Radha Agrawal: Creating Community with a Global Dance Movement

Takeaways

• The importance of knowing the numbers in developing a successful community or artistic enterprise
• The power of intentionally building our communities 
• The strength of prioritizing community over career and romance
• That dance is a powerful way to combat loneliness and promote well-being
• The role of community in supporting our dreams.

Resources

• Learn more about Radha and her work.
• Find out when DayBreaker is coming to a town near you!
• And explore what the Belong Center offers to combat loneliness (and maybe sponsor a bench!)

Transcript

Radha: [00:00:09] Hi, this is Radha Agrawal with Daybreaker and this is no time to be timid. 

Tricia: [00:00:15] Hey there, I’m Tricia Rose Burt and I want to ask you some questions. What creative work are you called to do but are too afraid to try? Is there a change you want to see happen in your community, but you’re waiting for someone else to step up and do it? Is fear of failure preventing you from starting new things that will make a difference to your life and to others? In this podcast, we look to artists to lead us and show us how they use creativity and courage to make changes in their lives and in the world. Pay close attention because this is no time to be timid. [00:00:53][38.8]

Tricia: [00:00:58] Welcome to the show. We’re so glad you’re joining us. And if you’re a new listener looking for some courage and inspiration, make sure to download the No Time to Be Timid manifesto, which is the show’s guiding principle. Just go to my website, triciaroseburt.com/manifesto to get your copy, then put it up where you can see it and be inspired every day. And if you’re a long time listener and you haven’t downloaded yours yet, go do it so you can be inspired too. And speaking of inspiring, today’s guest is that and more. Radha Agrawal is the co-founder, CEO and Chief Community Architect of Daybreaker, the global morning sober dance and wellness movement. Believe me, you have to be some kind of inspirational if you can get more than half a million people across 33 cities and five continents to get out of bed and start dancing at 6:00 in the morning, completely sober. And she’s been doing it for more than ten years now. And if you think sober means dull, check out Daybreaker’s website or follow them on Instagram. It is wild. Radha’s pretty much unstoppable. In 2020, she and her Daybreaker team toured with Oprah Winfrey on a nine-arena sold out tour, where Radha opened every show and led more than 150,000 people through a movement and dance experience with 30 musicians, dancers and performers behind her. She authored the book Belong, which shares how she and her team built the Daybreaker community and how each of us can find our people and live a more connected life. And MTV named her one of eight Women Who Will Change the World. And those are just a few of her accomplishments. Now, for those of you in more conventional occupations wondering how one ends up as a social entrepreneur on a mission to bring more joy and belonging to the world, you might be surprised to learn that Radha started out as an investment banker. And believe it or not, there’s a much straighter line between where she started and where she is now than you might think. In this episode, Radha shares with us the importance of knowing the numbers and building a successful community or artistic enterprise, an intentional way to build our own communities, that dance is a powerful way to combat loneliness and promote well-being, and that our communities are the key to supporting our dreams. With her biggest Daybreaker tour coming up and other projects in the works like her Belong Center, Radha is a very busy lady. She joined us with a sandwich in one hand and her toddler in the other. And we’re so honored that she could make the time to join us. Hi Radha, we’re so glad you can join us today. [00:03:54][175.8]

Radha: [00:03:55] Hi, Tricia. Good to be here. [00:03:56][1.0]

Tricia: [00:03:57] One of the joys of doing this podcast is I get to research people. In your case, I got to read your fabulous book, Belong. I know that it came out 2017. But to my listeners, if you haven’t read the book, go get it. It’s a really fabulous book. But what I loved about it is you have the whole journey that you’ve been on. So I have a question for you. What made you start in investment banking? [00:04:22][24.7]

Radha: [00:04:23] Great. I love this question. It’s probably the most unlikely path for me, but I think it was honestly to prove to my Indian father that a communications major with a minor in film and business could get a job in investment banking. It also got me to New York City, a city I wanted to live in, you know, for, for since I was in college, I went to Cornell, and I would come down to the city and I just fell in love with the kind of the cultural wow of the place, and just its, the freedom and expression of the city. And, I’ve actually been here ever since. I moved here at 22, and it’s been 23 years. It’s been a 23 year love story. [00:05:06][42.8]

Tricia: [00:05:06] Oh. That’s fantastic. [00:05:07][0.3]

Radha: [00:05:08] Investment banking got me to New York, got me an apartment, got me moved in. It taught me about finance. And not to be afraid of spreadsheets and to really learn and understand kind of the foundation and the kind of building blocks of business. [00:05:19][11.1]

Tricia: [00:05:20] It’s interesting because I started out in business as well, and then I was in it for 15 years and thought, I need to get out of here. And I ran to art school, and when I went to art school, they all said, you’re going to be so glad you have this business background. And they’re right. They were totally right. So do you see that, you know, in what appears to be the most completely different thing right now and that you’re you’re running a global dance movement. Do you see, you know, that investment banking experience kind of blend with what you’re doing now? [00:05:51][31.8]

Radha: [00:05:53] Absolutely. I think the artist community can sort of devalue the foundational sort of needs of how to actually scale and grow something. Yeah. So they’ll start a community, they’ll start an event or they’ll start a club. And just like I want to do it, it’s fun. And then very quickly becomes exhausting because there’s no sort of processes in place and there’s no back end systems that they’ve set up. And so I think that, to have, you know, to build a movement that we did, it really did require organization to be in 33 cities around the world. You know, you couldn’t just do that in a way that was sort of half assed and, and I think, so often when I see community builders, that’s the first thing. They’re like, they’re passionate about a topic. They’re passionate about dance or passionate about theater or whatever, and they just have no understanding or no desire to really get to know numbers and, and how to actually build the foundations of a community business. [00:06:56][62.8]

Tricia: [00:06:57] You know, I just think it’s fantastic. You go to art school and they don’t tell you the business side of it. And whether you’re building a community or you’re a solo entrepreneur, you got to know the numbers. You got to know how to do that. So kicking and screaming a lot at the time, but you got to know how to do it. [00:07:10][13.0]

Radha: [00:07:11] That’s right. You know, I, I just started this, I call it the Belong Institute, and we’re now teaching community builders how to build the community business of their dreams. And that’s actually been really, really important to me is like, how do we pass on to all these incredible community builders who are so excited to support their communities, but again, get exhausted after a few events and then kind of begin petering out, and now you have the next batch and sort of this tourniquet of never ending first time community builders, you know, who never really see things through. So, yeah, I had my first, you know, it was 170 person cohort and, really, really cool to see sort of all the fear around it turned into, okay, now I get what I need to do, and it’s really fun to be able to support that. [00:08:01][50.0]

Tricia: [00:08:02] Yeah. It’s sustainability. How do you keep it sustainable? Before we get into that, though, I have to I have to go to the origin story because I love the story of your epiphany in your book and could relate on several levels. So I know you’ve told before, but I would love for you to talk about that moment when you were like, I’m not leading a life of intention here at all. Yes, I would love to hear you tell that story. [00:08:25][23.6]

Radha: [00:08:26] You know, I think all of us go through these moments of where do I belong? Who am I? Who are my people? You know, and I think that we go through these phases in our lives. I actually identified seven different phases in our life where we’re moving through a transition, whether we’re moving out of our house to college or graduating and getting married and having kids and moving to neighborhoods. And there’s these transitional moments in our lives. And for me, it was this moment I, you know, graduated college, I was living in New York, and I woke up one day and I realized, whoa, you know, I don’t belong. Where are my people are at? I’ve been hanging out in bars and drinking alcohol. I hate alcohol, like, what am I doing? You know, I’m hanging out with people that I met in the gym or here or there, but wasn’t intentional about my community. And yet we are so intentional about our professional careers. And our romantic partners, right. And so think about how many lists you make, like, oh, I want him to be this and that, you know, I want my career to look like this. I want to make this much money. Whatever. But when it comes to friendships, we’re like, okay, great, like the guy that I just happened to meet next to the coffee shop barista, whatever, is like now my friend and it’s no wonder we feel so lonely. It’s no wonder we feel so misunderstood. And so that was this moment, this aha moment for me at 30, where I was going to my birthday, I was organizing my birthday party. I was like, people are coming to my birthday while I care for a few of them most of them I’m like, I don’t really feel a deep connection to. I feel really lonely in this moment. It’s like moving from my 20s to my 30s, and I don’t belong and I don’t even, I’m not even excited to go to my own birthday. Like, this is crazy. And so that was the moment that I realized, you know, what am I doing? What am I prioritizing? And then I looked at society and it’s like, wow. Society prioritizes career and romantic partnership over friendship. And yet friendship and community is the bedrock. It’s the foundation of the last, you know, millennia of the human experience. But only in the sort of recent kind of, you know, 21st century world have we deprioritized community and started prioritizing me, me, me, like my own romance, my own career versus the joy of community. And so when I began prioritizing community first over career and romance and realized, oh my gosh, my community is going to help me build up the business of my dreams. Oh, my community is going to help me find the person of my dreams. And when I began sort of just completely shifting my priorities, that’s when my entire life changed for the better. And yeah, and that’s sort of why I wrote the book. I was like, wow, you know, if I can help other people recognize that the human experience is best experienced in community, and it’s those who love us the most who will actually help us support our biggest dreams. That return to those values, I think is what we need the most right now. [00:11:29][182.9]

Tricia: [00:11:30] Yeah, I agree with you. And I just love the moment when you’re just saying, you know, you were basically like in a bar looking around going, why am I even here? All these people, all these people are just stuck in their phone or making out with people they just met, or way too drunk. I mean, I was like, I’ve been in those places before. Like I’ve just gotten caught up in something and it wasn’t something I chose. Someone else chose this for me. And this isn’t feeding what I’m supposed to be doing. And I think there’s a line in your book when you said you were at the bar and you just ran home. [00:12:00][29.9]

Radha: [00:12:01] Sometimes you just gotta you just got to go. And I do think that sometimes it’s easier to stay than it is to go. And, you know, old me stayed for too long. And I was actually, I’m really proud of myself that I was like, no, enough is enough, and let me go home and sort of sit down with myself and write down. I opened my journal. Never done exercise like this before, but I, like I wrote down three columns of what are the qualities I’m looking for in a friend? So column one was what are the qualities I’m looking for the friend. Column two is what are the qualities I don’t want in a friend. Yeah. And column three was what are the qualities I need to embody in order to attract the friends that will align with my values and my interests. Right? And so it was that beginning journey of just sort of like, what do I need? What do I want? What do I don’t want? How can I show up better? Yeah, that was the sort of beginning of this journey of intentional community building, which changed my life. [00:13:03][62.4]

Tricia: [00:13:04] When I was growing up, I never really felt like I fit in, like, you know, I was teased a lot. I just was always felt like I was kind of on the outside looking in, you know? I never dated anybody. I mean, all that kind of stuff, you know? Did you fit in? Like, you know, were you part of the cool kids? Or were you outside looking in? You know, like, right now you look like a cool kid, but, I mean, were you always that way or, you know, did you always feel like you belonged or when you were, you know, younger and shaping and that kind of thing? [00:13:32][27.9]

Radha: [00:13:33] Yeah. You know, I think being half Japanese, half Indian, living in French, Montreal, Canada, you know, I think that, and when you’re Indian-Japanese, you have inevitably a unibrow and a mustache when you’re like 14. So it’s not cute, let me tell you. Fortunately, it hasn’t grown back. But, yeah, I think that I was such a jock. I, I was at the soccer fields, you know, all my life, I didn’t even really know when I was younger kid, I was just a sporty kid. And I was with my, you know, my twin sister. I was I had a wombmate with my twin sister. So in that sense, I had a buddy. But no, societally, I always felt this existential kind of loneliness like, yeah, you know, I’m I don’t belong in any of these groups and communities, like ethnically, culturally. You know, I look different than the average French-Canadian kid being half Japanese, half Indian eating samosas for lunch instead of, like, a sandwich, you know? Yeah. Right? And you have, like, chickpea curry and like, sushi rolls, which is dope now, it’s dope now. But back then, you know, the kids are like, what are you eating? Like, that’s so gross. [00:14:48][74.9]

Tricia: [00:14:49] Why don’t you have it on white bread? [00:14:50][1.3]

Radha: [00:14:51] Yeah, totally. You know, my parents taught me to create my own community, like, you know, in the places where I didn’t fit in to create my own community. My parents actually launched the gifted children summer camp. Also not cool. They created community for themselves, like their families were in India and Japan, respectively. And so they were adopted by the Portuguese community. We were adopted by the Portuguese community in Montreal where we were raised. So we would go to the Portuguese, you know, cookouts. And we hung out with the Portuguese families. And we went to Hindi school every Sunday and Japanese school every Saturday. So we had all these different kind of communities that we grew up with. And I played soccer too. So I was I would say that I was part of many communities, but never really a part of an intentional community that really aligned with who I was. I think I was still discovering who I was, you know, so I, I sort of just fell in. I was just in all these communities because of my family, because of my interests. But I think, you know, we don’t even know what our values are at that time. So we’re just going with the flow. Yeah. And I never, you know, I never I never even thought of boys. I never even smooched a boy till a 17 years old. I just was so focused on sports and school. So it was really when I went to college, I really kind of started focusing on social connection. I joined a sorority. I was recruited to play soccer at Cornell. I kind of decided to be social chair of this sorority because I was, like, coming from Canada I didn’t have any understanding of of Greek life in America. My roommate had a George Bush framed photo in her room in my sorority, and I literally was like, okay, like, this is America. Like a president in our sorority dorm room house. It was just like, you know, I could tell you a lot of stories, but it was a wild experience, of the whiplash of moving from Canada to the United States and moving away from my family and into the sort of American culture where, you know, I’d be down the hall meeting another Asian girl and like, oh my God, where are you from? And she’s like, I’m from Madison, Wisconsin. And I was like, oh, but like, where are your parents from? And she’s like, oh, well, they’re Chinese, but I mean, but I’m American from Wisconsin, you know, and in Canada, we’re just so proud to be ethnically diverse. There’s a saying Canada is a mosaic of cultures and America’s a melting pot. I was like, oh, my mom from Japan and my dad’s from India. And I was very excited to share about my culture. But I’m American, I’m a very proud American. But I talk about this a lot because, I really encourage my community to get to know their lineage. Like, where are you from? Who are you? Like, where is your DNA from? And how can you more deeply connect with your roots, you know? [00:17:38][166.7]

Tricia: [00:17:53] We’ll get back to the second half of our conversation in a moment but right now I want to tell you about our sponsor, Interbang Books, a Dallas-based independent bookstore with a terrific online collection. At Interbang, their dedicated staff of book enthusiasts will guide you on your search for knowledge and the excitement of discovery. Shop their curated collection online at interbangbooks.com. That’s interabangbooks.com. [00:18:23][30.1]

Tricia: [00:18:47] It’s kind of interesting as you talk, it’s like you were just sort of born to do what you’re doing right now. I mean, all of these experiences just led you to this place, right? It’s just really fascinating. [00:18:58][10.6]

Radha: [00:18:58] I really do feel like a citizen of the world. I really do feel like I don’t belong anywhere, and I belong everywhere. And so I really want to build a world where everyone belongs, you know? [00:19:07][8.7]

Tricia: [00:19:08] Okay, so you wake up one morning and you say, oh, I know I’ll have a sober event at a coffee shop in Manhattan. Like, how did you go “oh, this is what I should do now.” Walk me through that, please. [00:19:23][14.9]

Radha: [00:19:24] Yeah. So this is 11 years ago. I was 34. You know, I think for me, I was just sort of over night life. And I actually was an investor in a nightclub, like the number one nightclub in the world they said, you know, by the dance club magazines. And I would go there, like thinking I was cool and bringing my friends and, you know, and it was just everyone on drugs and everyone on some new designer drug and everyone on their phones and spilled drinks everywhere. And it was like a zombie apocalypse. Like no one was actually listening to the music. No one was dancing. It was just sort of like swaying, like zombies. Like no one was all in, like, dancing, like with their freak flags, you know? And I just was like, what is happening to culture? Like what is happening to humans? And so me and a buddy, we were having falafels, it was like 4:00 in the morning. I had like, makeup running down my face, and it was just like a not a cute scene again, you know? And we were at a falafel joint on Bedford in Williamsburg, Brooklyn, and we’re just talking. We’re like, man, like, I’m exhausted. I’m 30. I want to stay out of 4:00 in the morning anymore. Like, what are we doing? And he was like, yeah, me too. And we’re like, okay, well, what if, do you think people be down to wake up in the morning? Like you think people would be down to the dance like sober? Do you think people would be down to like, you know, connect on a weekday morning before going to work? Like why not? Like, let’s try this social experiment. Let’s call it an art project and let’s call it a social experiments. Let’s call it Daybreaker. Let’s break the day with energy and intention, and let’s do it in a way that’s that keeps all the mystique and the mischief and the dressing up and the fun of nightlife, but also kind of also brings in the world of wellness. And back in 2013, you know, yoga was popping off and everything was popping off. It was like, you know what if we merged the world of nightlife with the world of wellness? And no one had done that yet. And, and so we launched Daybreaker in 2013. It Was the first snowfall in New York City. I’ll never forget. And I was like, I woke up, it was like 4:00 in the morning. And, you know, the party started at 6 a.m. on a Wednesday or a Thursday, something like that. And I was like, no one’s coming, it’s snowing. Can you imagine? Like no one is going to show up for a 6 a.m. dance party in Union Square on the first snowfall day in December. So I was prepared to just like, put out the DJ, have my friends come and just help us set up and we had tote bags. And we had like the stickers and we had the stamps and it was so cute. And it was like 5:50 and like there was like three people in the place and we’re like, oh God, this is a disaster. And then all of a sudden like 6:00 Am sharp, like all of a sudden there was like, you know, teams of people that started coming in and all of a sudden we had 180 people show up to the to the first one. [00:22:11][167.2]

Tricia: [00:22:12] How did you get the word out? [00:22:12][0.6]

Radha: [00:22:13] My partner Matt and I, we put together, an Excel spreadsheet, as you know, former investment bankers would do, and we put together an Excel spreadsheet. He wrote down literally 300 names of what I call in my book, if you read it, FYFs. Which are, you know, Fuck yeah friends. F yeah, friends. And the idea of like, who would be an F yes to waking up at 6 a.m. to go dance sober on a weekday morning like there’s not that many people. But like we said, you know, maybe these 300 friends that like friends of friends or friends of friends, that we both knew and we would ask other friends to give us names of friends that would be down for this type of weird art project. And so we put this list together over two days and invited 300 people from this list and 180 of those 300 showed up. That intentionality of taking the time to put that first list together was, I really believe, the beginning of this movement. And I think so often people who put events together will just invite anybody and everybody to come, hoping that they can just fill the seats of the room. But that’s really not the strategy. I’d rather have less people, but the right people. And when the right people come to the to the space, then all of a sudden the centrifuge of joy happens. And then they would and then they have such a good time, they wanted to invite their friend to the next one. So sure enough, after the first one, it was so juicy. It was so joyful. It was so, it felt so good in there that the second one we had 300 people that came in the second one because people brought a friend, you know. And then the third one, we had like 450 people come to the third one. And then one of those people had come to the first three, said, I’m moving to San Francisco, can I bring it to San Francisco? And I was like, oh, wow. Okay, let me go think about it. So I went home that night, and over the weekend I wrote a playbook on how to bring this vibe to San Francisco. What is the Daybreaker vibe? So what is the sound like? What is the music like? We have a mandatory horn section at every event. And we have, you know, we have confetti blasters. We have props. We replaced a mean bouncer with a hugging committee. We have green juice and coffee and tea instead of alcohol, you know, so we just, I put this playbook together and then trained him on the playbook. And then our first event in San Francisco had 400 people sold out event in San Francisco. I’m an entrepreneur, a long time entrepreneur, and everything I did was a slog. It was hard, hard, hard. But this one was so ready for its time. People wanted to dance and party, but people also wanted to be healthy. It was just like kind of the right moment. So Daybreaker’s, 75% women and 25% smart men I would say. Because of that energetic difference of 60 to 70% of nightlife is men, 75% of morning life, Daybreaker, is women. So think about just energetics of nightlife. It’s masculine testosterone. [00:25:23][190.4]

Tricia: [00:25:24] Yes. [00:25:24][0.0]

Radha: [00:25:25] Heavy. It’s like predatory, you know, whereas morning dance is daylight. It’s feminine, it’s light, it’s fairy. It’s new. You just came out of your bed. Nightlife, it’s like multiple energetics because you might have been stressed at the office. You might have been yelled at by your boss, might have had a fight with someone. So you’re like, medicating and drinking and drinking coffee to stay awake. So the energetics of nightlife are very masculine. Just very all over the place. The energetics of the morning are new. They’re feminine. They’re joyful. So I think all of that, we learned over the years that, wow, that that’s what took it to wildfire. It just felt so good in there. Felt so clean. It felt so safe. It felt so playful. It felt so healthy. And I think people just wanted to be part of that. [00:26:11][46.2]

Tricia: [00:26:11] Well, and I love the idea that you’re reinventing the word sober. I mean, I come from a culture in the South that drinks a great deal. And, you know, if you were going to go to a party that were there wasn’t an open bar, people would go, oh God, this is going to be such a drag. How can we get out of here? Right? And so if you just redefine what a sober event can be, I mean, it’s huge. Thank you. You know, the world is so geared to alcohol. And so to have an option that is that joyful, that creative. I encourage all of my listeners to go follow her on Daybreaker on Instagram. And you’ll be going like, what? Like this is happening in the morning, like, what? It’s just so important for so many reasons, because I think a lot of people ask the question, oh wait, can you have any fun if there’s no alcohol? And you look at this, you go, yeah. [00:26:59][48.1]

Radha: [00:27:00] You know, I think one of the bigger also keys to Daybreaker is that we are an intergenerational community as well. So because it’s a sober community, the intergenerational aspect of it has been so epic because you have little kids coming. We had Jane Goodall coming with her friends. Right? And so and it’s like you have the spectrum of humans coming to our events because everybody wants to party, doesn’t matter how old we are. And yet when you go to nightlife, you just, I feel so old when I go to a club. Yeah, because it’s so welcoming, because it’s so open, because it’s so sober. And this is something I’ve learned over the years, researching communities in general. But intergenerational community inspires the most belonging, inspires the most joy because there’s less comparison. It’s not like comparing and despairing, right? If someone’s younger than you, you’re mentoring them. Someone’s older than you, you’re learning from them. And so there’s no comparison experience. And so and so our community, it’s so it’s so special because of that. You know, no one’s like, oh my God, she’s, you know, whatever than me. She’s a better dancer than me because it’s everybody and everybody involved, you know. [00:28:08][67.7]

Tricia: [00:28:09] So my question for you is, I know you have two tours, one as a peace tour and one is a purple tour. And I want you to talk about both of them if you can. [00:28:17][8.2]

Radha: [00:28:18] Absolutely. So basically we’re I’m so essentially at the end of last year, we always set the tours and the themes for the tour at the, you know, toward the fourth quarter of, of the previous year. And obviously what we had seen, you know in 2023 is incredible devastation with, you know, the Russia-Ukraine war and the, of course, the October 7th Israel-Palestine experience. And so we just said, what is happening? What is going on with the world? Like what where have we gone wrong here? And so let’s make the first tour’s theme about peace. Let’s let’s dance for peace. Let’s share peace. Let’s all dress in white and glitter. And let’s really be a stand for joyful activism. Let’s be a stand for healing through a centrifuge of joy and dance and happiness. And dance is truly the most healing technology and modality right? To alchemy and compost any pain like you get, you dance and all of a sudden it’s like it’s now no longer in your body and you’re good again. And if you dance in a collective experience, what’s happening? You have mirror neurons. You see someone else who might be, you know, I don’t know, like 20 years older than you, you know, ten times more overweight than you, whatever, having the time of their life. And then you ask yourself, like, what am I upset about? And all of a sudden you’re like, wait. And you compost your own sadness, your own stories, and you realize, wait. You know, life is life is good. Life is okay. Life is blessed. And so the dance floor is such a great place to rediscover your joy, you know, sort of through witnessing other people. [00:30:01][102.7]

Tricia: [00:30:01] Yeah. [00:30:01][0.0]

Radha: [00:30:02] And, and so the peace store was really about that. And we’re still on the peace tour right now. And then we said the second half of the of the season, you know, looking at the elections and how, of course, you know, sort of divisive it is and how filled with anger and hate and just, you know, kind of superlatives on both sides. You know, we just said, listen, we’re one team, one dream. Let’s, let’s do this. Let’s call this tour the Purple Tour this fall, and let’s throw dance parties in every swing state during the elections and really reignite civic engagement through dance and celebration, rather than what the current voting experience is, which is like going to the DMV. Yeah, yeah. [00:30:47][45.5]

Tricia: [00:30:49] So on a good day. [00:30:49][0.8]

Radha: [00:30:51] On a good day, right? Like, well, you have headphones on, no one talks to each other. And you’re just kind of like waiting in line, waiting for your turn to vote. And this whole idea is like, hey guys, like, let’s make voting a party. Let’s make it something that you’re excited about. Let’s, let’s bring gold stars to bring to the line of the voting station so you can give the gold stars everyone in line, or let’s bring cookies to share, or let’s bring whatever coolers of orange juice or whatever it is to make civic engagement the voting experience communal, celebratory, and something to be really proud of. Yeah. And I think that’s really what, this Purple Tour is about. And we partnered with an amazing voter organization to get out the vote. And we are, going on the biggest tour in Daybreaker history. It’s like 50 events this fall. [00:31:36][45.3]

Tricia: [00:31:37] Wow, that is fantastic. In the show, notes will be how to get in touch with, you know, all the Daybreaker information, all of that as well. [00:31:44][7.4]

Radha: [00:31:45] And most of them, most of the fall events will be free by the way. [00:31:47][2.3]

Tricia: [00:31:48] Oh, fantastic. Tell us quickly about The Belong Center and what you’re trying to do there. Which seems like just such a natural extension from Daybreaker to go to the Belong Center. [00:31:59][11.7]

Radha: [00:32:00] Yeah. So during Covid, you know, we obviously saw that there is a massive exponential scaling of suicide and opioid overdoses and violence and loneliness and anxiety and depression from social distancing. And we realized, wow, so much of the world of supporting loneliness is pathologizing loneliness. Something’s wrong with you. Something is sad about you. Let me talk about your feelings. Rather than tackle the loneliness epidemic through joy again, through through community, through connection, through play, through, you know, through circling up together. And so, you know, looking at all the solutions that have been out there. And God bless all the solutions that are out there to support ending loneliness. I didn’t find, you know, any of them to be magnetizing or exciting to want to go to. And, and so, you know, we begin asking ourselves, like, what is our zone of genius? Our zone of genius is gathering humans. It’s making humans come together in a way that’s fun. But not everybody might want to dance at 6 a.m., you know, not everybody is a dancer necessarily, although I think everyone should be. But, but the idea for Belong Center is, you know, let’s create a nonprofit, an organization that is really about gathering people in a 2.0 way or the Community Center 2.0, you know, bring back the block party. We’re launching a thousand block party challenge very soon to bring back the block party to to America. We’re launching our Belong Circles program, which is, you know, sort of, you know, in 100 locations, 50 states, all 50 states across the country. Oh that’s fantastic. And basically these circles are like, if you moved to a new city, if you just got divorced, if you’re lonely, if you, you know, if you if you want to meet new people, you come to this Belong Circle and we’ll teach you how to make friends, how to rupture and repair, create your first event to host your first dinner party. Like all the different things to make friends where you live and we matchmake you to values-aligned communities. That’s the concept of Belong Center. And then we have these Belong benches. [00:34:18][138.4]

Tricia: [00:34:19] I was going to say, please talk about the benches. This is fantastic. [00:34:21][2.3]

Radha: [00:34:22] Yes. So we’re putting yellow benches all over the country. Everyone listening. I’d love you to sponsor a bench if you can, but these benches are essentially totems for hey, sit down and meet someone. Sit down on this yellow bench and make a new friend, you know, connect with someone. We’re putting a QR code at the end of the bench where you can QR scan it, and then we’ll give you, you know, 20 questions to fall in love, like ten questions and make a new friend. Here’s a music playlist that you can listen to with someone or alone to help you feel a sense of belonging. Here’s a sound of belonging. Here’s videos that you can watch together around how to make friends or how to mediate a struggle in a friendship. So yeah, we’re really excited. So these benches are going to go up in parks, outside offices and museums and in playgrounds and everywhere in between. We’re putting one in a refugee camp in Kenya right now, as well. And, and the whole idea is to really have these permanent reminders that cities get excited about. Every city that I speak to, every city leader, mayor, person wants to help make their city a city that’s that’s, you know, less lonely. And so we hope that these benches are a totem to begin doing that and our Belong Centers and our programs support in that as well. [00:35:45][82.6]

Tricia: [00:35:45] Just fantastic. Okay. I have one question for you. The name of this podcast is No Time to be Timid. So where do you need courage right now? [00:35:53][7.9]

Radha: [00:35:54] I need courage…you know, I think there’s… You know the saying the tall poppy gets cut down? You know, so if one poppy grows taller than the other poppies, the tall poppy gets cut down. And I think the courage for me is, you know, how to step more into leadership roles knowing like an even bigger, deeper, you know, leadership role, whether it’s in the elections, whether it’s whatever it is, knowing that taking on more leadership is taking on more haters or more people who want to cut you down. And I think that’s the courageous moment right now, is you know, how to push through, you know, those who want to see you fail, even if you know them very well and so I think that’s really what I need more courage with is just stepping forward into those spaces, knowing that that’s going to garner more positive and more negative, negative stuff. [00:37:07][73.1]

Tricia: [00:37:08] Yeah. Yeah. There’s the dark and the light. But you are shedding so much light in this world, Radha. We are just so excited that you came by and saw us on the show. We’re just delighted that you’re here. Thank you. And just blessings on all the work that you’re doing. [00:37:20][12.0]

Radha: [00:37:21] Thank you, Tricia. Appreciate you and your work too. [00:37:23][2.6]

Tricia: [00:37:42] I don’t know about you, but I feel like dancing and spreading some joy. Radha’s energy and passion are contagious. And she made me think of some questions. First, are you paying attention to your numbers? Is your creative enterprise sustainable, or are you in danger of wearing out before your dream is realized? Second, how intentional are you in building your community? Are you surrounding yourself with people who can help you support your dreams? And third, and probably most important, when was the last time you danced? To learn more about Radha and her work, go to her website radhaagrawal.com. That’s spelled Radha Agrawal. To check out Daybreaker’s upcoming tours, go to daybreaker.com and follow Daybreaker on Instagram @dybrkr and make sure to check out the Belong Center at belongcenter.org. If you’re listening to this podcast, it’s because you care about creativity and courage too and believe like I do, that this is no time to be timid. This year I’m taking the no time to be timid message on the road, and maybe your part of the world needs to hear it. If you’re looking to awaken boldness and creativity in your company or organization, I’d love to come speak to you. Let’s have a conversation. Please reach out to me at booking@triciaroseburt.com. Join us for our next episode when our guest will be Nora Fiffer, a writer, director, producer and actor in both theater and film. She’s the co-founder of Firelight Theater Workshop, currently in its seventh season, and she recently wrote, produced, directed and acted in her debut feature film, Another Happy Day, a postpartum depression comedy that premiered at the Vail Film Festival. And somehow she manages to do all this while raising two children. You don’t want to miss this episode. In fact, you don’t want to miss any episode this season, so make sure to subscribe. And if you have any thoughts about the show, we’d love to hear from you. So please reach out at podcast@triciaroseburt.com. Remember, this is no time to be timid. [00:40:12][149.6]

Tricia: [00:40:21] No Time to Be Timid is written and produced by me, Tricia Rose Burt. Our episodes are produced and scored by Adam Arnone of Echo Finch, and our theme music is Twists and Turns by the Paul Dunlea Group. If you like what you hear, please spread the word, subscribe to the show, and review us on Apple Podcasts, Spotify or wherever you listen. No Time to Be Timid is a presentation of I Will Be Good Productions. [00:40:21][0.0]