that – I mean, I definitely think I at times have entered into collaborations and like hoped for experiences of shared power with people that I didn't know that well and had that go really badly. Just for one or another reason, and that could be circumstantial, it could be compatibility, I don't know. But there were a lot of good, like, data points of, like, I know this person in many important ways already. So that's one thing. And then I think the organic part about it, that we were sitting at Mia's kitchen table just talking about what Mia was doing and talking about what I was thinking about after I'd lost my job in journalism. What Mia was doing with public librarians just seems so relevant for journalists. And it was like, well, what if we did this thing where we, you know, took the stuff that you're doing with the libraries and brought it to journalists? And so there was an organic aspect to it of like, we were doing something that both of us would do. It ended up being a job, but we were doing something that both of us would do, like not for money, not for anything other than like, Oh, this feels exciting.
MH: We didn't have any kind of idea that we could get paid.
LW: We were just like, let's do this. And we didn't get paid for it for a long time. We were just doing it and figuring it out. So I think that's another part of it too, like not having that, and this isn't to say that people can't come into really effective shared power collaborations through a more professional context, but I feel a lot of connection and depth from the fact that it was a more personal thing that was grounded in really an act of solidarity that you were doing with me, of like bringing me out there after I'd been fired to talk about my experience. You're one of the people helping me get on my feet at that time and practicing solidarity in ways that I've reflected so much over the last few years, like on just how much that solidarity is a practice and a skill and that professional context, like journalism is just one example of a professional context that not only doesn't teach or encourage that skill, but almost encourages the opposite. Like you're supposed to be individualistic and concerned about your own career, and competitive with other people, and that's how you do well, and you watch your own back and you don't watch other people's back. So I was coming out of that into the world of Mia's kitchen and was just like, this is so exciting and feels so good, and I feel so seen. And then I think because we've both had a lot of experience already with facilitating, it was just like checking the dots. But you're right that we haven't been afflicted with over-preparation or over-processing, which is because we're both little type A. And I think that can be a side of the type A thing, is leaning toward the perfectionist. I think you're probably more rigorous, though, than I am and that I've learned some things in facilitation, like not just winging every part of it, which is something that I've done before, but like really thinking carefully about certain aspects, and that you're a good balancer to my sort of like, “Oh, we got it. We'll just show up” attitude that I can have. So I think there's elements of similarity and elements of balance too in our collaboration.
MH: So I appreciate you recognizing my love for rigor as you call it, or my tendency towards it. And I really appreciate your value and reflection and doing what we say we're going to do. So I think that I do need to loosen up sometimes, and you help me loosen up, and I trust that because I know you're being thoughtful around it. It's not flippant, you know, let's just go off course from the agenda and give me a heart attack, but let's stop, you know, in every break we check in with each other. How's this going? Should we tweak anything? What might we need to leave out? What might we need to highlight because of what the space is telling us and the people are telling us, right? So there's reflection throughout all of our time together. I know that you hold that very dear, and so then I can trust we can go off script a little bit. Because I know we're gonna be thoughtful about it.
LW: I feel very seen by you saying that I value doing what we say we're gonna do. Because that's an area of growth for me, you know – I can be on the judgmental or the rigid side when it comes to that aspect of accountability in our work. I just really love it when people do what they say they're going to do. And I get really uptight about me not doing what I said I was going to do, but you do have to also adjust and it's a balance, you know, but I think that is like a place where we found in each other a lot of trust in just like the reliability of that. And then before and during and after these trainings, when you have that trust in someone, then you can also be more relaxed and adaptable.
MH: Yes. That is so true. I've been in situations, oh Lord. I've been in situations where you're like. We are going in directions I don't understand. And so I get even more protective right over the agenda, even more more rigid. And that is not good for anybody. As you said, because we are always modeling too. We are always modeling. I forget that. You mentioned before the individualism and journalism, but this is coming up for so many sectors. I was certainly raised to definitely care about people, but also be concerned with myself and some self preservation. And part of that is my identity. And part of it is coming from a family that needed money, cared about money, needed it for safety and security. And so definitely felt like it was important for me to look out for myself and that keeps us from being able to really trust other folks. So I struggle with that as well, but I think the collaboration piece is so important. I've had to relearn. I have to learn about how connecting with others actually does help myself too.
LW: Yeah, totally. I feel like in our political and economic context, it's like any trauma response. Like individualism is a survival tactic in the short term that can make it impossible for us to survive in the long term. And that's kind of an underlying value for me in any kind of collaboration too, is like, none of this would matter if we were doing it by ourselves, because it's not for that, but we're actively resisting a dominant culture by rejecting that. And we're taking certain risks, like you and I are probably both not as like, you know, rich and successful as we would be if we'd focused on ourselves.
MH: Yeah. Well, and focus on ourselves that, you know, at great cost, right? The cost of community, a cost of connection. We may not be rich, but we happy. I'm happy anyway, especially to have you in my life. Okay. So my last question for you, Lewis, though, is what advice do you have for leaders who are really trying to be their best in this moment of such transition, introspection, and I think fear too, of where we're going. And if we're equipped enough to deal with real opposition.
LW: I mean, I've had a lot of points, as you know, in the last couple years where I've just been like, “You know what? I don't want to do it anymore. I want to crawl into a hole instead of doing this work.” And that is tied to fear and to hurt and kind of heartbreak too over processes and formations that we've started that have fallen apart in different ways, or relationships that have fallen apart in different ways, and broken trust, and I think broken trust in myself. So I don't know that I have wisdom for people on this, but I think the way that I'm trying to rebuild trust in myself right now is very much about trusting my gut and also like paying really careful attention to not just what people say, but how people show up. And I think that's why some of the story of our collaboration is a good one for me to keep revisiting because of that. Experiencing how each other shows up was part of what led to an effective collaboration instead of going into the collaboration and then just seeing how the other person would show up, which also sometimes has to happen. Like that has to happen, but an advantage of being 15, 20 years in movement-building work is like, Oh, you can have people that you really, really know and have been building skills alongside of. And so, really following the lived lessons of that rather than like what people say, I think there's so much going on in the current conditions that we're fighting, that is very overwhelming. And then there's also this other layer of overwhelm with social media and kind of neoliberal performances of identity politics, and people using words that hold a really deep meaning for us. Words like solidarity, or transphobia. That it's really easy for folks to sort of platform ideas and use words without action behind it. So that's an area where I'm trying to grow. Because I love words, but being really rigorous about sort of checking on people's actions in alignment with their words as I build with them, and holding myself and the people that I'm in direct collaboration with accountable to doing more than just talking. To actually creating and building things together because the current conditions require that. We're not gonna win on Twitter. You know what I'm saying?
MH:We're not gonna talk our way to liberation.
LW: In fact, that might be an enormous distraction and a sinking ship and a terrible idea. So, I like to always end things with a sinking ship or some sort of sense that, you know, the end is nigh. Oh, no, no. Just kidding. Just kidding. I'm joking.
MH: I think the hope is the practice of sharing power, right? It's just all of us out here who are trying to do it and being okay with it not being perfect, right? Every collaboration, every coalition, every partnership is not good. None of them are gonna be perfect, actually. But they can be good. And it's that re-upping and being okay with like “Let's do it again.” Even though you mentioned Memphis was our third time, I think you said that we did it. And I was like, yeah the first two times, not memorable. We're not talking about those. I'm not saying they're not memorable, but we're not talking about those first couple of times on this podcast. So if we had stopped, even though it was so much we needed to think about and think through and change. If we had stopped after that first time, or that second time, we never would have had Memphis and all of the great work thereafter. So I think part of it is that the promise, the buoy, if you will, I think you used that earlier in this conversation, but we keep this the ship moving. I feel like is on, not the idea, but the practice of shared power, right? Sharing power. So I am so grateful for you, Lewis Raven.
LW: I'm so grateful for you. This has been such a lovely conversation and such a lovely many years of collaboration and learning together.
MH: Yes. You are a gift. I can't tell you that enough. I am a better person because of our friendship and our partnership.
Thanks for tuning in to this episode of the Shared Power Podcast. This podcast is a production of Freedom Lifted. A company that provides training, facilitation, and coaching for leaders rooted in justice and equity. It is produced and edited by Cassandra Sampson at It's 97. Production support also provided by Alicia Tate, Amber Kinney, Alicia Bunger, and the AK Collective. For more information about our work, visit freedomlifted. com or follow us at Freedom Lifted on Instagram, Facebook, or LinkedIn. Join us next time as we continue to explore the ingredients for leading with shared power.