 |
Superpowers for Good: Empowering Changemakers for Social Impact via Regulated Investment Crowdfunding from the SuperCrowd.Devin Thorpe for Congress Author: Devin Thorpe
We host changemakers who are using regulated investment crowdfunding for social impact--impact crowdfunding--as impact investors or social entrepreneurs, catalyzing change with leadership skills we call superpowers. www.superpowers4good.com Language: en Genres: Business, Entrepreneurship, Investing Contact email: Get it Feed URL: Get it iTunes ID: Get it |
Listen Now...
The Hidden Cost of Changing the World: Why Changemakers Need Healing, Too
Tuesday, 27 October, 2026
Watch the show on television by downloading the SuperCrowd.tv Channel app to your Roku, Google TV or Amazon Fire TV or e360tv channel app to your Roku, LG or Amazon Fire TV. You can also see it on YouTube.Devin: What is your superpower?Dr. Rhonda: I have lived the very thing that I now am helping people to navigate in their lives.The people working hardest to change the world can sometimes be the ones who neglect themselves most. Their commitment to a cause is admirable, but what happens when the work they love begins to undermine their health?Dr. Rhonda Tsoi-A-Fatt knows that question personally.After 11 years running a consulting practice focused on social justice, Rhonda made a difficult decision: sunset her company and pursue a new mission. Through her healing retreat center, she wants to help the leaders who spend their lives serving others find the rest and restoration they need.Her motivation came from an experience she could no longer ignore.While organizing healing retreats for other leaders, Rhonda was struggling with her own health. Ordinary illnesses lingered for weeks. She faced significant knee and shoulder problems and eventually took a three-month sabbatical.During the COVID-19 pandemic, slowing down gave her body time to recover. It also changed how she understood the needs of the people she had spent years supporting.“I began to see how my body was healing itself just because I was taking the time to slow down and pay attention to my body and pay attention to my health and well-being,” Rhonda told me.She began recognizing similar patterns among the changemakers in her fellowship programs. Exhaustion, insomnia and declining health were common among people who gave so much to their work that they paid little attention to their own needs.Rhonda connects this pattern to John Henryism, the story of a man who works so hard to beat the machines that he ultimately dies from exhaustion.As she explained, “We grind ourselves to dust and work ourselves to the bone in order to achieve something that is so important.”That is a sobering warning for anyone building a mission-driven business, leading a nonprofit or fighting for social justice. Dedication alone does not guarantee sustainable impact.Rhonda’s new retreat center, planned for North Carolina, is designed to offer individual and small-group experiences that may include breathwork, meditation, massage, sound baths and other healing practices. Her approach emphasizes helping people carry lessons from their retreats into everyday life.Her work also reflects a deeper lesson about leadership: personal hardship can become a source of wisdom when we take time to understand it.For Rhonda, that means helping changemakers process difficult experiences rather than simply pushing through them. She encourages people to journal, talk through their experiences and seek support from a business coach when needed.The goal isn’t to abandon a meaningful mission. It is to pursue that mission in a way that protects the person doing the work.The most sustainable way to change the world may begin with learning how to care for yourself.tl;dr:Rhonda’s transition from social justice consulting to healing retreats reflects a commitment to helping changemakers restore their health and energy.Her personal health struggles revealed the dangers of relentless work and the importance of rest, reflection and sustainable leadership.Iyoku Healing Retreat Center plans to offer individualized healing experiences incorporating ancestral traditions and practices that nurture mind, body and spirit.Rhonda’s superpower is transforming lived experience into empathy, helping changemakers navigate personal challenges and make decisions aligned with their lives.She encourages leaders to process emotions, reflect on setbacks, learn from experience and pursue meaningful impact without sacrificing well-being.How to Develop Empathetic Experience As a SuperpowerRhonda’s superpower is turning lived experience into empathy that helps other changemakers navigate difficult decisions. She explained, “I have lived the very thing that I now am helping people to navigate in their lives.” Having experienced professional stress, health struggles and the challenges of building mission-driven organizations, she can approach others with “empathy and care” and help them consider their personal healing journeys. Her experience allows her to offer guidance that goes beyond abstract advice because she understands the emotional and practical realities of doing difficult work while trying to maintain personal well-being.Rhonda recently coached a client in her late 50s who wanted to launch a nonprofit. Drawing on her own experience founding two companies and two nonprofits, Rhonda understood the substantial time, effort and energy a startup can demand. Rather than immediately outlining the tasks required to launch the organization, she asked her client to consider what she wanted her life to look like over the next three years. Together, they compared that vision with the realities of a startup’s first three years. If the commitment aligned with her client’s goals, Rhonda would help her move forward. If not, they could explore another way to make a meaningful community impact without compromising her health or family priorities.How to Develop This SuperpowerRhonda’s advice offers practical lessons for anyone working to make a positive difference.Turn setbacks into learning opportunities. When something goes wrong, resist the urge to dwell on failure. Ask yourself what the experience can teach you.Separate learning from self-blame. A disappointing outcome does not mean you are a failure. Focus on understanding what happened and how you can grow.Make time for reflection. Step away from your daily responsibilities to examine difficult experiences. Do not assume that moving straight to the next task means you have learned from the last one.Write down what you learn. Journal about your challenges, identify recurring patterns and record lessons you can apply to future decisions.Process your emotions, not just the facts. Recognize the feelings connected to setbacks. Mission-driven work often carries deep personal meaning, so emotional recovery deserves attention alongside practical problem-solving.Talk things through with others. Have honest conversations with trusted people and consider working with a business coach when you need additional perspective.Align your ambitions with your life. Before committing to a demanding project, consider your health, family, personal priorities and the kind of life you want to build.Use your experience to help others. Once you have reflected on a challenge, share what you learned with people facing similar situations. Your experience may help them make more thoughtful decisions.By following Rhonda’s example and advice, you can make empathetic experience a skill. With practice and effort, you could make it a superpower that enables you to do more good in the world.Remember, however, that research into success suggests that building on your own superpowers is more important than creating new ones or overcoming weaknesses. You do you!Guest ProfileRhonda Tsoi-A-Fatt (she/her):CEO / Founder, Ayoku Healing Retreat CenterAbout Ayoku Healing Retreat Center: Ayoku Healing Retreat Center is a restorative sanctuary for mission-driven leaders carrying the weight of their work - opening in January 2027 in North Carolina. Rooted in the belief that personal healing is essential to the work they do, Ayoku exists to support nonprofit professionals, movement leaders, and philanthropists through culturally grounded experiences that nourish the mind, body, and spirit. Meaning “joy remains” in Yoruba, Ayoku embodies the belief that rest is not a reward to be earned, but a necessary practice for those committed to creating greater impact. Through immersive retreats and holistic wellness practices, including body work, ancestral healing, peer coaching, leadership development, and an intentional community of mission-focused peers, Ayoku equips individuals and organizations with the tools to care for themselves as deeply as they care for others.More than a retreat center, Ayoku is a growing community dedicated to transforming how we think about the role of resilience within leadership and collective care. By creating intentional spaces for reflection, restoration, and reconnection, Ayoku empowers leaders to return to their work with renewed clarity, deeper joy, and the capacity to lead with greater purpose, presence, and perseverance.Website: ayokuhealing.comCompany Facebook Page: facebook.com/ayokuhealingBiographical Information: For more than 25 years, Dr. Rhonda Tsoi-A-Fatt has dedicated her life to advancing equity, strengthening communities, and supporting the leaders who make lasting social change possible. As an internationally recognized researcher and strategist, business leader, published author, public speaker, and iyanifa, Dr. Tsoi-A-Fatt has spent her career partnering with philanthropic institutions, nonprofit organizations, government agencies, and movement leaders to design initiatives that foster healing, strengthen leadership, and create more just and equitable futures for all.As Founder and CEO of The Moriah Group - an organization she founded in 2015, Dr. Tsoi-A-Fatt advised organizations and institutions navigating systems change, leadership development, and social impact. She made the decision to close the firm in 2026, after 11 years of operation. Creating and leading nationally recognized initiatives including Forward Promise, a movement dedicated to improving outcomes for boys and young men of color through healing-centered approaches, Dr. Tsoi-A-Fatt’s dedication to the advancement of minority communities remains the core tenet of her work.Following years of experiencing leadership burnout, Dr. Tsoi-A-Fatt found herself reflecting not only on the work she had accomplished, but on the personal cost of sustaining it. After decades of leading organizations, supporting communities, and pouring into others, she experienced firsthand the exhaustion and grief so common among mission-driven leaders. At the same time, she recognized that this experience was far from unique. Time and again, she had witnessed and advised those in her industry on how to carry the weight of their work, despite lacking spaces that promote restoration for themselves. That realization became the catalyst for Ayoku Healing Retreat Center.As the next evolution of Dr. Tsoi-A-Fatt’s life’s work, Ayoku aims to be a permanent sanctuary where nonprofit professionals, philanthropists, and entrepreneurs can reconnect with themselves through culturally grounded healing practices, holistic wellness experiences, leadership development, and intentional community. Rooted in the belief that personal healing is essential to the work they do, Ayoku reflects Dr. Tsoi-A-Fatt’s vision of a world where the people dedicating their lives to serving others are equally supported in sustaining their own wellbeing, joy, and humanity.LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/rhondainspiresInstagram: @ayokuhealingSponsored by:Join us Monday, November 9th, at 7 PM Eastern/4 PM Pacific for the SuperCrowd.tv pregame Tailgate Party with Farm to Pet, factory tour and webinar. This event will be unlike anything you’ve experienced before. Scheduled right before the Monday evening game, you’ll enjoy getting into the mood for some football as you learn more about investing in Farm to Pet. Register for free now.Register for Free Now!Impact jobs this weekSenior Director, Fund Finance — Local Initiatives Support Corporation (LISC) · Remote (United States) · $154,236–$196,651/yrSenior Asset Manager – Lending — Local Initiatives Support Corporation (LISC) · New York, NY · $102,000–$127,000/yrVice President, Partnerships & Philanthropy — Social Finance · San Francisco, CA · Hybrid · $190,000/yrSee all open rolesComing upNov 9, 7 PM ET / 4 PM PT — Pregame Tailgating with Farm to Pet: a special Superpowers for Good episode with a one-hour virtual site visit and barbecue before the game. #adNov 10, 8 PM ET / 5 PM PT — Impact Member networking session: a private networking session for Impact and Max-Impact Members, who’ll get registration details by email. Upgrade to join →Nov 19 — Superpowers for Good Live Pitch: raising through Reg CF? Pitch live to active investors, free if selected. Apply by Oct 29 →Feb 4, 2027 — SuperGreen Live: a global virtual gathering connecting climate solutions with the capital and community to scale them. Learn more →Anytime — Join the SuperCrowd Impact League: get recognized for your Reg CF impact investments, see how you compare with your peers, and win prizes. It’s free. Start now →See the full community event calendarThank youOur Max-Impact Members: Alisa Evans, Mission Enrollment | Brian Christie, Brainsy | Cameron Neil, Lend For Good | Carol Fineagan, Independent Consultant | Dion Whitman, Call4USA | Eric Coury, Arthia AI | Joey Hayes, thru | John Berlet, CORE Tax Deeds, LLC. | Justin Smith, Contractor+ | Justin Starbird, The Aebli Group | Ken Steele, Rotarian | Lory Moore, Lory Moore Law | Marcia Brinton, High Desert Gear | Mark Grimes, Networked Enterprise Development | Mike Babbit | Coledger Solutions | Mike Green, Envirosult | Nick Degnan, Unlimit Ventures | Paul Lovejoy, Stakeholder Enterprise | Pearl Wright, Global Changemaker | Scott Thorpe, Philanthropist | Sharon Samjitsingh, Health Care Originals | Add Your Name HereAdvertise with usManage the volume of emails you receive from us by clicking here.We share educational information—not investment advice. Some links may generate compensation. See our full disclosure.We use AI to help us write compelling recaps of each episode. Get full access to Superpowers for Good at www.superpowers4good.com/subscribe
