Cadre Today Interview With Speakwonder

Foreign Cadre. How are we doing? Turn on my little circle light here. Name the song, y' all. What is it? It's got a good Monday morning feel, doesn't it? Eyes are real, tears shed, swirls must have crossed. Said you don't know me, you don't even care T North. Name this song, buddy. What is it? Said you don't know me, you know where she stands. Good song, sad song, but a good rainy Monday morning song to kick off Cadre today. Today. I know we're supposed to be seeing Speak Wonder this morning for a little interview.

We're gonna bump that a little bit later into the time continuum, but I still wanted to go ahead and bop on in and kick off our Monday like I always have the opportunity to do. Hey, you know what? I'm glad I'm here. I'm glad you're here. I know what I know and I care about you. That's my fuel to be within this space, to be a responsible citizen in the Cadre sphere. Alongside each of you, we all have experience. We all have the catalyst of caring for ourselves in the world and others in the world so the world can be well and can move and can respond.

So today, if you're wondering why such a sad song to kick off the live stream, that song is called Boston by the band Augustana. I think they're kind of a one hit wonder, but that song is. Is nice and sticky. It kind of stays with you. And today is the day, the running of the 129th Boston Marathon. So a big group of people are in Boston while they're in Hopkintown getting ready to run back to Boston where the finish line is. You actually run about one mile of the Boston Marathon in Boston. A little trivia point for you.

Last year I had the opportunity to run Boston. I am not a, a runner. How they're culturally kind of often set up as being, you know, elite athlete or someone who really likes running or someone who's very disciplined in their running. I have spent the last, oh, 20 years or so kind of busting that mold down and creating pathways for other people to see that you can, you can run in different ways, you can marathon in different ways and for different reasons. I ran all the world majors for, for charities, and Boston was my last major and I ran it for National Ms.

Society, Ms. Society. If you think about all the people who support them and give money to them, it's 6% of people out of all of their givers are people who don't have any direct connection to Ms. And I am one of those 6%. You know, they often raise that number up. Like, yeah, like, this is really cool. We have people who don't even have a connection to Ms. Who care about Ms. And I go, I want to broadcast that number because that number's insanely low. Like, if the only people who care about the thing that you're talking about are people who are directly affected by the thing you're talking about, it's a really bad marketing campaign.

That's a really bad business plan. And so that's the work I've been doing with ms, going, how do you invite people to care, to know, to be aware of, to have it be front of mind when there's millions of things that you can have front of mind that you care about. I want to tell you a story about my Boston Marathon. So at about mile nine, I ran up next to someone who was running their first marathon. You know, they started a conversation with me. I love when that happens. It's the reason why I do marathons, to go and get to meet people I don't know yet.

And we started talking and he shared this was his first marathon. He asked me, is this your first marathon? Like, no, I've been around for a bit. This was number 40 for me. And he's like, wow. And he's like, so are you running? I go, no. Like, I love running for charity. He's like, oh, who are you running for? He's like, I'm running for Ms. Society. And he was running for a veteran foundation also running for charity. But he shared how he tried to get onto the Ms. Team to fundraise for Ms. Because his mom has Ms.

And in that moment, I was like, oh, gosh. Like, I'm the one who doesn't have a direct connection to ms, who is on team Ms. And he has a connection and didn't get on team Ms. And all of a sudden you go, imposter. Do I belong here? Well, a mile later he's like, oh, you need to meet my mom. His mom, who has Ms. Was on the side of the road about a mile down the road. And I got to meet his mom and his dad and him, obviously. And it reminded me of the power of following, the power of what we always talk about here to kick off Mondays.

And that's this idea of followership, not as being this passive, second best thing to leading, but a really great opportunity to impact the world in. I was following within the stories and within the energy of people whose lives are ripped apart by this icky, ugly Ms. And how lonely is the world when people live in a space where the only people who care about the things that they're dealing with are the people who have things that they're dealing with. In mile 10 of Austin Marathon, I got to meet a woman.

I didn't catch her name, but she double hand shook my hand and said thank you. And you know, we stopped and we talked for a few minutes because, because I don't care about running. I'm absolutely okay stopping on the side of the road for a long time and talking with people. And in that moment, me being the one of the 6%, me being the one who had the opportunity to run, for, to run with, to run in space of was a great reminder of. So if you have Boston Marathoners in your life today, or if you go ahead and see on the news, hey, Boston Marathon happened today, then you start seeing the jackets and you start seeing.

Sometimes it's really easy to go. Those are the people who are leading. Those are the people who are self determined and self ran and da, da, da, da, da, da. I invite you to flip that coin for a moment and go. Those people are the ones following within, mission, purpose, then the energy of others. There may be some 30,000 people running Boston Marathon today, but there is 10 times as many people who are setting the course for them. So yeah, let's clap it out for those marathoners today. But if you're like me, I'm going to clap 10 times more for all those people who never get the medal, who never get the glory, who actually set the course for those people to do the thing right.

When I ran for Ms. Last year, I was one of those people. I was not the one who was going to be on the, on the, on the front line of my life has been impacted by, but I was the one going, I'm going to amplify the voice of those people who need to be heard in order, right, to maybe make the world a little bit more balanced. So wherever you are, whatever's going on today, consider how you can follow. For all y' all who ticker taped in over the last couple of minutes, thanks for spending some time today.

Back to a little sad Boston to play us out. Sam.